Massachusetts to North Carolina relocation..HELP!!!! (Raleigh, Durham: affordable apartment, rental, chapel)

[masstonc123]

Hello, I see alot of relocation questions on this forum, so I'm hoping I can get help with my question.
I plan to move to the Raleigh, Durham, Cary, Chapel Hill area by Aug 2010, but I need to narrow down my search so that I can start applying for work and enrolling my child into school. Can you help me decide on the best area that fits my criteria below?

I work in the Healthcare IT field, with years of Management skills, so I'm looking for

Healthcare work
Diverse Charter schools-elementery
Shopping center (with a NY&Co and BeBe store hopefully)
Entertainment (good nightlife)
Outdoor/Indoor activities for my daughter
Affordable apartment rental in a somewhat diverse and family oriented area.

What do you think Raleigh, Durham, CH, or Cary. Thank you for your help.

[KellyCrash]

Schools here are traditional calendar like you're used to up in MA & also year round. There are a lot of changes going on in the school district right now. If you come here in Aug. it's possible your base school would have started in July. Just something to be aware of.

[leighbhe]

This is an excellent area for Healthcare. There are some "major" hospital systems in the area:

WakeMed (one main hospital - many refer to as "big wake", and 5 or 6 satellite locations, north raleigh, apex, cary, etc. You can look up WakeMed and find a map of all of their locations.

Rex Hospital: Another big one, located in raleigh, also with satellite offices

Duke Raleigh: Located in north raleigh

Duke Hospital: Durham

UNC Hospital: Chapel hill

That may be all of them, at least those are the big ones. All of the hospitals have satellites throughout the triangle area.

Schools, as Kelly said, are in the midst of change it seems. Charter Schools, which are application only, have already done the "lottery" process at this point. I know the charter in my area (wake forest) only had 6 slots for kindergarten. My sister applied and was put 99th on the waiting list. Many charters are difficult to get into! The charter I was referring to, Franklin Academy, had over 1200 applications for less than 100 spots.


Shopping centers: generally those types of stores are in the malls, the big malls around here are:

Crabtree Valley (in raleigh, on glenwood ave near interstate 440)
Triangle Town Center: off of 540, in north raleigh
Southpointe: Durham, just off of I40

The area is very very big, it is hard to pin point one place to live! Much would depend on a job and how long you want to commute to work.

Leigh

[masstonc123]

Thank you both for your responses. They were very helpful. I really can't stand driving, so a commute of no more than an hour including school drop off would be ideal. I'll be visiting the area this month and next to narrow my search, while looking for work.
How the electronic health record inititive going in North Carolina? Are healthcare facilites adopting well?

[ljd1010]

Originally Posted by masstonc123

Thank you both for your responses. They were very helpful. I really can't stand driving, so a commute of no more than an hour including school drop off would be ideal. I'll be visiting the area this month and next to narrow my search, while looking for work.
How the electronic health record inititive going in North Carolina? Are healthcare facilites adopting well?

My department at Duke initiated its EMR in January. Multiple other departments as paperless as well. It's actually going pretty well since the majority of our staff are young and pretty computer saavy.

[masstonc123]

That's great news! Getting use to be paperless system is a tough transition. Which EMR are you using at Duke?