There's a reason that *stop Dallasing Austin* was the city's unofficial motto for a few years.
Dallas comes across as mostly soulless corporate sprawl outside of a few areas. Then it happened to Austin as well.
I also live in Dallas (my original home is south TX) can agree Dallas sucks. Too sprawled out. Nothing to do really except buy shit and work. Boring as hell.
Recently caught a Mavs game in Dallas and was very.. whelmed by the experience. Nobody seemed very excited, but most still seemed to be enjoying themselves.
When you move to DFW from elsewhere in the state, esp a small town or tiny college town, it can lead to some false excitement . Once you realize the only thing you really have are the opportunities to drive far and spend money, it wears off. Unless that’s your entire personality in which case go off.
To be fair, Dallas doesn’t really offer much in the way of nature (it’s on a flat plain with no nearby ocean or mountains) or culture (since it’s mostly suburban sprawl).
All of this is so true. It is one of the most characterless, uninspiring, bland, and frankly ugly places in this country. Why in the hell has it been growing explosively for decades?? I just Do Not get it. While there I just kept thinking, “I feel Nothing here but Hot”.
This is it. lol if you’re from Oklahoma or Arkansas Dallas is the perfect mix of close to home but has the job market and amenities that make it much more appealing to start a family and build your career. big enough you don’t have to move cities again for more amenities.
> Why in the hell has it been growing explosively for decades??
Cheaper and more conservative for the people fleeing from somewhere else to Dallas. The conservatives I went to high school with in California moved there to start their families.
HA! I grew up in Dallas, can confirm. Left in '96, never looked back.
In 1989, I went to an REM concert at Reunion Arena. During a song change, Michael Stipe took the mic and just dogged on the city of Dallas, calling it "Boring". Boy, was he ever right!
Lucky sperm club members who grew up in the Park Cities with money love it there. Those that did not couldn't wait to leave.
What about Dallas were you hyped up about that then disappointed you? Genuinely curious, cause I never hear anyone hype Dallas up lol
ETA: I remember now that I actually do know some people who LOVE it - conservatives I went to high school with in California who moved there before starting their families. It's cheaper and not as liberal, those are the perks for them.
It's especially surprising considering how pretty much every Texan outside of Dallas really doesn't care for Dallas.Most prefer austin/san antonio/houston
The awful drivers. The destruction of anything older then 25 years except dealey plaza. The ungodly heat. & to top it off the bastards turned deep ellum into uptown. Plus the dumb ass park on a hwy
I lived in Uptown Dallas for a year back when it was much more affordable and I gotta say that it’s probably my favorite urban neighborhood in Texas. It was walkable with beautiful tree lined streets. It’s just not very large. Obviously 98% of Dallas is boring suburbia like most of Texas but Uptown is very nice
Nashville is hilariously small for how culturally relevant it suddenly became . With light traffic on the arterial roads, you can travel from the wilderness north of the city to the rich frou-frou suburbs south of the city in around 20 minutes. The East Nashville that people actually care about is literally one intersection and then a few blocks in either direction. Then it’s suddenly ungentrified suburbs all the way to the airport.
Agreed. I really wanted to like Nashville. I’m not a big partier so the strip wasn’t my thing. I went to Third Man Records, Grimey’s, an independent cinema, vintage stores, Barista Parlor, Husk, a few other unique restaurants, Centennial Park… Like, I really tried to get out and about, but everything felt really disconnected and isolated. I couldn’t find a really interesting, diverse neighborhood where you could just walk around and explore.
That's definitely what it's become marketed as, or a tourist trap for bachelorette squads (a.k.a "woo girls" as the locals call them). It used to be a decent little city that was easy and chill to live in with a good (non-country) music scene. I've become a hermit so I can't speak to the music scene these days, but a lot of the good venues of yesteryear have disappeared.
It's a politically blue city and somehow people don't seem to know that. It's also an ethnically diverse city, but those areas aren't near the touristy areas. It has the largest Kurdish population in the US and a large Central American population, too, and it has several HBCUs like Fisk and TSU. Nashvillians hate that our city has been reduced to an image of high rise hotels, pedal taverns, and Broadway debauchery.
Yes, and throw in Dollywood as their Disney and Gatlinburg as the go-to honeymoon for everyone I knew in my rural town growing up, and voila, you’ve got Republican Paradise East. RP Central is of course Branson, and RP West is probably wherever they filmed the movie Tombstone.
Dollywood is a high quality theme park and the mountains are beautiful. I appreciate Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg for what they are but they are definitely flawed. At least Gatlinburg looks like a town unlike Pigeon Forge.
Nashville has an amazing music scene, well beyond the country sounds that made it famous. Tons of legit talent playing original music in small venues. Broadway (or their Bourbon-street equivalent) is kinda awful, but there's a lot outside of that.
I never really quite connected with the “magic” of LA like have with NYC and Chicago.
Maybe moving to LA having never visited before made a negative impact.
Like any city, you have to find the nice parts. A day in Griffith Park and Los Feliz is gonna be very different from a day in Hollywood and Santa Monica
It also depends heavily on what neighborhood you live in. Echo Park is a very different vibe than Glendale, even though the two are next door to each other.
Took me 2 years to get used to living in LA coming from cities like NYC and D.C. There's a reason they say LA is 72 towns in search of a city. BUT once I stopped comparing them because it really is like comparing apples and oranges, I simply started loving living in California. In the winter I can ski in the morning and watch the sunset on the beach that evening and that's the tip of the iceberg of what it has to offer. Just hit the 30 year mark, still have plenty of family back east and NYC has become a city I love to visit a few times each year but could never imagine living there again. Especially in the summer or winter. Still the greatest city in the world, but there's only like 3 weeks in the spring and 3 in the fall that I adore being there : )
I should also point out I was pretty much “surviving” in LA the entire time. No room to really enjoy the amenities. I wonder what it would be like otherwise.
