Phoenix and Flagstaff (Prescott, Payson, New River: houses, neighborhoods, college) - Arizona (AZ) - City-Data Forum

spltend · 09-28-2006, 11:34 AM

What is a good place to live between the two? I was thinking about 20-30 min outside of Phoenix but a little closer to Flagstaff than Phoenix for when I want to drive up to snowboard. Also, if anyone could compare Phoenix and it's surrounding area (Flagstaff, etc) to cities like Charlotte, Dallas, or Nashville, that would be great too.

WantingoutofAz · 09-28-2006, 09:56 PM

First of let me say that the snowboarding in Flagstaff is horrible. I went to college up there and some years the resort won't even open. When it does it is usually under terrible conditions and the runs are very limited. The closest decent resort for snow sports to the Phoenix area is in the White Mountains about 2 hours east of Payson and 3.5 to 4 hours from Phoenix. I am not sure where you are coming from but I am not the biggest fan of Phoenix, I have lived here my whole life and am just a few years older than you. It is overgrown, crowded, etc. Not sure what you are looking for other than close to snowboarding but I wouldn't recommend Phoenix or it's surrounding cities.

I did enjoy going to college in Flagstaff, it is definitely a college town. It is smaller, colder but much more expensive living and as stated above not the greatest place for snowboarding.

I noticed that you also posted on the Tennessee forum. My husband and I are looking to move to the Nashville area in the next 1-2 years and we absolutely loved it there when we visited last summer. Again, it depends on what you are looking for in a city. Nashville is green, much less expensive homes with much more land and very friendly people. After a 5 day visit we knew that is where we wanted to move and we have been researching a lot of places including Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Colorado and North Carolina.

Good luck to you in your search.

Angie

monsoon74 · 09-29-2006, 08:27 AM

Well, let's explain something...the West has been in a drought for about a decade, and yes, some years the snow in Flagstaff just isn't there until January, or sometimes not at all.

The White Mtns are an excellent place to go, but the roads aren't always the easiest access. There are, for the most part, only two-lane roads, winding and twisting. No freeways to get you there. Obviously in the backcountry, the snowplows aren't going to get the roads cleared as quickly.

As far as comparing Phx to other cities, it really is different than most in many regards. I guess Dallas would be a closer comparison than the others you mentioned, only because of how the DFW area is spread out and there are freeways everywhere. In the last 10 years or so, we have completed many more freeways so getting around is much easier. Sure, there are traffic problems at certain times during the day, but all cities suffer from that. Our traffic is nowhere close to the LA traffic, although some people have implied that it is.

There really isn't any cities 20-30 miles north of Phx...other than New River and Black Canyon City, and these are not exactly thriving towns nor great places to live IMHO. Prescott can be nice, but that's about 90 miles out.

spltend · 09-29-2006, 10:36 AM

Thanks a lot for the tips. I have family and some coworkers who used to live in Phoenix about 8-10 years ago and I always hear the same thing - If I ever moved from where I am now, it would be back to Phoenix. They just always portray it as the most fun they've ever had living in a city and mentioned how a couple hour drive could get to the mountains and snow (I grew up in Erie, PA so I'm trying to get away from so much snow, but would still like to see it occansionally). So I guess maybe Phoenix has changed a lot since these people I know lived there? Another draw is that my field is really in need in Phoenix.

Angie - what cities did you look into in NC? And does Nashville have a big city feel to it at all? I'm guessing you looked into Charlotte and Raleigh/Durham, which one of the 2 would you say Nashville is more like?

Thanks again.

Ponderosa · 09-29-2006, 12:09 PM

Phoenix has grown a lot in the last 8-10 years and it takes longer than ever to get out of town. But there are still millions and millions of acres of public land at your doorstep. You can get out of the heat anytime you want in a couple of hours and you can camp anywhere you feel like on all those millions of acres of desert and pine forest -except in late May/June when there are almost always fire restrictions. I have been thinking of leaving for some time now due to heat and humanity, but after reading about the other areas and their problems with heat, humidity, mosquitos, cliques, bigotry and intolerance, I am begining to wonder just how green the grass really is on the other side. And anyway, the temps have (almost) cooled down and my attitude about the place always improves when that happens.

As for snow, who knows with global warming, but in the many years I have been here, there typically is snow above about 7000-7500 feet from late December into March. On average, Flagstaff gets more snow than Buffalo. There are cross-country ski trails on the "Rim", Flagstaff is trying to get snowmaking equipment and that would help even when everything else is dry. The White Mountain area has vast expanses where the elevation is near 9000'. Greer and surrounding area (Alpine, Hannigan Meadow) is snow-covered much of the winter. As people have said, its been a little dry all over the west - especially last year. It can be fickle. But this kind of stuff is cyclical - the winter before that was phenomenal snow. And when there's no snow you can always jump on the ATV and ride miles upon miles of forest roads. Or go to the lakes and catch winter trout.

rivcelt · 09-29-2006, 01:06 PM

Had to mention that the "snowmaking" in Flagstaff referred to in the earlier post would be with reclaimed water (100% wastewater) and isn't even close to being implemented yet; 100% wastewater use for snowmaking has never been done anywhere else in the country. And it's quite possible that the lawsuit filed by several environmental groups and area tribes will put a halt to any talk of snowmaking anyway. It's my understanding that in order to make any snow, you have to have a bit of snow to begin with, and since we are in a 30 year drought cycle coupled with global warming the Snow Bowl may fold in a year. The resort is on the western side of the mountain, killer for quick snow melt, and really far south, factors that have always made the success of Snow Bowl iffy.

