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Then count yourselves lucky. My wife has had several bad experiences, one with an opthamologist who could not get her prescription right and wanted to "guess" and the other with a surgeon's office who kept losing her records and the surgeon who berated her for being late when she had been there for over an hour waiting on him and his staff.
My co-worker called and specifically asked a question prior to a procedure and was assured the medication he was on would not impact the procedure. When he arrived at the office the following week they refused to do the procedure because of the medication he was on. I know this for a fact because I was his transportation to and from the procedure and he was furious over the waste of time. He also told me the office had his medical condition wrong in their notes because he saw them before leaving their office.
Yes, bad medical care can happen anywhere. I've had pretty good medical care yet my wife and my co-worker have both been messed up by bad medical care providers.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BarbG
Me either. All I've heard from those I work with and go to church with is good.
My wife is legally blind and uses a cain. She has had people curse at her for tripping on her cain because they are not looking where they are going.
Recently we had a man close the car door on her while she was getting in the car because he could not go around (I have no idea why he couldn't go around one of the cars next to us) and he would not wait for her. He closed the door on her ankle and she never saw him because he came up on her blind side.
I've seen people barge out of doors nearly knocking her down and not even say "excuse me". There are rare occasions when people will hold the door open for her but mostly people are not looking and don't seem to care. Me? I tend to hold doors open and know where people are in both front and behind me.
Our experiences in Knoxville have not been as positive as our experiences in Nashville or Austin, TX. This includes going to malls, movie theaters, concerts, etc. The Nashville crowd has always been respective of her cain and creating a path for her. The Knoxville crowd does not and then have the BALLS to curse at her. What example is the parent providing for their child when they show this type of disrespect for the disabled?
There may be some wonderful people, and we've met some, but the rule based on our observations, runs counter to your feelings. We've been here 3 years and the rudeness we've experienced in Knoxville was very surprising. Not even Atlanta was this bad and we went for the Bruce Springsteen concert. They were respectful of her there as well. In that large of crowd you would have thought we would have had more issues.
Take care,
Quote:
Originally Posted by ThatTNGuy
It's always interesting when people try to characterize the citizens of an entire city as "more friendly" or "less friendly" than the citizens of another city. I'm not trying to pick on you here, but everybody seems to have something different to say when it comes to this particular topic, regardless of which part of the country they're living in - some have had great experiences, others not so much. That's why I try to avoid broaching this subject if at all possible. Personally, I've met more wonderful people than I can count here in Knoxville, but I'm not naive enough to think that everybody else will have a similar story to tell.
Saying the difference is "night and day" is very misleading, simply because both Nashville and Knoxville have a mixed bag of great and not-so-great people - that's how it is in every city. I realize you may have had some bad encounters, but the above comment is completely unfair.
When my wife was at Parkfield they messed up her medications big time. We told 3 different doctors, not nurses, the perscriptions. We had the perscriptions with us and still they messed them up. And this was around the time Parkfield was talking about their "state of the art listening". BLAH We even tried to get the errors corrected and for the week she was there we could not.
I hate to come off as negative here but until you have experienced Knoxville through her and my eyes, you have no idea the experiences we have had, especially with medical people.
There are a few standouts. Dr. Wood with Summit Medical is OUTSTANDING. Dr. Cribbs (dentist) is outstanding and this from 2 dentalphobes. She is kind and caring and works to make procedures pain free. My recent root-canal was as good of an experience as one can get for that procedure. The only pain I had was one of the deadening shots.
Dr. Lott, our NEW opthamotologist, is also good and does not try to guess the prescription for our glasses and even got us with a GREAT ocularist (who is in Nashville but visits Knoxville and Chattanooga).
And the music scene here is better than one would expect for the size of city Knoxville is. We've seen big name acts like Lyle Lovette and Lorena McKinnette (sp) plus others.
Yet to have people curse at my wife for tripping on her cain, or for men to close the car door on her foot because they are too much in a hurry to go around or wait, then you have not experienced the Knoxville we have experienced. We won't even talk about the drivers who DIVE towards pedistrains in our neighborhood and have made my wife a prisoner of her own home.
Here's to wishing for better times.
Quote:
Originally Posted by JMT
I have to say that my experiences with health care in Knoxville have been absolutely wonderful. Everyone I know who has had to endure hospital procedures in Knoxville has had wonderful experiences, too.
Knoxville may have its drawbacks, but our health care system is not one of them. We are blessed to have three excellent health care systems in Knoxville (U.T., Baptist-St. Mary's, and Fort Sanders). While Nashville has outstanding health care, too (Vanderbilt, Baptist, Saint Thomas, and the entire HCA chain), let's not forget that people in Nashville routinely had to come to Knoxville for serious pediatric care since Knoxville had a children's hospital long before Nashville did.