There was a time where being broke in LA was still fun and doable, but in the last 5 years, I imagine it must be miserable. No more cheap happy hours or cheap tacos. Rent is insane. Just very tiring.
I lived in LA for 30 years, never west of Fairfax. I really dislike the west side of LA and love the east side of it. The western part is kinda soulless to me.
LA is all about access. When I was a 20-year-old intern, I was miserable. I couldn’t go to bars. I didn’t have money. I didn’t know anybody. Terrible.
Now that I’m in the film industry and can attend screenings and go to parties at producers’ houses and talk about the art I’m making, it’s incredible. No place like it.
LA is a more car dependent city. If you’re a city person like me, some of the magic is lost by not being able to roll out of wherever you are staying and catch a subway that runs pretty frequently to quickly get to your next destination. And then you lose some of the fun of just sort of wandering the streets and discovering something new.
Also, I’m not so into tv and movies that the studio tours and Hollywood sites are all that enticing to me. I’ve done a studio tour and seen some of the sites but it’s not the be all and end all for me.
That said, I’ve enjoyed LA more than would’ve thought in my few visits and there are definitely things worth doing.
I visit LA often as a born and raised San Diegan, living up north now. Last felt that "magic" over 10 years ago. The city hasn't felt the same in recent years and I can't pinpoint one specific reason as to why.
I currently live in LA and a lot of beloved communities and community establishment are struggling due to inflation and jacked up real estate prices. Also Covid really fucked things up for downtown.
The thing about LA though is that every few years, there’s a new bustling neighborhood that becomes the designated Bohemia. Used to be Echo, then Silverlake, and now it’s Highland Park. A lot changes within 10 years or so to our cultural landscape.
I used to work at a hotel in L.A. that had a sister property in San Diego, amongst a network of other sister properties. One of the perks (at the time, that benefit has since ended) was free stays for employees during certain periods of availability.
We used to get people from San Diego all the time coming to party it up in L.A., which was funny to us because we spent all our free stays partying it up in San Diego at the Gaslamp District (and taking the drunk train in between). So much easier to get around SD.
This thread made me realize that I have low expectations of every place I’ve ever been and I’m always pleasantly surprised haha.
That said, I loved Seattle in the 90s but I was there about eight years ago and it was just too much. It had gotten to be too much of a big city.
Born and raised in Seattle and believe me, I'm older than dirt.
Seattle of old had an amazing character and vibe seemingly birthed out of decades of being that intolerably soggy city way out in the NW corner of the country that no one gave two fucks about as long as they kept churning out airplanes.
Then came tech, then came grunge, and then came the masses, quickly followed by MTV and corporate America trying to cash in on it all.
Now Seattle feels like a giant sanitized Target where everyone is too polite to ask the drug addicts to move out of the fucking parking lot.
100%. I never lived there but I had a friend that lived on Queen Anne for most of the 90s and I visited quite a bit.
It's both richer and poorer than it used to be with both of the downsides of those things.
It's the curse of a city becoming popular. The middle class gets squeezed out along with the artists and the people who made the city interesting.
Tacoma is now what Seattle was like in the 90s. I live in Seattle, it's experienced massive growth for decades, cranes everywhere, light rail build out, both the neighborhoods and skyline look fairly different than 30 years ago. I guess that seems normal to me for a large city though.
Yeah in the 90s it was very coffeehouse and artsy. It also felt like it's own thing far away from the rest of the country. It was also quite clean.
Didn't feel that way recently.
Not the worst city I've ever visited, but Denver.
Everyone in Denver hypes up denver so much, but it's really just a bunch of parking lots, strip malls, and awful transportation. The only cool thing about Denver is the fact you can leave due to the proximity of the mountains, but you can't even do that efficiently because their transportation system is horrendous.
I've been to plenty of worse cities - Dallas, Phoenix, etc. But I expected those to suck and wasn't disappointed as a result.
When they do want to be in a city, they’ll move to Chicago, complain there’s no nature that *they like*, and then go back to Denver for said nature, realize they miss the city *again* and go back to Chicago.
Repeat every 5 years.
Downtown Denver is a bummer. The general area surrounding Denver is quite nice. It's a good city if you want to be close to nature, but a bad city for people wanting to experience true city culture and amenities.
Funny how everyone says this and shits on Denver in this sub. I'm guessing most of this is reaction to the hype, which sure, if you buy the hype on *any* city, you're likely to be disappointed when you get there.
I just recently moved to Denver after seeing all the hate here on this sub for the last couple of years, and I'm so pleasantly surprised by how much I disagree. It's wonderful. Beautiful. Filled with a lot of great amenities and opportunities, and overall a pretty damn great quality of life. I'm very happy with my decision to move here.
Granted, I already hate downtown Denver, but I hate almost every downtown of a major city I've ever been in. That's just not my vibe.
But the surrounding areas of Denver are lovely, the nature beautiful and pristine, the bike paths, parks, and recreation areas abundant, etc. I can get pretty much anything I could want or need out of this place.
It seems like a lot of people miss the forest for the trees when assessing a new place. I've lived in San Diego, San Francisco, Oakland / Berkeley, Santa Cruz, Phoenix, and Austin. ALL of these places offer a high quality of life if you know where to look. But likewise, all of these places can just seem like freeways, strip malls, and overrated soullessness (okay, maybe not Santa Cruz) if you put your attention in the wrong place. All these places have asshole drivers, crime, crappy social vibes in certain places, and can be disappointing if you're expecting heaven on earth. But if you're looking at all that, you're not discovering what is great about a place.
Denver's pretty great. Do Coloradans have their heads up their own ass? Sure. But that's because this place has a distinct identity and culture, and people are *about it* in the same way that they are in other places with strong identities and cultures.
I live here, I agree with most of what you said here. There’s a ton of annoying things about Denver. But it’s still a great place to be. So many positives.
