Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
What an interesting post. As a west coast person (CA and OR) who recently moved to PA, reading it was like Opposite Land or something. Quite a few of your descriptions of what you don't like about CA sound like the things I am having to learn to adapt to in SE PA, and the things you remember fondly about NJ sound like what I miss about the west.
I guess it's all location specific -- like specifically where in CA you're talking about and specifically where in PA you imagine you might live.
My experience of being born, raised, and living nearly my whole life in CA and OR (and I'm old!) is that the west is far more beautiful, less trashy, more spacious, less in a state of perpetual decay, the people are more relaxed, there's way more wild nature, big mountains, fast rivers. I like PA okay, but really if my grown kids hadn't settled in the east I would be in the west until my dying day.
In any case depending on your financial situation you could find a cozy, pretty, quiet suburb in Lancaster county and would be pretty close to all the big box stores. It's expensive but being in CA you probably wouldn't find it too bad by comparison. Wages are lower, but don't know how the fact that you work remotely might offset that issue.
The West definitely is more beautiful in terms of scenery, you can't get me wrong. Less litter everywhere and it is a more sparsely populated region. I personally don't think Californians are more relaxed. I found people out in California to be passive-aggressive, sheltered, and rude, while the people in PA were pretty relaxed.
The part I found funny is the part about how the East Coast is "more car-centric" than California.
San Francisco, being a city that fully came of age before the dawn of the Motor Age, is different, I understand, but all of California's other large metropolises, especially Los Angeles, grew up with the automobile, and their cityscapes are heavily influenced by it.
If California is "less car-centric" now, one possible reason is that the topography of the Los Angeles Basin combined with the exhaust from all those cars produced the worst smog in the country. Since the late 1960s, the state has attempted to fix this problem through the country's strictest air quality standards (and emissions controls on cars, all of which have spread to cars sold throughout the country) and a massive program of constructing mass transit systems.
But I suspect the reason California suburbs are more crowded than those on the East Coast — and they are — has more to do with water than with cars. Keep in mind that the Southwest has very little of it and pretty much has to pull it in from elsewhere to support the urban populations that have settled there. This is especially true for Los Angeles, which brings water down from wetter Northern California in order to slake Angelenos' thirsts and water their golf courses and lawns. The fewer of the latter that need watering, the less water LA needs, and putting suburban houses close together on small lots reduces the amount of grass to water. (Xeriscaping would reduce it even further.) And it may be that dense suburbs are also encouraged to reduce the distances people must drive.
East Coast cities have historically had better and more extensive mass transit systems than West Coast ones, though that gap has narrowed significantly over the decades since Bay Area Rapid Transit opened in 1971. For instance, for you to hang out in Philly's LGBT bars, I would recommend that, rather than drive all the way in, you head to the nearest SEPTA Regional Rail station, park your car there, and let SEPTA do the driving so you can do the drinking. The only downside to this is that your night on the town will end earlier than it otherwise might, for the last trains out from Center City on most lines depart the central train stations around midnight. (But hey, if you find a hookup, that might not be all that much of a problem.)
Lancaster City also has one gay bar and another gay-owned restaurant and bar, open to all, whose sensibility is so gay it hurts. I hear the gay bar may have been a victim of the pandemic, but in general, I'm a huge fan of Lancaster, one of the coolest small cities in Pennsylvania or anywhere else. You might want to give some consideration to settling in Berks County's less-settled precincts, as that puts you within striking distance of both Philly and Lancaster.
The East Coast is built more spaced out, which is surprising considering that the East Coast was discovered first and is less modern. The East Coast is more car centric to me, but less automobile friendly, which I consider to be two different terminologies. Roads are narrower back East, but you need a car to get around town.
California does not have any real "suburbs" especially in the Bay Area. They are more "suburban cities". I believe western states build houses closer to each other to preserve natural beauty and plus California has to squeeze its population of 40 million. It's a good thing to have smaller plots of land for that reason, but as a person myself, I would prefer to have houses spaced out for myself just to have not have neighbors lol.
Glad to hear that SE PA has a good LGBT life, because that is what I am looking for. Also, looking for low crime, which is also a priority.
