St Louis A Possibility? (St. Charles, Wildwood: big house, to live in, shop)

[BurnInTheMil]

Originally Posted by glamatomic

Be sure to check out Sugarfire if/ when you visit! They've got a number of St. Louis locations although I've only been to the Elm Street (St. Charles) one. They're crazy good!

Thanks for the recommendation!

[MUTGR]

Originally Posted by Greg10556

Thanks for the recommendation!

Honestly. St. Louis gets a bad rap but if you have a good job here and are starting or thinking about starting a family i'ts probably one of the best places. If you want excitement go to Chicago.

[BurnInTheMil]

Originally Posted by MUTGR

Honestly. St. Louis gets a bad rap but if you have a good job here and are starting or thinking about starting a family i'ts probably one of the best places. If you want excitement go to Chicago.

My wife and I both work a lot, and make a decent living from it. The “excitement” phase as far as partying, nightclubs, etc...are over for us. Now we prefer to hike, paddle board, etc...

Why the bad rep honestly? I get that every major city has its problems, crime, etc...But St Louis overall seems like a decent place, but yet I hear so many negatives

[MOforthewin]

Originally Posted by roycel

My wife and I just moved to St.Louis from Santa Barbara 6 months ago... I grew up here, so it wasn't difficult for me to transition. We do miss California for its amenities, but we've found we are much more relaxed here. People are much more polite and easy going at work. As others have mentioned, there's definitely enough to do here to keep entertained. ...Plus, the dollar goes so much further here.

Anyhow, you are absolutely correct about traffic. For regular rush hour (no major accidents/ construction), traffic seems to move at about 15-40mph at its worst. Most of the traffic I see is on I-270 and I-64. What normally takes me 20 mins w/o traffic, might take me 40 in traffic (16 miles roughly). Seriously, compared to Cali, it is not bad at all.

With consideration to your outdoorsy lifestyle, I'd think you'd want to live west of I-270 (St. Charles/ Chesterfield). They're family oriented but much more convenient for trails.

BTW: ethnic food (if you're into that) is pretty awful outside of the city. There are some choices here and there, but I find myself driving 20 minutes to get ramen or sushi for example. ...but then again, I guess I drove longer than that on a regular basis in LA.

I live in FL now and St. Louis area traffic is a lot better than down here. Everything is congested down here and horrible drivers as well.

St. Louis is pretty easy to navigate. The highways down here are very confusing in the big cities. I75 isn't, except more accidents and crazy drivers.

I think the traffic in Tampa and Orlando is worse than St. Louis and due to the designs of the highways.

[chicagobear]

Originally Posted by Greg10556

My wife and I both work a lot, and make a decent living from it. The “excitement” phase as far as partying, nightclubs, etc...are over for us. Now we prefer to hike, paddle board, etc...

Why the bad rep honestly? I get that every major city has its problems, crime, etc...But St Louis overall seems like a decent place, but yet I hear so many negatives

I think it is in part the crime statistics for the city proper which give a misleading view of the metro area in the national press. Also downtown is so pitiful for a metro area of almost 3 million people. There is so little there these days.

[1grin_g0]

Originally Posted by Greg10556

My wife and I both work a lot, and make a decent living from it. The “excitement” phase as far as partying, nightclubs, etc...are over for us. Now we prefer to hike, paddle board, etc...

Why the bad rep honestly? I get that every major city has its problems, crime, etc...But St Louis overall seems like a decent place, but yet I hear so many negatives

The thing about STL is that crime is concentrated in North City and parts of North County such as Ferguson. That area was really hit hard decades ago with the closure of manufacturing plants. Unfortunately, that area has never been able to recover. The national media is partly to blame for the bad rap. There is some racial tension in the metro area, no different than any other city in the Midwest, but the cable news networks really like to fan the flames and embolden the agitators. If you paid any atttention to the Mike Brown story, then you probably know what I'm talking about. The national media was totally obsessed with that case, I guess it was good for ratings. It's too bad that they served to escalate the situation, instead of using their platform to actually do some good.

[chicagobear]

Originally Posted by 1grin_g0

The thing about STL is that crime is concentrated in North City and parts of North County such as Ferguson. That area was really hit hard decades ago with the closure of manufacturing plants. Unfortunately, that area has never been able to recover. The national media is partly to blame for the bad rap. There is some racial tension in the metro area, no different than any other city in the Midwest, but the cable news networks really like to fan the flames and embolden the agitators. If you paid any atttention to the Mike Brown story, then you probably know what I'm talking about. The national media was totally obsessed with that case, I guess it was good for ratings. It's too bad that they served to escalate the situation, instead of using their platform to actually do some good.

"Hands up, don't shoot" was a complete fabrication. Yet you never see the press talk about that.

[FrankMiller]

I feel like anywhere on the outer edge of the metro would potentially satisfy the OP's desires re: space, outdoors and price. Two things I would consider:

1) Potential job locations
2) Whether you're visiting So Indiana often enough that you'd care about starting the trip an hour closer (i.e., living near I-70 on the IL side).

There are nice bike trails on the IL side you might want to live on/near, if you go that direction.

[BurnInTheMil]

Originally Posted by FrankMiller

I feel like anywhere on the outer edge of the metro would potentially satisfy the OP's desires re: space, outdoors and price. Two things I would consider:

1) Potential job locations
2) Whether you're visiting So Indiana often enough that you'd care about starting the trip an hour closer (i.e., living near I-70 on the IL side).

There are nice bike trails on the IL side you might want to live on/near, if you go that direction.

We will be visiting home often, but being an hour closer is definitely NOT needed. I’ve done my research and it seems anywhere in St Louis and surrounding areas like St Charles are still 3 1/2 to 4 1/2 hours which is perfectly fine.

[FrankMiller]

In that case, I wouldn't narrow the search prematurely. I know people who are happy in every direction, and love Wentzville, Wildwood, Eureka, Imperial, Millstadt, and Edwardsville. It just depends on what you want, what kind of amenities are important, and where you're commuting to.