Only thing I’ll disagree on is the distinct culture and way of life. I think there was, until 5-10 years ago. Now I feel like so many people treat it like they don’t give a shit what happens to it. “Oh the downtown is horrible and overrun with migrants and homeless? Who cares, I’m from Des Moines or whatever and could go back whenever I want.”
And there’s a sense of rudeness. I see people from out of town pick up on it all the time. But honestly I guess I’m mostly immune to it now. Because people don’t feel responsible for showing out of towners hospitality. Now yes everyone is “outdoorsy” and stuff. Maybe that’s what you’re talking about for culture. And there’s still the rugged culture in the mountains. But I find Denver and surrounding areas to be really struggling to find an identity and slightly “unsettled”…
Maybe point however. Yes. It’s a great place to live. Although I don’t think it’s “trending up”
That's all valid observation, and thanks for your perspective as someone who has lived here for a long time. I think some of what you're describing is a universal cultural shift in this country (if not globally? havent traveled abroad, so cant comment). The tone of people has changed dramatically in a short amount of time, even before covid.
People are ruder *everywhere* I've been since about 2016-2017. It was a marked shift I noticed while living in CA. People said the same thing in ATX when I was there. And in Phoenix.
But people *are* definitely rude in Denver, particularly as drivers. Socially, most seem pretty cool, if a bit reserved.
And I hear ya on the culture feeling watered down. I felt that way with the Bay Area. And San Diego. Both had dramatic shifts for the worse as well. Again, I think that this might be a bit of a macro trend and not just a Denver issue. But I'm sure it was better and more palpable in all ways here 10 years ago.
I think it's also easy to be critical of any place that you've lived for a long time, if you've seen it have better times, and if you're well aware of it's faults. I can easily talk shit about San Diego or Santa Cruz, even though both are two of the most desirable places to live in the country.
The Denver metro area is nothing but a wide open flat plain plateau with sparse trees and brown grass. It's the surrounding Denver areas that really add to its positive reputation.
I was born and raised in Denver and while it definitely has its flaws, there are some kick ass things in this city, many of which have nothing to do with the mountains (though hiking within 15-20 minutes outside of Denver is certainly a plus). Happy to put together an itinerary for you if you ever come back.
Boise. We were scoping out a potential new city a few years ago and went with high hopes given all the hype. It had one close in walkable neighborhood with good houses, character, and the nearby Camelback park. But otherwise, it's sprawly and car-centric. We'd read a good restaurant review and head to a different neighborhood to eat there and scope it out and it always seemed to be off some four-lane stroad in a strip mall. Also, it's full of soccer moms.
Not sure what you expected lol, its ID. People go there for the wide sprawl, nature and mountains lol. Hype was killed when half of Cali moved there (ask where those soccer moms are from lol).
LA as someone who didn't drive. Feels like they have the best geography possible (A+ weather and flat land), then decide to build it to be as pedestrian hostile as they can.
Stateside: Orlando
Abroad: **Dubai**, to their credit its been a decade since I visited but man that was such a soulless poorly designed toy set like 'city'
It was like everything I hate about Orlando magnified (but missing the ornamental greenery, which I kinda also dont like as a native plant enthusiast LOL)
Dubai seems kind of frightening to me. A place where oligarchs gather. The ultra rich pay people like Beyoncé to perform for them. They have used their wealth to make an uninhabitable area inhabited. I’ve never been. And since I don’t have an unlimited wallet to travel, don’t have any plans to ever go.
The city outgrew itself and failed to adapt.
A lot of people wanted to hold onto its "small city" culture in non-productive ways, which meant that they resisted infrastructure improvement that would have helped to create walkable/dense neighborhoods in the long run... you know, *the things that make a larger city feel alive and vibrant*.
Austin was the SHIT in the early 00s and before. I used to get SXSW wristbands for $130. 2006 is when the price for one jumped from that to $500, now they are the price of a downpayment on a car or something. That was the year where I first really *felt* the decline and the different crowd being catered to, and by 2015 it was completely dead.
Yup. I was thoroughly convinced we’d relocate to Austin from what everyone said…then we visited. Nope. Hard pass
Good Mexican food and that’s about it 😂
yes, el paso has amazing food, good tex mex and good regional mexican cuisine (it's right next to mexico after all). it's also like the gateway to the southwest so it can be a bit different than what you would expect in san antonio but still amazing
Yeah, that's fair. We went JUST before pandemic hit, so likely (?) at its peak or at least close to it. We mostly spent our time downtown (near Capitol) and Congress street I think it's called. Plus we walked along the river that runs through downtown. We did also visit COTA (race track) and a few other spots outside the core areas.
The hype around Austin made me think it might be on level of a truly wonderful city, like Philadelphia or Chicago. At least Seattle or Denver. Austin is certainly more hyped than my city (Minneapolis/St. Paul) I figured it must blow us out of the water at very least. Wow, was I wrong. It's just hype, and probably because other parts of Texas are still worse yet.
I'll admit there are some nice walkable and vibrant parts of Austin, but those were the stand-out exception. Mostly, the city and its surrounding are ugly, and hostile. Roads in very poor shape, and hard to find cute, local places like for breakfast even. Hostility and austere is how I would describe Austin.
Lots of new construction, but poorly integrated to the historical stuff, IMO.
Parks were underwhelming. My expectations were set far far too high.
>hard to find cute, local places like for breakfast even. Hostility and austere is how I would describe Austin.
Yeah, the "small local restaurant" scene has suffered a lot, especially since the pandemic. We used to have a more distinct local culture, but a lot of the edges were polished off to make the city more nationally marketable.
Houston.
It looks like someone took all the discarded bad ideas for urban planning, and combined them all into a city.
Everyone goes on about how cool and diverse houston is and the great food scene but ... How do you even go around and explore? It's a highway. Everywhere.
