Big city that is close to wilderness. Like, a 1 hour drive to leave the city and be in a forest.
I like having my big selection of restaurants, entertainment venues, large hospitals with lots of doctors and specialists, massage therapists/physiotherapists, high speed internet/phone, oddball clubs and sports, and Costco.
I also want to get away from it all easily for a day or two at a time.
I don’t want a huge lawn or massive house, that’s just extra chores. I’d rather just live in a condo, higher up with a nice view, but it has to be near a park. Let someone else mow the damn lawn. And I like being within walking distance of groceries, movie theaters, and restaurants.
I’ve done both, neither, just kill me now. Unless the small town is near a big city, so I can have cheaper housing but also access to more than a dollar general without driving for an hour.
I prefer living i a nice suburb with excellent public transport to get to work in the city.
Just like I have been doing for all my life (:
The city is a place you visit, and then come home to your nice suburb walk home from the bus stop along a small, quiet canal, sometimes there is an event in the park you pass through, else it is just quiet.
Need to get to work in the city center? Get on the bus that departs every 5-10 min during rush hour, 30 min later switch to the underground that departs every 5 min, switch lines, get off 15 and walk to the office, arrive 45 min after you left home having slept or watched videos on your commute.
It is really expensive to build public transportation in lower density suburbs.
Nope, not if you build it before selling land and building houses.
Here in Sweden, it usually works like this:
The municilapity decide to develop some land, this includes public transport, in lower density areas a few well placed bus stops is all that is needed, they connect with the suburb center, and might even have a few lines connecting further away, the suburb center usually has a train station and a small shopping center, the train then takes you further along to your destination.
If you don’t build public transport during or before construction of the neighbourhood then it will obviously be a higher cost. But build it before or during construction and it will be quite resonable
Perfectly located small town. 10k population, right besides the train station which takes me in 10min to either a small city, a medium sized city or, in 30min, to the largest city of the country.
I’ve lived in both, and prefer big cities as long as I’m living in a walkable neighborhood.
US Centric Answer:
Somewhere in between.
Somewhere there is still a downtown, the arts, interesting things to do.
But also, just not to massive. I don’t want actual skyscrapers. 6 stories is tall enough for me.
There’s only a handful of US cities like this, that straddle the line between having big city amenities and small town charm where it feels like you know a bunch of the locals.
I’m always confused when I hear people say this. I’m in an actual one-water tower small town and I see people I don’t know constantly. If you go up to tens of thousands you might as well be in the city, because you’ll mostly be interacting with strangers.
Is everyone else just really great at keeping track of everyone, or something?
What are some places in the US that would fit this description? I’m guessing maybe something like Burlington, VT?
Most cities in the 100-200k population
Asheville, North Carolina used to be one, but it’s been almost 16 years since I knew anyone out that way, so I don’t know if it still has the same vibe. Easy for that vibe to be killed by too many people moving there.
Also yes, Burlington is pretty much exactly the kind of city I’m thinking about (never been there, just looked it up on Wikipedia).
A lot of big state university towns that are not part of major metros probably fit this. They are going to have a lot of amenities due to the university.
They can definitely fit this, and are my preferred town type. I grew up and spent most my life around college towns and they’re pretty great.
To add examples about the nearby metros: Moscow/Pullman on the Idaho/Washington border are college towns in the middle of a large farming community. Never any real need to travel to a city because they’re too far away and the needs of the college keep the town in stock with everything you’d want anyway. Cheney on the other hand is close enough to Spokane that it uses Spokane’s bus system (or used to idk haven’t been there in years). Cheney is lacking a lot of essentials because people just go to Spokane for them.
Moscow/Pullman have tight knit communities while also being open and friendly. You just see so many people from different places coming in through the colleges. College towns are really the best middle ground of small town feel with city convenience I’ve been able to find.
Low cost of living city near big city is great
Small town. Cities are high energy. I like visiting but get worn down by the hustle and bustle.
Big enough to get a Costco.
Costco or bust.
I grew up in a small town. I live in a big city. While I can see the allure of smallish towns (20-50k people), I prefer not having to drive several miles to get anywhere. I have three grocery stores and a bar/restaurant/music venue within walking distance. Cities that size also tend to have urban sprawl which I think is ugly af.
The town I grew up in had about 2500 people and you had to drive an hour and a half to get to a town with more than 10k people. People there tend to be very conservative which is odd considering the government is the biggest employer and towns like that take more state funds than they produce.
Small town, need woods
300 k is the sweet spot, but I want to live in the outskirts, small house with a big garden. 15 mn drive from the city or 35 mn walk to the city
City. Around 100k is the comfortable size.
Not like I require the city’s wider array of amenities all that much. I will still be spending 97% of my time at work or at home.
But if I lived in a small town again (born and raised in a town of <8,000), that extra 3% of the time I wanted to go out I’d have to remind myself, “Oh yeah, I live in a dead end town in the middle of nowhere that services none of my personal interests,” and that 3% would rapidly become 0%. I’d live fine with that, but eh. Why take a strict net loss when I can simply not?
The walkabiity and community arguments for small towns are complete non-factors for me, seeing as I go basically nowhere and talk to basically no one. And I’m not persuaded by the cost of living argument for small towns, since lower rent would be almost equally counterbalanced by lower salary opportunities.
100k is a big town, not a city.
Not only does the salary go down in small towns but the number of positions are greatly reduced. All it takes is a layoff and that “cheaper” small town could be too expensive because there are no more positions to fill.
The exception would be high-paid remote work, I guess. But with the reputation that corpos big enough to field those salaries have been recently building, going mask-off with no warning for no reason and asking employees to start filling desks again, I don’t know if I’d risk it.
Big city. I feel claustrophobic in small towns.