All,
My intent is to not be negative BUT to relate my and my wife's experiences during our 3 years in Knoxville. We have direct comparisons between Oklahoma City, Portland, OR and Austin, TX. These are the cities we have lived in. We have visited Seattle, WA, Dallas, TX, Tulsa, OK, Nashville, TN, Chattanooga, TN and Altanta, GA among others.
Given that my wife was deemed legally blind 10 years ago and started using a cain 8 years ago we have direct experience with her and her cain in Austin, Chattanooga, Nashville and Knoxville.
Our experiences, already documented above, are not as positive as we would have hoped for the reputation Knoxville has. Her personal experience with medical care, and notice I've not named doctors and only named the hospital because I felt it might help someone else, who have delivered substandard services.
When I had back problems, Dr. Johnson at Ft. Sanders West did a great job of fixing me up. But a doctor in the same group as Dr. Johnson kept messing up my wife's records and breaking promises. Given her allergies to certain drugs and the doctor's staff's inability to keep her records straight, we will not use said doctor for my wife. Our GP has not provided us another recommendation and being on an HMO has limited our choices of specialist. BUT we won't leave Dr. Woods because he is a GREAT doctor and he takes the time to listen to his patients.
I wish my and my wife's experiences were better. We are not much on outdoors because of her visual problems.
So let me close with, if you love outdoor activity, there is no better location than the Knoxville area. If one wants and needs the services found in larger cities I would shy away from Knoxville. Can we leave it at that folks?
The Tennessee Theater has gone out of its way to help my wife purchase tickets so she can enjoy the shows. There is also the Bijou Theater that is good. Marketplace has some wonderful local shops and restaurants and should be visited several times a year.
Downtown West, an art theater, has a wonderful staff who look after my wife and are very friendly. We have seen some wonderful films there and can recommend them if you like art films.
Alturda's at Kingston and Peters is a wonderful local Italian restaurant run by Paul who is generally there to great his guests and to make sure your dining experience is good. Good food for a good price.
We are still looking for good BBQ but in the meantime Sonny's on Peters just west of Cedar Bluff is a good spot for ribs. We were spoiled by BBQ in TX and just call us that, spoiled.
If anyone has any allergies or sensitivities to perfume, avoid Turkey Creek during peak hours. Go at off times to see your movies. And this is not only our observation but the observation of other friends and co-workers. Turkey Creek has wonderful screens. Just avoid the peak hours if you do not want to breath in a lot of perfume. Don't know about other TN towns/cities but never had this problem in Austin or Oklahoma City.
The postal clerks in Knoxville have ALWAYS been very helpful. We have used the post offices near Executive Park, Waisegarber and Sutherland.
Community Pharmacy, a local outfit, has a caring staff who are ready to help. We used them, or I should say our vet used them, for special medications for our 19 year old cat. It gave him an additional 2 years of a quality time and mostly painfree. They have a wonderful reputation that has been earned.
If you drive a Honda both Westside and Airport Honda have good service centers. I have recent experience with both and have had positive things to say about both of them. Airport Honda is south Knoxville and Westide Honda is west Knoxville.
As others have noted, traffic is pretty good here. I would add Christmas it gets bad, especially around West Town Mall. And I-40 can get really bad should there be a traffic incident.
Jerry's Artorama is a great store to buy art supplies from. Sign up for their mailing list to get notification of sales and coupons.
So see, not all in Knoxville is bad and I am not an entirely negative person. And if it were just myself my opinion and experiences would be different. I am also colored by my wife's experiences and her feelings.
Knoxville is a great city that sticks out somewhat against the traditional Southern background- great educational opportunities abound with some of the best colleges and universities in Tennessee being found in the Knoxville area, sporting some great public school systems as well.
Knoxville is a 30 minute drive to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, as well as Dollywood (Tennessee's only theme park) and other great activities in the Sevierville/Pigeon Forge/Gatlinburg area. The city itself is quite large and sprawls over the surrounding area. Downtown features alot of interesting cultural centers (such as the Museum of Modern Art, the History Center, Tennessee, Bijou, Riviera Theaters) as well as shopping, dining, and plays host to many of the larger events in the city throughout the course of the year (Sundown in the City on Market Square, 4th of July Celebration at World's Fair Park, Boomsday on Volunteer Landing, and of course, who could forget UT Football Saturdays?) Downtown also features several walking trails (such as the 'Cradle of Country Music' trail showcasing Knoxville's involvement with said music). The outlying areas feature their own unique identity for you to explore.