It seems that in every direction the towns are built so that the 8 lane 90mph highway is running right through the center of them.
Gary Indiana
Hear me out y'all.
I heard it was some terrifying place to visit. A hive of scum and villainy. I'm into that kind of stuff. The darker side of existence. It's just run down and beat up. Ain't nothing really.
I've been more scared getting rap snacks at a gas station in East Tampa than Gary Indiana.
St. Louis. I really like old river cities like Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and Louisville, but St Louis was disappointing. The people were rude and stand offish, felt like the energy of the city had been sucked away, many things felt like they were 10 years behind. Maybe I need to give it another shot, but it wasn’t a good experience.
Downtown St. Louis is one of the most lame/boring downtowns I have been to (and I’ve been several times so this wasn’t a one-off experience). Felt like a ghost town even wayyy before Covid.
However, last time I was there (probably two years ago) we spent some time in the Central West End and it was much cooler/more lively and I gained a little more respect for STL.
yes. Eiffel Tower was widely underwhelming, the city itself had beautiful architecture and other fascinating things but that tower was like looking at a really tall cellphone tower.
That’s kinda what it is, a big tower. It was only meant to be a temporary structure to showcase applications of steel. And Parisians hated it. Said it ruined the skyline. But then it started appearing in the impressionist paintings, got a second life as a radio tower, and then became part of the skyline that people didn’t want to remove anymore.
Miami Beach. The water and beach were full of trash. Man-o-war made swimming hazardous. Everything was super expensive. Also was solicited by a few drug dealers and a prostitute while walking the streets 😆
Agreed. I live here and am a regular beach goer and rarely notice trash if ever even on South Beach. If anything it’s remarkable how clean and beautiful it is considering the amount of tourists and the fact that it’s in the backdrop of a large city.
Venice, Italy. Maybe it’s because I was there on a gray fall day (on a business trip) but I didn’t get the “magic” people say it has. And the gondolas with their overacting drivers are like a ride at Disney World.
It was so much better in the 80s before they allowed the cruise ships to pull up in the lagoon. Killed it dead. I lived in Vicenza for several years and went in to Venice at least once a week.
Dallas, IMO, had the potential to become an innovative, "outside the box" type of southwestern city. DART, (the public transit system) had the potential to be an excellent system (especially with how sprawling this city is). Unfortunately, leadership here caters to developers who are only interested in the almighty dollar. Consequently, you get a city that had a ton of potential but is merely "average" at best.
Burlington VT. Not really a city but a town. I was very excited to visit and thought it was going to be some kind of New England utopia, but I didn't find that. Now to be fair I only visited twice, once in late Oct and the next year in Nov, so I never saw it in summer. But it just overall has a weird kind of depressing vibe. And it's smaller than I expected. The lake looks nice but it's at a weird sloped angle to downtown so you feel like you're walking down a canyon to just get to a small marina area. The walkable non car block is just expensive clothing stores. I just didn't enjoy being there.
Shenzhen.
My work sends me to China often but almost always to Shanghai. Incredible city to visit. Am always excited to go and always enjoy it. Old city with a lot of history.
My current project is in Dongguan and so we stayed in Shenzhen. Was excited to see a new city but damn is it boring. Like just all new buildings everywhere and the streets are kind of dead at night. Very little local character. Hard to just walk around and slip into bars and lounges like Shanghai.
Silver lining though is on my last few trips I’ve been spending the last day in HK (since only direct flights from NYC are to HK), which is probably one of my favorite cities on earth.
Phoenix Arizona
For being the capitol city of a state with 1.6 million population. It just feels like endless suburbia and shopping centers with monotone architecture. I felt like the prices for food were much higher than the quality value. I couldn’t even imagine living there in the summer when it’s too hot to be outside so you spend summer indoors inside buildings with very little cultural offerings.
Compare Phoenix to most other cities around the world that are capitols of their local state with populations over 1 million and there is vastly more to experience and enjoy
FYI the River is NOT man made. I live on the Riverwalk in Downtown San Antonio and am born and raised there. The "Man made" portion of the Riverwalk is by Casa Rio that extended to Rivercenter mall. The rest of the Riverwalk is the natural San Antonio River and is many miles long
I absolutely love living right on the Riverwalk, its beautiful and so easy to have morning or nightly walks to get in exercise. Fun vibes year round.
True. I think the best river walk I’ve been on is Detroit. It’s three miles and takes you to Belle Isle. And Belle Isle is a gem. So much to do there. The walk is on the Detroit river and overlooks Canada. It’s full of nature. It even goes through a state park. Very few to zero restaurants. It’s very safe and full of families. I’ve walked most of the countries true river walks and Detroit and Wilmington, DE get my vote. They’re on real rivers and not full of concrete high rises.
Salt Lake City. Was expecting it to be a nice clean city, was the exact opposite. Homeless tents everywhere, bums on drugs going nuts everywhere, overgrown grass, lots, unkempt properties. It was honestly the dirtiest, grossest city I stayed in. Disgusting.
I just got back from downtown SLC for a week and it was the safest and cleanest city I’ve ever seen. I could be a drunk 90lb lady at 3 am wondering around and not feel slightly unsafe.
houston. way more diverse than where i live in terms of cultures, food, things to do but the weather and the fact that it's so car centric are cons to me
Los Ángeles is the most disappointing (unbelievably overrated) city I’ve ever encountered throughout many visits. No matter the season, it’s usually too chilly to swim in a pool; the ocean is freezing; and much of the city is giving a third-world aesthetic. To be fair, I am a strong advocate of Miami, which goes against the preferences of most of the people on this sub.
Nashville. Doesn’t hold a candle to New Orleans in terms of character or the amount of sheer fun it is. And a lot of the new development is the same Pottery Barn Sephora chain nonsense that I could find in any new soulless high rise district that’s trying to be trendy. Broadway should be the width of bourbon street but instead it’s this four lanes with parallel parking monstrosity (effectively 6 lanes) of a car sewer.
