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Location: Live:Downtown Phoenix, AZ/Work:Greater Los Angeles, CA
27,606 posts, read 14,610,214 times
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As someone who wants to move TO LA as opposed to leave it, I basically know what the sentiment of the naysayers is.
These days, most people are spoiled and want the world without having to work for it. People want to have some simple job paying $10-15/hr but still have a 3,000sq ft house! 😮😑
I on the otherhand am willing to work myself to the bone to be able to live in a place with great scenery and great weather and liberal politics.
I mean, what is the point of moving to Texas or Kansas just so you can afford a house on a working class paycheck, when at the end of the day, you are stuck in depressing flyover country with some of the worlds worst weather?
For quality of life, it's a deeply personal matter of taste, personal preference & what one is looking for.
So, the answer will vary between "yes" for some and "no" for others.
Who is to say that what's right or perfect for one person should automatically default & be right & perfect for another person.
So, as to the op's question, there is no 1 size fits all correct yes or no answer.
For me the answer is a big loud YES. We relocated to Oregon from the east coast and love it. I love all the green, the healthy people, all the amazing things to do. I can't speak for the entire West Coast, but people around here take their fun very seriously. We have an excellent quality of life.
I guess it helps that we left a very expensive and crowded place, and also traded the sprawly suburbs (of NYC) for a smaller, compact city.
I love it so much that if I don't survive the big quake: it will have been worth it.
For me the answer is a big loud YES. We relocated to Oregon from the east coast and love it. I love all the green, the healthy people, all the amazing things to do. I can't speak for the entire West Coast, but people around here take their fun very seriously. We have an excellent quality of life.
I guess it helps that we left a very expensive and crowded place, and also traded the sprawly suburbs (of NYC) for a smaller, compact city.
I love it so much that if I don't survive the big quake: it will have been worth it.
Gah. For me, the biggest fear would be actually surviving. Out of curiosity, which part of Oregon? One of my friends recently moved there but seems to have been disappointed. Though, in my opinion, he just hyped it up too much.
Not an apples to apples comparison here. The West is severely restricted geographically in terms of developable land. Even within LA county for example there are huge expanses that cannot be developed. So people are forced to crowd together in the rather small areas that are fit for habitation (and not blocked by NIMBYs). Texas is not even remotely similar to this. Even though it is a state of 26 million, it still has a ton of land up for grabs. I believe it could triple or even quadruple in population and still not feel as overcrowded as California is in 2015.
This is an old post, but I feel like I have to respond to this.
This highlights the difference between one who loves the west coast and gets it, and those who don't.
What you just explained in this post is the very reason why I love California and the west coast/southwest/intermountain west.
Having so much rugged, wildlife-filled, geologically diverse public lands for me to explore and hike with meetup groups, Sierra club, and take my students on fieldtrips is something I cherish deeply. I became a better and more well adjusted person since I moved out here five years ago. I absolutely have no problem downsizing my housing to fit in to my budget to get to live somewhere that has both the culture and diversity of a major metro area and wildlands minutes away. Having grown up in an outlying Chicago suburb that had a lot of fields and farm buildings when I was a kid in the 80, where all that is left are a few forest preserve holdings, where cornfields have been turned into prairie restoration with a bike bath going through the middle, all that land "locked up" surrounding greater LA (or Bay Area or fill in the blank) is me in heaven compared to back where I'm from.
Conversely, I see NO point all to having all that "greenery" woods and farms that looks the same for hours in whatever direction you travel to, and have it all be privately owned with no trespassing, and a local culture in the cities where it is impossible to find groups of people who engage in hiking, camping, kayaking, etc. and where you can't take your students anyhwere on a fieldtrip that inspires them a wonder in the natural sciences.
Even the natural hazards and water resource issues are great, because that's part of the curriculum I teach, and its impossible to make that stuff relevant in class in the east.
Yeah, I think you get the idea.
I will say this though, I know this is like the reverse of most people would say, but I would only live in a midwest metro area if I WAS rich. I know its easier to be middle class in these areas, but the middle class can be a little too unpolitically correct for me. But yeah, if I was rich, I would definitely buy the type of house featured in John Hughes movies of the 80s. (like Camerons house in Highland Park, IL)
For a moment, put aside the political and economic talk. Taxes/Real Estate/etc, irrelevant all of it. Cities/traffic/people, irrelevant too.
Let's focus for a minute on NATURAL DISASTERS. Earthquakes, Wildfires, Tsunamis. The fact that Baja California could separate from the continent at any given moment.
For a lot of it, it's not a matter of IF but WHEN. WHEN will another giant earthquake hit LA? Eventually.
I am not keen on living the movie San Andreas.
Uhh . . . no. The most amount that the "Big one" will do is make this pond a little bigger:
Make the folds on this highway roadcut a little more compressed and bunched up:
and this creek, have its 90 degree turn a little longer:
It would damage aquaducts and other infrastructure that would take months to repair, but that doesn't make for good movies.
Uhh . . . you do realize that San Andreas was a movie with the Rock, right??
Gah. For me, the biggest fear would be actually surviving. Out of curiosity, which part of Oregon? One of my friends recently moved there but seems to have been disappointed. Though, in my opinion, he just hyped it up too much.
I live in Eugene. Did your friend move to Portland? I love Portland, but it is often a victim of its own hype.
I'm actually not too worried about an earthquake. I've read about the most likely scenarios and they aren't that dire. I try to stay prepared. And frankly, I lived in NY during 9/11. It showed me that life is unpredictable so there's no point living in fear.
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