Knoxville is re-inventing itself- a growing downtown, the new South Waterfront, being ranked as one of the best places in America to do business with a great transportation network (well, once I-40 reopens) equals a great city to raise a family and work.
I reccomend you do some research and figure out if Knoxville and the surrounding area matches your family and what you expect and need from a new home. If so, I am sure you will enjoy it, this is a great place to live.
P.S. Knoxville vs. Nashville comes down to: do you want to live in a very large city, or not? There is not much that can be found in Nashville that couldn't be found in Knoxville or East Tennessee.
Love the post. As a non-native, and current resident, let me add a few things for perspective...
1.) Knoxville = Large is somewhat deceptive. In terms of square-miles, Knoxville is large. Knoxville is 10% bigger than Boston! However, you have to realize the vast majority of that is sprawl (low density suburban communities that won't exactly be contributing business or recreational activities).
Actually, Knoxville is the smallest major Metropolitan city in the United States in terms of the actual "city."
In my opinion, the best thing Knoxville has going for it is its compactness. The downtown is among the top 10 fastest growing in America according to Forbes' magazine. As stated, our Waterfront, while almost embarrassing now, is currently being developed (construction is already underway) in a 3-phase several dozen million dollar project. Residences, Shops and Restaurants are all going to be well placed along the TN River, and phase 1 will show results in the very near future (2010-ish).
The Strip (W. Cumberland/the University's downtown) serves its purpose with many restaurants and nightlife venues, but is very ugly/commercial looking. Last week began an overview of the current plan to erect highrise buildings along the entire corridor.
An underground downtown is currently under construction, similar to Atlanta's on the 100-block of Gay St.
The beauty is, all of these projects are within a 5-mile radius of each other which will make the downtown really something.
And the primary downtown (S. Gay St. & Market St.) is very pretty, with what you'd expect from any major downtown (two upscale theatres, a new movie theater, multiple art galleries, multiple restaurants & bistros) and seasonal attractions, huge-scale weekly concerts, various festivals and a winter outdoor ice-skating rink. What is lacking is size, we're talking 5 blocks, and there's really no mainstream retail shopping like Macy's.
2.) If all you're looking for is suburban living, I'd take Williamson County, TN (Nashville's suburbs Franklin & Brentwood) over Knoxville any day of the week. The beauty of (West) Knoxville is that there isn't a big divide between suburban & urban life. Knoxville has its big retailers, malls, etc., but if you're in the right place, 7-minutes west and you're at the mall, and 7-minutes east and you're downtown.
I've lived in NY, South Florida & Nashville, and Knoxville certainly has a lot to offer compared to the others (it's not better, but not unilaterally worse either). Just don't expect Knox's 98-square miles to all be useful area. In terms of public use areas, you're looking at 10-square miles.
edit:
In response to above posts-
In terms of hospitals, I believe Fort Sanders is a poor hospital, and Baptist is in the process of closing down, to make room for a newer facility. Knoxville has the densest concentration of hospitals I've ever seen, and the UT Medical Center Hospital is extremely modern & competent.
As far as getting around in large event crowds when disabled, I really find it hard to believe that it is easy anywhere. I can empathize somewhat since I was on crutches for a couple of weeks recently, and it is hard, but where would a disability be easy? Also, I don't see gauging a city's health care based on HMO doctors is fair. That's like staying in a youth hostile in Paris, and saying the city's a dump. I've been on both sides of the glass in local hospitals MANY times over the past few years, and while costly, the doctors are quite good. I almost hit my PPO's $2k co-pay cap last year, but hey, in return I'm healthy. "Both sides of the glass" because I'm studying medicine with plans on becoming a doctor and because I'm an active young adult who gets hurt now and then.
I'm pretty surprised at the Turkey Creek statement too. I make it out there a few times a month, and while it is crowded, it's not even comperable to say Opry Mills where you feel like cattle. Btw, it will only get more crowded, since development is about 1/3 complete I believe.
A major benefit above other cities (as others have stated) is the proximity to Gatlinburg, the Smokey Mountains are just beautiful, and worthy of a weekend trip for Knoxvillians.
And let me stipulate, that my endorsement of Knoxville is exclusive to the New Downtown (S. Gay/Market) & West Knoxville (Sequoyah, Farragut & Bearden). While I know people who enjoy living in South Knox, I would not. As a Yankee, a conservative Christian, but still a Yankee, South, East or North Knoxville would be outside of my comfort zone.
But like I said, Knoxville, in terms of sq-mi is very large, each region is essentially its own city in terms of mindset.