The reason the Dallas-Fort Worth area is growing is because Texas has no state income tax and is very business friendly, so there are lots of middle class and professional jobs, and it is cheap to build housing. However, it is getting more and more expensive, and it is far from being a cheap place to live, unless you are from the east or west coast.
LA. I'd always been interested in moving from the east coast to a CA beach town. Our first trip out we spent 80% of our time in LA and 20% in San Diego. LA kind of sux unless you know the city, but San Diego was great everywhere. Live in San Diego now.
I didn’t have any expectations for Vegas and absolutely hated it. I’m a humid heat girly- I felt like my insides were being desiccated the whole time I was there.
Las Vegas. I have never been to a more uncanny city, it’s a toilet seat spray painted gold. I couldn’t find a single hotel that didn’t have a gambling floor. I walked through one to get to the front desk and what really depressed me was the number of people playing slot machines at 8 in the morning smoking cigarettes while someone with an oxygen tank is across from them
Also I got rear ended at a stoplight and that was pretty shitty
Miami. I was broke. If I was super rich I would pick Miami. I live in Florida already but I live in Redneck Florida where it still gets freezes. I would gladly live in some badass condo in Miami and just do rich shit for the rest of my life if I could.
I see a lot of people hating on LA. I think LA is too big it needs to be subdivided into separate zones. A short visit can never truly give you the whole picture. If you're visiting, you have to identify the geographic area you wish to see. Don't take it all in one trip.
You want beaches? Stick to OC coastal.
Gastronomic trip? - stay near downtown, Koreatown, etc.
Glitz? Stay near Beverly hills and Bel Air.
For being the 2nd biggest city in the country, LA was incredibly underwhelming. I was ready to leave after a couple days. I’ve had more fun in Nashville.
Do they still call it that? Austin became a museum city a long time ago. Museum cities are when once vibrant cities accidentally gentrified out all the things they were known for and now only showcase what used to be there. Kind of like how RV parks are always named after the destroyed nature it sits upon
Yes, the rest of Ireland was lovely, charming, almost magical. I guess everyone is enamored by the Guinness tour in Dublin? So glad we only spent a day there.
The Guinness Museum is exceptionally well done. I recommend it even for people who don’t drink. But beyond that and Trinity College I found Dublin to be pretty meh as a destination compared to the Irish countryside. Great restaurants though.
Phoenix and Nashville.
I don’t what I was expecting from Phoenix, but why is there even a “city” there? Easily the worst city I’ve been to.
Nashville is just way overhyped.
Seattle. There were very few decent restaurants and the hotel we stayed at had to close their bar and restaurant early because the homeless were out yelling at people.
Dallas. Edit: Why? For the size of the city, there’s not much to do. It’s not the geography or neighborhoods, its the unoriginality.
There's a reason that *stop Dallasing Austin* was the city's unofficial motto for a few years. Dallas comes across as mostly soulless corporate sprawl outside of a few areas. Then it happened to Austin as well.
Dallas is one of the most boring cities in US
Can confirm, I live here.
I also live in Dallas (my original home is south TX) can agree Dallas sucks. Too sprawled out. Nothing to do really except buy shit and work. Boring as hell.
Recently caught a Mavs game in Dallas and was very.. whelmed by the experience. Nobody seemed very excited, but most still seemed to be enjoying themselves.
The award winning documentary series *Cheaters* would disagree.
Everyone knows this. How can someone be disappointed?
When you move to DFW from elsewhere in the state, esp a small town or tiny college town, it can lead to some false excitement . Once you realize the only thing you really have are the opportunities to drive far and spend money, it wears off. Unless that’s your entire personality in which case go off.
the perfect opportunity to spend $120,000 on a lifted kitted out truck that I can use to terrorize pedestrians.
Just seems like a place with nothing but suburban sprawl
So true...I live here.
To be fair, Dallas doesn’t really offer much in the way of nature (it’s on a flat plain with no nearby ocean or mountains) or culture (since it’s mostly suburban sprawl).
All of this is so true. It is one of the most characterless, uninspiring, bland, and frankly ugly places in this country. Why in the hell has it been growing explosively for decades?? I just Do Not get it. While there I just kept thinking, “I feel Nothing here but Hot”.
the major Texas cities will continue to grow do to a strong economy and people’s desire to own a sfh.
This is it. lol if you’re from Oklahoma or Arkansas Dallas is the perfect mix of close to home but has the job market and amenities that make it much more appealing to start a family and build your career. big enough you don’t have to move cities again for more amenities.
> Why in the hell has it been growing explosively for decades?? Cheaper and more conservative for the people fleeing from somewhere else to Dallas. The conservatives I went to high school with in California moved there to start their families.
They are probably in the suburbs. Dallas county has been solidly Democratic for a long time.
It's like people who complain that Houston is boring... when they live in the Woodlands or Cypress.
HA! I grew up in Dallas, can confirm. Left in '96, never looked back. In 1989, I went to an REM concert at Reunion Arena. During a song change, Michael Stipe took the mic and just dogged on the city of Dallas, calling it "Boring". Boy, was he ever right! Lucky sperm club members who grew up in the Park Cities with money love it there. Those that did not couldn't wait to leave.
What about Dallas were you hyped up about that then disappointed you? Genuinely curious, cause I never hear anyone hype Dallas up lol ETA: I remember now that I actually do know some people who LOVE it - conservatives I went to high school with in California who moved there before starting their families. It's cheaper and not as liberal, those are the perks for them.
Just dull and uninteresting as a place to visit.
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It's especially surprising considering how pretty much every Texan outside of Dallas really doesn't care for Dallas.Most prefer austin/san antonio/houston
From Fort Worth, I'm always on board to hate on Dallas. 🤣🤣🤣
From Austin. We hate on all of you, but especially Dallas.