Some interesting hot takes, CA is (or maybe was?) the poster child for post war, car dependent suburbia. And frankly, outside of NYC, everyone who isn't poor in America needs and has a car.
Some interesting hot takes, CA is (or maybe was?) the poster child for post war, car dependent suburbia. And frankly, outside of NYC, everyone who isn't poor in America needs and has a car.
CA suburbia is less car dependent. Everything seems to be built denser and you can shop at strip malls where everything is organized well into one area while in NJ I have to pick up a car and drive from development to development just to get to my favorite stores, which was not too fun. In California, you can just spend one day in a town, but in NJ, no, you need a car.
CA suburbia is less car dependent. Everything seems to be built denser and you can shop at strip malls where everything is organized well into one area while in NJ I have to pick up a car and drive from development to development just to get to my favorite stores, which was not too fun. In California, you can just spend one day in a town, but in NJ, no, you need a car.
Who needs a strip mall when you have a corner store to walk to?
I suspect that your experience may also be influenced by the way land is surveyed and subdivided East vs. West.
Even much of Southern California is plotted on the Jeffersonian grid of one-mile squares with "township" and "range" lines. The roads that follow the township and range lines tend to be major thoroughfares, and commerce clusters around their intersections.
The East Coast was surveyed much earlier, and not following a near-universal grid. Also, things other than roads influenced where settlement occurred: river landings, for instance, which are pretty much nonexistent in California, or ferry crossings, ditto.
Something else it seems to me you have not experienced on your sojourns eastward is the "railroad suburb." The railroads were the original engines of large-scale outward expansion for most Eastern cities, and villages clustered around the stations they built. The practice of offering commuted fares (from which our word "commuter" derives) for people living in these villages and working in the city stimulated their growth.
In most of these, if you choose your residence wisely (i.e., buy a home or condo or rent an apartment within, say, a 10-minute walk of the town center), you may be able to accomplish most everyday tasks without getting behind the wheel at all. It's mainly in postwar suburbia — the Levittowns and their progeny — that driving everywhere is necessary. But I will allow that in the more distant reaches of those railroad suburbs, driving is also necessary.
Are you familiar with Walk Score? This subsidiary of the online brokerage Redfin developed a proprietary algorithm that rates locations based on walkability. "Walkability" here is measured by the number of business establishments of varying types (grocery stores, drugstores, restaurants, coffee shops, cleaners or laundromats, and so on) within a 10-minute, or one-half-mile, walk of the location.
For instance: University Town Center in Irvine is that Orange County community's most walkable neighborhood, with a Walk Score of 71 (at the low end of the Very Walkable range, which runs from 70 to 89).
That's comparable to the overall Walk Score for West Chester borough, the county seat of suburban Chester County, which used to have regional rail service and may once again some decade. (There was also an interurban-style light rail line that ran to its center from the end of one of the city's two rapid transit lines; it shut down in the 1950s.)
But the devil is in the details. Drill down to the borough's central intersection, Gay and High streets, and you will find it has a Walk Score of 94 (middle of the Walker's Paradise range, which runs from 90 to 100).
OTOH, scale out to the community level in Irvine and the overall Walk Score is only 43 (upper end of the Car-Dependent range, which runs from 25 to 49).
I believe you will find (a) far more Walker's Paradise suburbs around Philadelphia than you will around Los Angeles and (b) a wider range of Walk Scores in Philadelphia than in Los Angeles, in part because California suburbs are developed at more uniform densities. For another example of both: Ardmore, where the government of the quintessential Main Line municipality, Lower Merion Township, is located, has a Walker's Paradise village center (Walk Score: 91). But the wealthiest village in the township, Gladwyne, is almost totally residential (it does have a small commercial district near its center), and most of the houses sit on lots of a half-acre or larger. Its Walk Score? An abysmal 7 (the extreme end of the Car-Dependent range, which runs from 0 to 24. In communities with these Walk Scores, "all errands require a car," while in the 25-49 ones, "most errands require a car"). And even that village center scores only a 45.