I hate to come off as negative here but until you have experienced Knoxville through her and my eyes, you have no idea the experiences we have had, especially with medical people.
Yet to have people curse at my wife for tripping on her cain, or for men to close the car door on her foot because they are too much in a hurry to go around or wait, then you have not experienced the Knoxville we have experienced. We won't even talk about the drivers who DIVE towards pedistrains in our neighborhood and have made my wife a prisoner of her own home.
I am very sorry to hear about what you and your wife have gone through. It's a shame that many people don't seem to have a conscience these days.
My point, though, is that people like this are not exclusive to Knoxville. Every city has creeps like those you mentioned, but I simply cannot agree that people in Nashville are universally more friendly than those in Knoxville. I am NOT trying to downplay your experiences (please don't take it that way), but I still believe it's unfair to say the difference is "night and day" when so many other members on this forum have nothing but great things to say about Knoxville residents, myself included. I just don't want somebody who's never been here to think that everyone in our city is a heartless jerk.
In the end, it all comes down to what we've seen with our own eyes, so I do realize that one person's paradise can be another person's hell. It's unfortunate that you've run into all the wrong people in your time here - I wish you better luck in the future.
I have found for the " most" part that people here in Knoxville and East Tenn are very friendly as far as saying hello and waving but to try and get into a "circle" of friends thats harder. I have not come across "too" many rude people but I'm sure Knoxville has its fair share as most cities do. I was born in Miami so if you want to compare rudeness Miami is hard to beat
Agreed, we had creeps who gave her dirty looks for her cain in Austin. But not one of them cursed her for using her cain.
And I'm only reporting my observations when I've been with her. What people have done and how people have treated her. They are not a 100% sample of the population or even a scientific sample.
We've also met some wonderful folks here. Some who are very kind and considerate. Unfortunately our experiences with the kind and considerate crowd are the exception not the rule.
What I really blame is the me-now mentality people seem to be taking on and it gets worse with each new round of technology. For those old enough to remember think about life before fax machines or email.
Take care,
Quote:
Originally Posted by ThatTNGuy
I am very sorry to hear about what you and your wife have gone through. It's a shame that many people don't seem to have a conscience these days.
My point, though, is that people like this are not exclusive to Knoxville. Every city has creeps like those you mentioned, but I simply cannot agree that people in Nashville are universally more friendly than those in Knoxville. I am NOT trying to downplay your experiences (please don't take it that way), but I still believe it's unfair to say the difference is "night and day" when so many other members on this forum have nothing but great things to say about Knoxville residents, myself included. I just don't want somebody who's never been here to think that everyone in our city is a heartless jerk.
In the end, it all comes down to what we've seen with our own eyes, so I do realize that one person's paradise can be another person's hell. It's unfortunate that you've run into all the wrong people in your time here - I wish you better luck in the future.
To be honest Nashville is more urban, big music industry, people from all over, several have moved from Hollywood, such as Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman, I lived in Calif for 5 years, i liked it alot. Knoxville is small, i had no problem finding a job there but its quiet. I checked and Nashville pays a bit better but it also depends on the job.
It has been nearly 8 years since my posts. Time for an update.
Sadly we are still in Knoxville but only because this is where the job is. After a certain age it becomes difficult to find new employment in my field. Doesn't help that the technology I am working with is several revisions out of date.
The eye professionals have changed. Shortly after my post about Dr. Lott we had to drop him. It was not pretty and there was likely illegal activity involved on his or his office staff part. We will leave it at that. It was messy for my wife. We eventually found a eye specialist for her here but for several years we drove back to Austin, TX for her specialized eye care.
Dr. Wood and his staff still are wonderful. Sadly the other professionals we've dealt with have not been happy experiences. Spent a year bouncing between 2 professionals, both saying to see the other and neither providing any help; just taking our money.
Altruda's is still amazing. It is our go to place when out-of-town friends show up.
We still experience rude people daily. People who use "excuse me" after they have shoved their way through a crowd. I was taught to wait until people acknowledged you and "excuse me", not just barge through and likely hurt someone.
Knoxville seems to desire chain restaurants as the independents we loved are mostly gone.
CostCo and Trader Joe's, along with Whole Foods, has made Knoxville a better town for us, there are still issues for shopping and choice.
We've mostly stopped going to events and concerts because of the rude people and my wife's visual disability.
In Knoxville I feel we are just surviving, not living. There is a difference and it is sad that we are in this state of being. But things will change. This is not where we will retire and hopefully not die. There is better, at least for us, and we will find it.
Between the need for sophisticated medical care and want for bigger shopping, it sounds to me like you're just a bigger city person.
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I have found