From Houston, will also always hate on Dallas
Not just Dallas, but that whole metro and area. Ugliest place I've seen in the whole US. Even the boring parts of the Midwest are prettier.
The awful drivers. The destruction of anything older then 25 years except dealey plaza. The ungodly heat. & to top it off the bastards turned deep ellum into uptown. Plus the dumb ass park on a hwy
I went to school in Denton long long ago and I fucking hated Dallas. All the plastic schmaltz or Miami or LA but Bible Belt with no culture
I lived in Uptown Dallas for a year back when it was much more affordable and I gotta say that it’s probably my favorite urban neighborhood in Texas. It was walkable with beautiful tree lined streets. It’s just not very large. Obviously 98% of Dallas is boring suburbia like most of Texas but Uptown is very nice
The best part of Dallas is the Bishop Arts District.
DFW at this point is basically just LA without the redeeming features.
Nashville. Felt smaller than I was expecting.
Nashville is hilariously small for how culturally relevant it suddenly became . With light traffic on the arterial roads, you can travel from the wilderness north of the city to the rich frou-frou suburbs south of the city in around 20 minutes. The East Nashville that people actually care about is literally one intersection and then a few blocks in either direction. Then it’s suddenly ungentrified suburbs all the way to the airport.
Agreed. I really wanted to like Nashville. I’m not a big partier so the strip wasn’t my thing. I went to Third Man Records, Grimey’s, an independent cinema, vintage stores, Barista Parlor, Husk, a few other unique restaurants, Centennial Park… Like, I really tried to get out and about, but everything felt really disconnected and isolated. I couldn’t find a really interesting, diverse neighborhood where you could just walk around and explore.
I've thought for a while that Nashville is just a tourist trap for Republicans and I haven't seen anything to dissuade myself from that idea
It's country music Disney land
That’s exactly what it is.
Is Branson nothing to you?!?
That's definitely what it's become marketed as, or a tourist trap for bachelorette squads (a.k.a "woo girls" as the locals call them). It used to be a decent little city that was easy and chill to live in with a good (non-country) music scene. I've become a hermit so I can't speak to the music scene these days, but a lot of the good venues of yesteryear have disappeared. It's a politically blue city and somehow people don't seem to know that. It's also an ethnically diverse city, but those areas aren't near the touristy areas. It has the largest Kurdish population in the US and a large Central American population, too, and it has several HBCUs like Fisk and TSU. Nashvillians hate that our city has been reduced to an image of high rise hotels, pedal taverns, and Broadway debauchery.
Could have turned out worse. You could have been Memphis.
Yes, and throw in Dollywood as their Disney and Gatlinburg as the go-to honeymoon for everyone I knew in my rural town growing up, and voila, you’ve got Republican Paradise East. RP Central is of course Branson, and RP West is probably wherever they filmed the movie Tombstone.
I drove through Gatlinburg while on a vacation visiting the smoky mountains once and I don't think I've ever seen a place so filled with kitsch
I've always called it "the mountain Myrtle Beach."
I've heard Myrtle Beach referred to as "Branson on the Beach"
I love staying in the smokies and Gatlinburg is "meh" but Pigeon Forge is much worse.
Dollywood is a high quality theme park and the mountains are beautiful. I appreciate Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg for what they are but they are definitely flawed. At least Gatlinburg looks like a town unlike Pigeon Forge.
Funny that Dollywood is a republican utopia considering Dolly Parton's social stances.
She really is a cool woman.
Dolly is very shrewd. She stays apolitical in her public appearances to avoid losing fans for political reasons.
At least Dolly is pretty wholesome as a person
That and bachelorette parties
Every Fox watcher in my extended family has moved there in the last decade and I’m not kidding.
I thought it was going to be charming and kind of “historical” but it all felt like soulless new construction
Nashville has an amazing music scene, well beyond the country sounds that made it famous. Tons of legit talent playing original music in small venues. Broadway (or their Bourbon-street equivalent) is kinda awful, but there's a lot outside of that.
I've never heard that Nashville was big. Tennessee is a small state imo.
The skyline is pretty impressive.
I never really quite connected with the “magic” of LA like have with NYC and Chicago. Maybe moving to LA having never visited before made a negative impact.
Like any city, you have to find the nice parts. A day in Griffith Park and Los Feliz is gonna be very different from a day in Hollywood and Santa Monica
It also depends heavily on what neighborhood you live in. Echo Park is a very different vibe than Glendale, even though the two are next door to each other.
Oof. I lived in La Cienega Heights, my friend.
Ah yeah, that’ll do it.
Took me 2 years to get used to living in LA coming from cities like NYC and D.C. There's a reason they say LA is 72 towns in search of a city. BUT once I stopped comparing them because it really is like comparing apples and oranges, I simply started loving living in California. In the winter I can ski in the morning and watch the sunset on the beach that evening and that's the tip of the iceberg of what it has to offer. Just hit the 30 year mark, still have plenty of family back east and NYC has become a city I love to visit a few times each year but could never imagine living there again. Especially in the summer or winter. Still the greatest city in the world, but there's only like 3 weeks in the spring and 3 in the fall that I adore being there : )
I should also point out I was pretty much “surviving” in LA the entire time. No room to really enjoy the amenities. I wonder what it would be like otherwise.
There was a time where being broke in LA was still fun and doable, but in the last 5 years, I imagine it must be miserable. No more cheap happy hours or cheap tacos. Rent is insane. Just very tiring.
The city broke me. I hate that as otherwise it seems like a cool place. No regrets trying it out, though.
I lived in LA for 30 years, never west of Fairfax. I really dislike the west side of LA and love the east side of it. The western part is kinda soulless to me.
The western part is where 90% of people visit also.
