[jamom]

My husband is looking at a job in Lincoln. We are currently East Coast subarbinites but like to have access to city with good classical music offerings, museums, etc. We have teenage boys and would prefer Catholic school for them. Good youth orchestra or top-notch high school music program would be important for them, too. Mom and kids play a lot of tennis and would like to belong to a club where we can play year round. We are middle of the road to conservative leaning in our political outlook. Where would we be happiest? If Omaha, how bad would the commute to Lincoln be, and are there nice communities in between that would be convenient to the things we enjoy? Thanks.

[Omaha Rocks]

Look at the Elkhorn area. It's the extreme west part of Omaha. You might also want to look into the Millard area. The commute to Lincoln would probably be about 45 minutes, depending on where in Lincoln you work and what kind of traffic you hit.

[GMinSWO]

Gretna is a nice town for access to both Omaha or Lincoln, but it is closer to Omaha. It also may have too much of a small town attitude and feel then what you are looking for in a town.

I am biased but I think Creighton Prep is a great school, but I did attend the school. If your boys don't mind going to an all boys high school, then I think it would be a perfect fit. The academics are top notch, but there are public schools that have great academics also. They have very good athletics program and I believe they built brand new tennis courts and a basketball court last year. Mount Michael is in Elkhorn and has a boarding population, but has good academics, it is also much smaller then Creighton Prep.

According to Google maps, the commute from Gretna to Creighton Prep is 25 minutes and the commute from Gretna to downtown Lincoln is about 40 minutes. Hope this helps!

[GMinSWO]

Here are a couple links for classical music events
Omaha Performing Arts
Home - Omaha Symphony

Here is a link for an area youth symphony
Welcome to OAYO!

Here is a link for a good museum in Omaha
Joslyn Art Museum

[pheaton]

Originally Posted by Omaha Rocks

Look at the Elkhorn area. It's the extreme west part of Omaha. You might also want to look into the Millard area. The commute to Lincoln would probably be about 45 minutes, depending on where in Lincoln you work and what kind of traffic you hit.

Elkhorn is also close to Mt. Michael which I think is a pretty good Catholic school. Mount Michael Benedictine - Nebraska's leading college prep education for young men.

However, if you are working in Lincoln it would probably just be easier living there. Especially in the winter. I find it better to live closer to work than play. You drive to work everyday, you play on your free time. Plus when you want to go and spend the day out having fun it's nice to get away from your usual surroundings even if it's only 45 minutes down the road to Omaha.

[Omahahonors]

Originally Posted by jamom

My husband is looking at a job in Lincoln. We are currently East Coast subarbinites but like to have access to city with good classical music offerings, museums, etc. We have teenage boys and would prefer Catholic school for them. Good youth orchestra or top-notch high school music program would be important for them, too. Mom and kids play a lot of tennis and would like to belong to a club where we can play year round. We are middle of the road to conservative leaning in our political outlook. Where would we be happiest? If Omaha, how bad would the commute to Lincoln be, and are there nice communities in between that would be convenient to the things we enjoy? Thanks.

Gretna runs continuously into Omaha now, but is the center point between downtown Lincoln and downtown Omaha.

about 8 miles north is the very prestigeous Mount Michael Catholic school which would set them up for success academically.

If your family is okay with a bit of a commute to Omaha's arts and cultural scene (about a 20 minute drive) and about a 20 minute drive to Lincoln, then this is a primed spot for your family.

Here are a few other really good locations:
Elkhorn: Add another 5 minutes to Lincoln commute and approximately the same commute to the Omaha art's scene. The catholic schools IS in Elkhorn.

Papillion: A very high regarded suburb with a lot of wealth. Commute to downtown Omaha is about 15 minutes, commute to Lincoln about 25 minutes and the commute to Mount Micheal is about 10 minutes.

La Vista: A very highly regarded corporate business city just north of Papillion. The cities commute times are approximate to Papillion due to it's bordering of each other.

Millard (southwest Omaha): A relatively wealthy area with numerous living options. About 25 minute commute to Lincoln, 10-15 commute to downtown Omaha, and a 5-10 minute commute to Mount Micheal.

Catholic schools to consider:
http://schools.archomaha.org/factSheet.cfm

Omaha Metro Catholic Schools:
31 parish schools Grades K-8
1 private school Grades 4-8
4 corporation high schools
5 private high schools
1 special needs K-12

I belive Lincoln (city: 250,000, metro: 296,000 people) is a great city with things to do. In the next five years, Lincoln will be a true second anchor (corporate and entertainment speaking) to the Omaha/Lincoln area. I still would recommend Omaha due to the numerous nationally recognised music and arts scene in the downtown area. Think of Lincoln as a big college sports city that is growing into a large city, while just a few miles up the interstate is a large city with everything already built and more opportunities continuing to pour in.

[jamom]

Thanks so much! Is everybody in NE this nice and helpful? If so, I'll look forward to moving there. How many days a year would it be impossible for my husband to get to Lincoln b/c of bad weather, do you think? The biggest potential downside that I can see to NE is the weather. I HATE the cold!

[Omaha Rocks]

Originally Posted by jamom

Thanks so much! Is everybody in NE this nice and helpful? If so, I'll look forward to moving there. How many days a year would it be impossible for my husband to get to Lincoln b/c of bad weather, do you think? The biggest potential downside that I can see to NE is the weather. I HATE the cold!

No. Absolutely not. We are the ONLY people in Nebraska that are even close to being nice!


Weather... Hmmmm, well, you're probably not going to like winters very much. My family moved here after living in Minnesota for many years, but it's not always nice.

Honestly though, the winter weather is just something you adapt to and learn to deal with. You can dwell on it, and make yourself miserable, or you can just find ways to more or less ignore it.

I'd guess that your husband would have had 4-5 days, this past winter, when it was not possible to get to work in Lincoln. But this past winter was an unusually brutal one.