Faceplant into toilet water anyone? Yeeeaaahhhhh!

WantingoutofAz · 09-29-2006, 03:37 PM

spltend,

You probably would find Phx. a fun place to live. I have lived here my whole life except to go to Flagstaff for college and thought I would never live anywhere but Phx. (Flag is a little too cold for me). But once my husband and I started having kids, my priorities changed and I wanted to move somewhere more family friendly. You are younger and I am assuming don't have children so Phx. may be a great fit for you. It is very crowded, traffic is pretty bad (in my opinion) and the housing costs are out the roof (compared to what they were).

I have not visited NC, only looked at houses on the internet and checked the forums on here but my brother and sister in law visited Raleigh this summer, more specifically a town named Cary and loved it. The way they described it sounded a lot like Nashville. I have gotten a lot of my information from this forum and it seemed a lot of people posted that the Raleigh and Charlotte areas had some traffic problems and higher crime, things I am trying to get away from here in Phoenix which is why we are leaning more towards Nashville.

I loved Nashville because the best way to describe it is that it had the big city amenities with a small town feel. It still had great restaurants, shopping, a zoo, lots of outdoor recreation but when you drove through the neighborhoods the homes were so spread out and there wasn't a gas station or convenience store on every corner and traffic backed up at every light. Again, my priorities are a little different than yours because I am looking for a great place to raise my children. I think behind Nashville just from my research my second choice would be one of the suburbs of Raleigh or Knoxville, Tennessee which I think would be much closer to the mountains for you.

If you have any other questions I would be happy to try to help.

Nea1 · 09-29-2006, 04:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WantingoutofAz

spltend,

You probably would find Phx. a fun place to live. I have lived here my whole life except to go to Flagstaff for college and thought I would never live anywhere but Phx. (Flag is a little too cold for me). But once my husband and I started having kids, my priorities changed and I wanted to move somewhere more family friendly. You are younger and I am assuming don't have children so Phx. may be a great fit for you. It is very crowded, traffic is pretty bad (in my opinion) and the housing costs are out the roof (compared to what they were).

I have not visited NC, only looked at houses on the internet and checked the forums on here but my brother and sister in law visited Raleigh this summer, more specifically a town named Cary and loved it. The way they described it sounded a lot like Nashville. I have gotten a lot of my information from this forum and it seemed a lot of people posted that the Raleigh and Charlotte areas had some traffic problems and higher crime, things I am trying to get away from here in Phoenix which is why we are leaning more towards Nashville.

I loved Nashville because the best way to describe it is that it had the big city amenities with a small town feel. It still had great restaurants, shopping, a zoo, lots of outdoor recreation but when you drove through the neighborhoods the homes were so spread out and there wasn't a gas station or convenience store on every corner and traffic backed up at every light. Again, my priorities are a little different than yours because I am looking for a great place to raise my children. I think behind Nashville just from my research my second choice would be one of the suburbs of Raleigh or Knoxville, Tennessee which I think would be much closer to the mountains for you.

If you have any other questions I would be happy to try to help.

I live in Raleigh now and let me tell you Cary isnt like Nashville, we went to nashville several times, it is much better than Cary, stick to Nashville, great city!!!!!!!!!! Knoxville is great too, personally I think NC is way over rated.

WantingoutofAz · 09-29-2006, 11:13 PM

sci1:

Just curious if you could give more definitive differences between Nashville and Raleigh, what you prefer about Nashville over Raleigh and why you say NC is overrated? Thanks so much.

Angie

spltend · 09-30-2006, 10:23 AM

I second that sci1, I visited Raleigh as it was one of my top spots to move to after reading so much about it. Now granted we visited on a Sunday so naturally not much is going on. But, I expected a little more to be going on for all the football games. We went out to the bars in Glenwood (which from what we've been told is the most pop night spot) around the start of the 2nd set of games and we saw maybe 20 other ppl. By 9pm we were walking the street from bar to bar not seeing a single person! I mean I know it's Sunday, but even Erie, PA (where I'm from) fills up the sports bars most of Sunday. Probably because ppl are so depressed about living in Erie they are driven to drink! Plus I was wrong to expect Raleigh to have a big city feel just cause it had 250K+ residents, it seemed to be a very flat city, but again, I only spent 1 day and night there. I liked the feel of Charlotte a little more cause it had a bigger "downtown" and we saw a lot of people out on Monday night.

So anyways, maybe you could tell us more about Nashville and NC in general sci1?