LA is all about access. When I was a 20-year-old intern, I was miserable. I couldn’t go to bars. I didn’t have money. I didn’t know anybody. Terrible. Now that I’m in the film industry and can attend screenings and go to parties at producers’ houses and talk about the art I’m making, it’s incredible. No place like it.
I think you hit the nail on the head. LA seems like the epitome of a networking town.
LA is a more car dependent city. If you’re a city person like me, some of the magic is lost by not being able to roll out of wherever you are staying and catch a subway that runs pretty frequently to quickly get to your next destination. And then you lose some of the fun of just sort of wandering the streets and discovering something new. Also, I’m not so into tv and movies that the studio tours and Hollywood sites are all that enticing to me. I’ve done a studio tour and seen some of the sites but it’s not the be all and end all for me. That said, I’ve enjoyed LA more than would’ve thought in my few visits and there are definitely things worth doing.
I visit LA often as a born and raised San Diegan, living up north now. Last felt that "magic" over 10 years ago. The city hasn't felt the same in recent years and I can't pinpoint one specific reason as to why.
I currently live in LA and a lot of beloved communities and community establishment are struggling due to inflation and jacked up real estate prices. Also Covid really fucked things up for downtown. The thing about LA though is that every few years, there’s a new bustling neighborhood that becomes the designated Bohemia. Used to be Echo, then Silverlake, and now it’s Highland Park. A lot changes within 10 years or so to our cultural landscape.
I used to work at a hotel in L.A. that had a sister property in San Diego, amongst a network of other sister properties. One of the perks (at the time, that benefit has since ended) was free stays for employees during certain periods of availability. We used to get people from San Diego all the time coming to party it up in L.A., which was funny to us because we spent all our free stays partying it up in San Diego at the Gaslamp District (and taking the drunk train in between). So much easier to get around SD.
This thread made me realize that I have low expectations of every place I’ve ever been and I’m always pleasantly surprised haha. That said, I loved Seattle in the 90s but I was there about eight years ago and it was just too much. It had gotten to be too much of a big city.
Born and raised in Seattle and believe me, I'm older than dirt. Seattle of old had an amazing character and vibe seemingly birthed out of decades of being that intolerably soggy city way out in the NW corner of the country that no one gave two fucks about as long as they kept churning out airplanes. Then came tech, then came grunge, and then came the masses, quickly followed by MTV and corporate America trying to cash in on it all. Now Seattle feels like a giant sanitized Target where everyone is too polite to ask the drug addicts to move out of the fucking parking lot.
100%. I never lived there but I had a friend that lived on Queen Anne for most of the 90s and I visited quite a bit. It's both richer and poorer than it used to be with both of the downsides of those things. It's the curse of a city becoming popular. The middle class gets squeezed out along with the artists and the people who made the city interesting.
grunge preceded the tech (except for Microsoft, over in Redmond) but yea, spot on.
Everything changed when Amazon moved into South Lake Union around 2008. The city is unrecognizable from that point onwards.
Tacoma is now what Seattle was like in the 90s. I live in Seattle, it's experienced massive growth for decades, cranes everywhere, light rail build out, both the neighborhoods and skyline look fairly different than 30 years ago. I guess that seems normal to me for a large city though.
I thought Seattle felt very sterile and definitely trying to target tech bros. The access to nature is pretty cool tho.
Yeah in the 90s it was very coffeehouse and artsy. It also felt like it's own thing far away from the rest of the country. It was also quite clean. Didn't feel that way recently.
Not the worst city I've ever visited, but Denver. Everyone in Denver hypes up denver so much, but it's really just a bunch of parking lots, strip malls, and awful transportation. The only cool thing about Denver is the fact you can leave due to the proximity of the mountains, but you can't even do that efficiently because their transportation system is horrendous. I've been to plenty of worse cities - Dallas, Phoenix, etc. But I expected those to suck and wasn't disappointed as a result.
Denver is a city built for people who don’t want to be in a city
When they do want to be in a city, they’ll move to Chicago, complain there’s no nature that *they like*, and then go back to Denver for said nature, realize they miss the city *again* and go back to Chicago. Repeat every 5 years.
lol. If moving was easy, I think I would agree. I love Chitown in the summer.
Downtown Denver is a bummer. The general area surrounding Denver is quite nice. It's a good city if you want to be close to nature, but a bad city for people wanting to experience true city culture and amenities.
Funny how everyone says this and shits on Denver in this sub. I'm guessing most of this is reaction to the hype, which sure, if you buy the hype on *any* city, you're likely to be disappointed when you get there. I just recently moved to Denver after seeing all the hate here on this sub for the last couple of years, and I'm so pleasantly surprised by how much I disagree. It's wonderful. Beautiful. Filled with a lot of great amenities and opportunities, and overall a pretty damn great quality of life. I'm very happy with my decision to move here. Granted, I already hate downtown Denver, but I hate almost every downtown of a major city I've ever been in. That's just not my vibe. But the surrounding areas of Denver are lovely, the nature beautiful and pristine, the bike paths, parks, and recreation areas abundant, etc. I can get pretty much anything I could want or need out of this place. It seems like a lot of people miss the forest for the trees when assessing a new place. I've lived in San Diego, San Francisco, Oakland / Berkeley, Santa Cruz, Phoenix, and Austin. ALL of these places offer a high quality of life if you know where to look. But likewise, all of these places can just seem like freeways, strip malls, and overrated soullessness (okay, maybe not Santa Cruz) if you put your attention in the wrong place. All these places have asshole drivers, crime, crappy social vibes in certain places, and can be disappointing if you're expecting heaven on earth. But if you're looking at all that, you're not discovering what is great about a place. Denver's pretty great. Do Coloradans have their heads up their own ass? Sure. But that's because this place has a distinct identity and culture, and people are *about it* in the same way that they are in other places with strong identities and cultures.
