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Old 07-31-2012, 09:23 AM
 
Location: Estonia
1,759 posts, read 1,874,201 times
Reputation: 1109

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Seattle barely qualifies as rainy, I really don't get its reputation. In the summer months it averages below 40 mm of precipitation which is flat out dry. The yearly total is about 1000 mm which is nothing compared other west coast cities like Ketchikan.

Chicago has very cold winters with high snowfall? Its daily highs are above freezing. Oklahoma city has 10° C daily highs with nights just at the freezing point. Very cold? Anchorage, the standard four season climate, is extremely bad? "Some people's children..."

I do agree on the hot summers part though. Most of the US gets really hot in the summer and few residents seem to enjoy it, running from one AC to another.
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Old 07-31-2012, 10:37 AM
 
Location: Laurentia
5,580 posts, read 7,973,508 times
Reputation: 2442
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hiromant View Post
Seattle barely qualifies as rainy, I really don't get its reputation. In the summer months it averages below 40 mm of precipitation which is flat out dry. The yearly total is about 1000 mm which is nothing compared other west coast cities like Ketchikan.

Chicago has very cold winters with high snowfall? Its daily highs are above freezing. Oklahoma city has 10° C daily highs with nights just at the freezing point. Very cold? Anchorage, the standard four season climate, is extremely bad? "Some people's children..."
I agree with all that. However, it's worth pointing out that Seattle is somewhat rainy in winter, and is definitely cloudy in the cooler half of the year. The amounts aren't high; most of the time it's drizzle up to light rain. As for it being truly "rainy" I agree with you. Its rainy days even in winter, let alone annually, don't hold a candle to the Alaska Panhandle or coastal Norway.

After some research I've found that, at least to me, it takes 200 days of rain or more for a place to be truly rainy. Ketchikan has that. Seattle does not.

I'd also like to note that I'm talking about just Seattle here. The Pacific Northwest is diverse, and the immediate coastal regions and coastal mountains are truly rainy (on an annual basis - the summers are still not rainy), with high totals and a lot of rainy days. Forks, Washington, for example, has 211 rainy days annually, and 2715 mm of rain per year, the monthly totals ranging from 59 mm to 372 mm.
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Old 08-01-2012, 11:28 AM
 
Location: Los Angeles, CA
2,098 posts, read 3,513,197 times
Reputation: 998
Actually on second thought doesn't NYC get more rain year round than seattle?
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Old 05-17-2013, 05:29 AM
 
Location: Kharkiv, Ukraine
2,618 posts, read 3,441,622 times
Reputation: 1106
Best: Marquette MI
Worst: San Juan PR
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Old 05-17-2013, 10:52 AM
 
Location: Zagreb, Croatia
3,990 posts, read 3,387,749 times
Reputation: 1004
Best: Boone, NC
Worst: Either one of the tropical cities of southern Florida, or one of the hot desert climates, or most of subarctic or polar climates in Alaska.
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Old 05-17-2013, 12:15 PM
 
Location: Mid Atlantic USA
12,623 posts, read 13,873,504 times
Reputation: 5883
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hiromant View Post
Seattle barely qualifies as rainy, I really don't get its reputation. In the summer months it averages below 40 mm of precipitation which is flat out dry. The yearly total is about 1000 mm which is nothing compared other west coast cities like Ketchikan.

Chicago has very cold winters with high snowfall? Its daily highs are above freezing. Oklahoma city has 10° C daily highs with nights just at the freezing point. Very cold? Anchorage, the standard four season climate, is extremely bad? "Some people's children..."

I do agree on the hot summers part though. Most of the US gets really hot in the summer and few residents seem to enjoy it, running from one AC to another.
Mostly during business hours in cities. Generally Americans spend most of the summer out of doors. As children we were outside all summer in the heat. And for many years Americans had no AC to run to.
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Old 05-17-2013, 12:53 PM
 
Location: Philadelphia
5,294 posts, read 10,166,222 times
Reputation: 2136
Best: Honolulu, Miami, New Orleans, San Diego, Key West
Worst: Anchorage, Washington DC, Chicago, San Francisco, Seattle
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Old 05-17-2013, 01:21 PM
 
Location: Top of the South, NZ
22,216 posts, read 21,547,782 times
Reputation: 7608
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hiromant View Post
Seattle barely qualifies as rainy, I really don't get its reputation. In the summer months it averages below 40 mm of precipitation which is flat out dry. The yearly total is about 1000 mm which is nothing compared other west coast cities like Ketchikan.

Chicago has very cold winters with high snowfall? Its daily highs are above freezing. Oklahoma city has 10° C daily highs with nights just at the freezing point. Very cold? Anchorage, the standard four season climate, is extremely bad? "Some people's children..."

I do agree on the hot summers part though. Most of the US gets really hot in the summer and few residents seem to enjoy it, running from one AC to another.
Seattle is rainy for about half of the year. I spent time there during winter and spring. It often was raining/drizzling or just very damp. The cloud didn't clear quickly either. My hosts assured me, that was the typical weather for winter. For that reason I wouldn't to live there.

The worst climate for a US city would be somewhere like Anchorage/Fairbanks.

The best climate would probably be somewhere like Santa Cruz in California. Summers are drier than I like but the rest of the year looks good. Asheville NC also look good, although winters are a little colder than I like.
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Old 05-17-2013, 05:39 PM
 
Location: Seattle
1,244 posts, read 1,291,270 times
Reputation: 460
The best US climates for me are: West Yellowstone, Montana, Climax, Colorado, and Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. All snowy climates with winter being the dominant season. Cool summer nights and reliably cold winters, and acceptable sunshine amounts. (Presumably).

Worst: (There's many more): Key West, Florida, Lake Havasu City, Arizona, Death Valley, California, Honolulu, Hawaii. So the worst climates are basically any hot desert or tropical climate.
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Old 05-17-2013, 05:49 PM
 
Location: Paris
8,161 posts, read 8,703,810 times
Reputation: 3546
Best? Des Moines. Why? A typical American humid continental climate, with well-balanced seasons and adequate rainfall. Even the place looks nice for a midsize midwestern city.

Worst? Barrow.
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