Searching for the perfect Texas Town (Houston, Dallas: crime, houses, neighborhoods)

[ready_to_settle]

My wife and I have a problem... she grew up in the middle of a hectic city and I grew up in the burbs. I cant stand living in the middle of a big city and she cant stand being out in the boondocks. We currently live in New Jersey (not by choice) as my wife just finished law school. We are ready to get out of this place and FINALLY settle down and start a family in Texas. Here's the rub... the middle of a big city in TX is out (Austin, Houston, Dallas, SA, etc) and the middle of no-where is out.

Ideally, we'd love to find a quaint town that has a vibrant main street, is safe, has great schools, and, oh, by the way, is only a half hour or so from one of the bigger cities in TX. I know, tall order right? We love the small traditional american towns (the kind that Disney tries so hard to replicate in places like Celebration, Florida) and also love the variety of stuff to do (and ease of finding a job) in bigger cities..

SOOOO, Im sorry... this is probably a toughy but any advice you could throw my way would be wonderful. We look forward to becoming Texans!!

[hound 109]

Boerne, New Braunfels, Georgetown....all real towns with good to great schools that are county seats & 30-40 miles from large cities.

I'm sure others will offer opinions (particularly for the Houston/Dallas-FW areas).

The "excellent schools" requirement knocks out a dozen others that i could think of (like Bastrop, Lockhart, Seguin & others)......& the 30-40 mile requirement knocks out another dozen or.

Here's a map that might be helpful when looking at towns & schools (just click on a town or area):

Texas School Performance Maps

[LQQKOUT]

Well Texas is REALLY big...so we would need more general locals...like North Texas, South Texas, Central Texas, West Texas, Texas Panhandle.....where is the job?

I am in North Texas, east of Dallas. Dallas is about 22 miles away from where I am at. Easy to get to and have a job there but great to drive home. I live in Rowlett, close to Rockwall, East Garland, Wylie, Sachse. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rowlett,_Texas

[Premont]

I'd look for a smaller city near a big city like Friendswood (near Houston), Round Rock (near Austin), or Flower Mound (near Dallas).

[hound 109]

Originally Posted by Premont

I'd look for a smaller city near a big city like Friendswood (near Houston), Round Rock (near Austin), or Flower Mound (near Dallas).

All three of these "towns" are suburbs....& imo none have a small hometown feel or are separated by their neighboring metropolis.

[stillkit]

My suggestion would be to spend a little time studying the trends of expansion of the large cities and pick a town in the other direction.

For instance, Dallas has always grown north and east, so any suburbs on those sides of town which currently fit your bill will soon be overwhelmed by creeping urbanization. The small towns to the south of the metroplex, though, have remained small towns and are likely to do so in the future.

The same can be said of suburbs east of Austin (which has historically grown west), south of Houston or San Antonio and northwest of Ft. Worth.

[awecelot]

Hmmm...I know that it's a suburb, but in my opinion, if New Braunfels and Georgetown can be mentioned on here as "real towns" then so can this town:

Grapevine

[hound 109]

Originally Posted by awecelot

Hmmm...I know that it's a suburb, but in my opinion, if New Braunfels and Georgetown can be mentioned on here as "real towns" then so can this town:

Grapevine

Towns like New Braunfels, Georgetown, Boerne, Lockhart & Seguin (in the greater SA/Austin area) are all "real towns" imo because they have a number of things going for them...such as:

- they were "real towns" 100 + years ago.
- real downtowns & real neighborhoods that are established.
- all are county seats...with beautiful courthouses & downtowns.
- local newspapers & businesspeople.
- friday night lights are events.
- all probably have a great local BBQ joint & a great local hamburger joint.

Other smaller burgs (like Dripping Springs, Cedar Park, Cibolo, Leon Springs, Friendswood, & dozens of others like them)....were just dots on the map until 20-30 years ago. Suburbia has invaded & overwhelmed them. Suburbia may very well envelope towns like NB, Boerne & Georgetown, but there will always be a distinct sense of place within these towns...even if it looks like suburbian sprawling hell out on the interstate.

I've never been to Grapevine....is it a county seat & does its HS have a 50 year old rivalry? I do see it advertising itself quite a bit in TX Monthly.

[Premont]

It seems like by that criteria that you would distinguish Tomball and Alvin from say Sugar Land, Friendswood or Pearland. The question is, would you find better homes and schools in Tomball and Alvin? I guess there would be more of a country and independent feel to the "real towns", but being close to the big city suburbia and crime would still spill over. I guess if you wanted more of a "Green Acres" feel you would choose Alvin, but Friendswood would probably have better schools and less crime.

[Westerner92]

I'm not sure how good the schools are, but you might want to check out Waxahachie south of Dallas.