Opinions from Georgians on North Carolina? (Atlanta, Columbus: beaches, suburbs, rated)

[Newsboy]

Originally Posted by JayJayCB

Definitely! NASCAR was practically born in the foothills and mountains of NC, not to mention Richard Petty, Dale Earnhardt, and all the greats. The hilarious Will Ferrell movie "Talladega Nights" is set in Charlotte!

Actually, this is something else that Georgia and NC have in common. From Wikipedia:

NASCAR has it's origins in bootlegging during Prohibition, when drivers ran bootleg whiskey made primarily in the Appalachian region of the United States. Bootleggers needed to distribute their illicit products, and they typically used small, fast vehicles to better evade the police. Many of the drivers would modify their cars for speed and handling, as well as increased cargo capacity, and some of them came to love the fast-paced driving down twisty mountain roads.

During this era, "liquor running" from the North Georgia mountains into Atlanta was big business, and even in the Piedmont region of the state, most farm economies depended on the growth and sale of corn to supply illegal alcohol industry (cotton having been destroyed by the boll weevil).

[BullGoodBearBad]

If you question whether or not NC is Southern..well...this picture was just posted to a local news station's facebook page from my neck of the woods. Looks like the south to me!

[JayJayCB]

Originally Posted by Newsboy

Actually, this is something else that Georgia and NC have in common. From Wikipedia:

NASCAR has it's origins in bootlegging during Prohibition, when drivers ran bootleg whiskey made primarily in the Appalachian region of the United States. Bootleggers needed to distribute their illicit products, and they typically used small, fast vehicles to better evade the police. Many of the drivers would modify their cars for speed and handling, as well as increased cargo capacity, and some of them came to love the fast-paced driving down twisty mountain roads.

During this era, "liquor running" from the North Georgia mountains into Atlanta was big business, and even in the Piedmont region of the state, most farm economies depended on the growth and sale of corn to supply illegal alcohol industry (cotton having been destroyed by the boll weevil).

It was also common in Virginia, but I think NC is the state that is considered to be the birthplace of NASCAR. I love the term "Liquor Running" because it reminds me of the Dukes of Hazzard! Wilkes County, NC is a county in western NC that I believe was once known as either the moonshine or NASCAR capital of the world. Junior Johnson, if you're real familiar with NASCAR history, is a native of Wilkes County.

[Mutiny77]

Originally Posted by JayJayCB

It was also common in Virginia, but I think NC is the state that is considered to be the birthplace of NASCAR. I love the term "Liquor Running" because it reminds me of the Dukes of Hazzard! Wilkes County, NC is a county in western NC that I believe was once known as either the moonshine or NASCAR capital of the world. Junior Johnson, if you're real familiar with NASCAR history, is a native of Wilkes County.

Actually NASCAR was born in Daytona Beach, but North Carolina was one of the centers of stock-car racing early on.

[GRS86]

Originally Posted by Newsboy

Well, let me put it to you this way: EVERY state in the country has a neighboring state of which its residents make jokes about. In Georgia, that state is Alabama. Among the most common:

Q: What's the best thing that ever came out of Alabama?
A: I-20

Q: What does a tornado and an Alabama divorce have in common?
A: Somebody's gonna lose a trailer.

Q: How do Alabamans practice safe sex?
A: They place signs on the animals that kick.

For many years, Alabama has suffered from a serious brain drain. That is, the more educated and progressive young people of the state leave as soon as they have a way, and most of them end up in Metro Atlanta. My brother in law is a native of Gadsden, Alabama, and he and my sister and their kids (all residents of Georgia) go back to visit when they can. They always come back with humorous, and sometimes sad, stories about what they see.

My sister is a school teacher in Georgia; her sister in law is one in Alabama. My sister makes almost twice as much with the same education level teaching in Georgia. That's how different the states are economically.

My brother-in-laws family never comes to Georgia to visit. They're afraid of Atlanta, and scared to death to drive in the traffic.

My other sister and her husband just spent two years living in Tuscaloosa, Ala., while he finsihed his Phd at the university. While they enjoyed the collegiate experience, and became Tide fans in the process, they hated living in Alabama. My sister, who is not a person of high means or a snob, cried every time they came to visit and had to return to Alabama. She said the people, while nice, were just incredibly naive and unsophisticated, and the degree of poverty and lack of education in an otherwise progressive city like Tuscaloosa was appalling.

This has been my experience living in Alabama too: The people are nice (on the surface), but incredibly distrusting and naive about everyday matters. I lived in Auburn, Ala, and paid a ridiculous amount of rent, utilities and local taxes to live in a sub-standard duplex that had an unending list of problems the entire time I lived there. Every time I complained to the management, they accused me of having a bad attitude. They couldn't understand why I wasn't happy living in a house that had constant sewer backups and flooding; or why I didn't just get rid of the bugs myself; or why I wanted THEM to do something about the $300 power bills that were a result of the broken windows, torn screens and lack of insulation. They eventually asked me to move, because they didn't like my personality. And I gladly did (BTW, all these people, even in a college town like Auburn, talk like Andy Griffith, Barney Fife, and Gomer Pyle, but without the good hearts or sensibility).