BTW: you said something about crime in a post upthread. Given that, I have to reluctantly warn you away from many city neighborhoods for now, as crime (especially violent) has risen in the city over the past year. Chestnut Hill, the city's most affluent neighborhood, would probably cross your comfort threshold, as would much of Mt. Airy just to its south, but most other neighborhoods that have the kind of housing I think you want wouldn't — and anyway, there are only a handful of them (upper Roxborough, which probably would cross your comfort threshold, is another).
But take a look at the SEPTA Regional Rail map and check out the Walk Scores for the communities where it has stations. I think you'll find lots of low-car places to choose from.
My experience of being born, raised, and living nearly my whole life in CA and OR (and I'm old!) is that the west is far more beautiful, less trashy, more spacious, less in a state of perpetual decay
That used to be true, but not any more.
Even when I moved to CA in the 1990s it was largely true. But over the last 5-7 years, many parts of the Bay Area have been trashed by homeless people. And there is very little enforcement of "petty" crime, to the point where grocery stores and drug stores in many urban areas (including mine) have closed. And car break-ins have become normal. A lot of Californians seem "laid back" about the lack of enforcement in a way that wasn't true in the past. I think all the Californians who are tired of this stuff have moved out and/or soon will, and the rest either turn a blind eye or are ok with it. I'll be one of those moving out of state. Gave my 30 days notice at my apartment.
Our OP is correct. Trashy people are attracted to mild weather. Combine mild weather with an enabling social climate and you have a mess.
Unlike our OP, I'm from the Philly area but am not interested in moving back. The West has always felt more like home to me. That said, I won't be in California, which has layered one set of self inflicted problems on top of another for years now, with no end in sight. Yes, I know no place is paradise, but I'm done with CA.
Last edited by mysticaltyger; 01-20-2022 at 04:20 PM..
Even when I moved to CA in the 1990s it was largely true. But over the last 5-7 years, many parts of the Bay Area have been trashed by homeless people. And there is very little enforcement of "petty" crime, to the point where grocery stores and drug stores in many urban areas (including mine) have closed. And car break-ins have become normal. A lot of Californians seem "laid back" about the lack of enforcement in a way that wasn't true in the past. I think all the Californians who are tired of this stuff have moved out and/or soon will, and the rest either turn a blind eye or are ok with it. I'll be one of those moving out of state. Gave my 30 days notice at my apartment.
Our OP is correct. Trashy people are attracted to mild weather. Combine mild weather with an enabling social climate and you have a mess.
Unlike our OP, I'm from the Philly area but am not interested in moving back. The West has always felt more like home to me. That said, I won't be in California, which has layered one set of self inflicted problems on top of another for years now, with no end in sight. Yes, I know no place is paradise, but I'm done with CA.
Thank you for being nice. I go on Nextdoor.com and I realized how Californians are the most hypocritical people about their state. People tell me stuff like "California is safe to me", "You grew up sheltered", "You were not underprivileged", "Crime will be exactly the same everywhere". No, all of that is not true. I did not live a sheltered life and just because I did not grow up poor, does not mean I am cruel for hating the crimes people in California commit like stealing money and cars. I get that crime happens everywhere, but I grew up in suburban NJ and we never "needed" cops because NJ was "naturally" safe to live in.
I absolutely Californians. This is why people don't want Californians in their state. Nobody wants their politics and their pro-crime mentality. They are hypocrites who vote for politicians that import these "bad" homeless people and then they complain on Nextdoor.com how they got robbed. Nextdoor.com is full of rude Californians.
The property prices are through the roof in PA. Too many are moving from NY and NJ. It’ll be an overpriced area in 1.5 years when you get here.
I am praying for a big crash.
It seems pretty obvious that PA is great for New Jerseyans to escape to for living, but tbh, that is not necessarily a current trend. That was probably more of a thing in the past. Nowadays, it's the California population. It has reached its peak point of 40 million people and now those Calfornians moving out of California are the new trends today. The East Coast is older and already went through its trends of New Jerseyans settling in PA. Pre-covid days, Californians flocked to other western states and during covid, Californians are going to Texas and parts of the Southeast. Western states are still becoming more popular for flockers and then the West is complaining about their water shortages.
12 million people in PA sounds good enough to me, I hope PA does not ecer become overpopulated within my lifetime.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