Another Alabama story that has always bothered me to my core: Auburn, one of the most affluent communities in the state, is exactly 19 miles from Tuskegee, one of the poorest. Tuskegee, as I'm sure you well know, is one of the most historic sites in this country, home to the Tuskegee Airmen, Tuskegee University, George Washington Carver and Booker T. Washington. Yet it is one of the most depressing, filthy, rundown, ghetto towns in all of America. It's shameful. It is 96 percent black and 36 percent impoverished. Many of the streets are unpaved, or so badly paved that they're nothing but potholes. There are few to no businesses in the town, despite a population of 10,000 people. Outside of the university, the only employment center of any consequence in Macon County is Victory Land, an electronic gambling casino run by one of the most corrupt and racist "boss men" in all of Alabama. A few years ago, dozens of Alabama state lawmakers were indicted in a bribery scandal to bring bingo gambling to Macon County. The place is that corrupt. The place is that backward.

And all this, mind you, is a 20 minute drive from the campus of Auburn University, which many people probably have a favorable opinion of. (I don't; it's equally corrupt, but that's another story for another day.) One day I went to Tuskegee just to see it. On my return to Auburn, I mentioned this to several intelligent people who all looked at me like I was crazy. "Why would you go there?" One co-worker, a black girl who had lived in Auburn her whole life, confessed to me that she had NEVER been to Tuskegee. Can you imagine that? Worse, she further admitted (rather proudly) that she had seldom been outside of Auburn. She had never been to Georgia. The state line was 30 miles away.

My point though is this: All throughout Alabama, you will witness this great disparity between black and white, rich and poor, haves and have-nots. And the most unbelievable thing about it, the people there don't think it's a problem or give it a second thought. That's just the way things have always been in Alabama, and probably always will be ... sadly.

Sadly, this is pretty much AL to a tee. As an alum of Tuskegee University (then Tuskegee Institute), I can honestly say that Newsboy hit the nail squarely on the head. As a kid who grew up in Fitzgerald, in rural South GA, even I was appalled by the level of poverty, lack of education, and provincialism in Alabama. It actually made Fitzgerald, Tifton, Cordele, and that area of GA look prosperous and progressive by comparison.

Back to the topic at hand. I'd say that NC, especially, the Charlotte or the RDU metros would be my next choice if I were to leave Metro Atlanta. I have always liked NC, and think that it's very similar to GA in most every metric, save the population distribution. I also wouldn't mind VA, especially NOVA. VA is probably the state IMHO that next to NC, is most similar to GA in most all metrics. Like GA, Virginia's population distribution is very similar.

[JayJayCB]

Originally Posted by GRS86

Sadly, this is pretty much AL to a tee. As an alum of Tuskegee University (then Tuskegee Institute), I can honestly say that Newsboy hit the nail squarely on the head. As a kid who grew up in Fitzgerald, in rural South GA, even I was appalled by the level of poverty, lack of education, and provincialism in Alabama. It actually made Fitzgerald, Tifton, Cordele, and that area of GA look prosperous and progressive by comparison.

Back to the topic at hand. I'd say that NC, especially, the Charlotte or the RDU metros would be my next choice if I were to leave Metro Atlanta. I have always liked NC, and think that it's very similar to GA in most every metric, save the population distribution. I also wouldn't mind VA, especially NOVA. VA is probably the state IMHO that next to NC, is most similar to GA in most all metrics. Like GA, Virginia's population distribution is very similar.

I think Atlanta is pretty similar to Charlotte and the Triangle actually, more so Charlotte.

[Iconographer]

Originally Posted by BullGoodBearBad

If you question whether or not NC is Southern..well...this picture was just posted to a local news station's facebook page from my neck of the woods. Looks like the south to me!

What makes that particularly Southern?

[BullGoodBearBad]

Originally Posted by LovinDecatur

What makes that particularly Southern?

Because fits the stereo type of geographically southern places. While some places outside of the south resemble this, most people would associate the picture with somewhere in the south.

[Mutiny77]

Originally Posted by GRS86

Like GA, Virginia's population distribution is very similar.

Not really; VA is similar to NC in that regard with three metro regions of 1 million+ and a few smaller ones. NOVA is about 2.8 million, Hampton Roads is 1.7 million, and Richmond is 1.25 million. While NOVA comprises a third of VA's population, it doesn't utterly dominate the state like Atlanta does GA. Metro Atlanta is ten times larger than the next largest metro in the state (Augusta), while NOVA isn't even twice the size of Hampton Roads.

[JayJayCB]

Originally Posted by Mutiny77

Not really; VA is similar to NC in that regard with three metro regions of 1 million+ and a few smaller ones. NOVA is about 2.8 million, Hampton Roads is 1.7 million, and Richmond is 1.25 million. While NOVA comprises a third of VA's population, it doesn't utterly dominate the state like Atlanta does GA. Metro Atlanta is ten times larger than the next largest metro in the state (Augusta), while NOVA isn't even twice the size of Hampton Roads.

Atlanta is also more accessible for other Georgians to travel to because of it's geographical location. The Atlanta metro isn't a terrible drive from cities such as Athens, Augusta, Columbus, and Macon. NOVA is the tip northeast corner of Virginia, not the quickest drive from areas such as Roanoke and the Hampton Roads area.