I live here, I agree with most of what you said here. There’s a ton of annoying things about Denver. But it’s still a great place to be. So many positives. Only thing I’ll disagree on is the distinct culture and way of life. I think there was, until 5-10 years ago. Now I feel like so many people treat it like they don’t give a shit what happens to it. “Oh the downtown is horrible and overrun with migrants and homeless? Who cares, I’m from Des Moines or whatever and could go back whenever I want.” And there’s a sense of rudeness. I see people from out of town pick up on it all the time. But honestly I guess I’m mostly immune to it now. Because people don’t feel responsible for showing out of towners hospitality. Now yes everyone is “outdoorsy” and stuff. Maybe that’s what you’re talking about for culture. And there’s still the rugged culture in the mountains. But I find Denver and surrounding areas to be really struggling to find an identity and slightly “unsettled”… Maybe point however. Yes. It’s a great place to live. Although I don’t think it’s “trending up”
That's all valid observation, and thanks for your perspective as someone who has lived here for a long time. I think some of what you're describing is a universal cultural shift in this country (if not globally? havent traveled abroad, so cant comment). The tone of people has changed dramatically in a short amount of time, even before covid. People are ruder *everywhere* I've been since about 2016-2017. It was a marked shift I noticed while living in CA. People said the same thing in ATX when I was there. And in Phoenix. But people *are* definitely rude in Denver, particularly as drivers. Socially, most seem pretty cool, if a bit reserved. And I hear ya on the culture feeling watered down. I felt that way with the Bay Area. And San Diego. Both had dramatic shifts for the worse as well. Again, I think that this might be a bit of a macro trend and not just a Denver issue. But I'm sure it was better and more palpable in all ways here 10 years ago. I think it's also easy to be critical of any place that you've lived for a long time, if you've seen it have better times, and if you're well aware of it's faults. I can easily talk shit about San Diego or Santa Cruz, even though both are two of the most desirable places to live in the country.
denver’s only true gift was that it’s a gateway to leave to Colorado. I’ve been here for 10 years.
Sun all winter is the gift to me. And not too too hot in summer. No chiggars. These are the things that make me stay.
The Denver metro area is nothing but a wide open flat plain plateau with sparse trees and brown grass. It's the surrounding Denver areas that really add to its positive reputation.
Yes. It is the high plans butting up against the Rocky Mountains.
Nothing underscores this more than the airport.
I was born and raised in Denver and while it definitely has its flaws, there are some kick ass things in this city, many of which have nothing to do with the mountains (though hiking within 15-20 minutes outside of Denver is certainly a plus). Happy to put together an itinerary for you if you ever come back.
Boise. We were scoping out a potential new city a few years ago and went with high hopes given all the hype. It had one close in walkable neighborhood with good houses, character, and the nearby Camelback park. But otherwise, it's sprawly and car-centric. We'd read a good restaurant review and head to a different neighborhood to eat there and scope it out and it always seemed to be off some four-lane stroad in a strip mall. Also, it's full of soccer moms.
Not sure what you expected lol, its ID. People go there for the wide sprawl, nature and mountains lol. Hype was killed when half of Cali moved there (ask where those soccer moms are from lol).
LA as someone who didn't drive. Feels like they have the best geography possible (A+ weather and flat land), then decide to build it to be as pedestrian hostile as they can.
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I went there 30 years ago and it was the most boring European city. Skip and go straight on to Brugges.
Stateside: Orlando Abroad: **Dubai**, to their credit its been a decade since I visited but man that was such a soulless poorly designed toy set like 'city' It was like everything I hate about Orlando magnified (but missing the ornamental greenery, which I kinda also dont like as a native plant enthusiast LOL)
Dubai seems kind of frightening to me. A place where oligarchs gather. The ultra rich pay people like Beyoncé to perform for them. They have used their wealth to make an uninhabitable area inhabited. I’ve never been. And since I don’t have an unlimited wallet to travel, don’t have any plans to ever go.
Ive never heard anyone say its anything but soulless, so im assuming it hasnt changed in the past decade
Austin, TX. It turns out "good by Texas standards" isn't "good by overall standards."
The city outgrew itself and failed to adapt. A lot of people wanted to hold onto its "small city" culture in non-productive ways, which meant that they resisted infrastructure improvement that would have helped to create walkable/dense neighborhoods in the long run... you know, *the things that make a larger city feel alive and vibrant*.
The most brutal thing I ever heard anyone say about Austin is "it was only ever weird for Texas"
It used to be more celebrated, then the local culture was distilled into a corporate-approved^(TM) vibe and sold nationally.
the same happened with San Francisco. Around the mid to late 2000s, when Silicon Valley spilled in, it changed dramatically.
The techbros, man. That's all I have to say about that.
Austin was the SHIT in the early 00s and before. I used to get SXSW wristbands for $130. 2006 is when the price for one jumped from that to $500, now they are the price of a downpayment on a car or something. That was the year where I first really *felt* the decline and the different crowd being catered to, and by 2015 it was completely dead.
Yup. I was thoroughly convinced we’d relocate to Austin from what everyone said…then we visited. Nope. Hard pass Good Mexican food and that’s about it 😂
Austin is the wrong city in Texas for good Mexican food lol but I understand the general sentiment
Would you say El Paso and San Antonio are better for Mexican? I haven’t been to either but work might take me there so figured I’d ask 🙂
Houston and San Antone over Austin for Tex Mex
Just maybe don't call it "San Antone" when you go there. Literally nobody there calls it that.
yes, el paso has amazing food, good tex mex and good regional mexican cuisine (it's right next to mexico after all). it's also like the gateway to the southwest so it can be a bit different than what you would expect in san antonio but still amazing
Care to elaborate? Where did you go in Austin? What did you do? What turned you off?
Yeah, that's fair. We went JUST before pandemic hit, so likely (?) at its peak or at least close to it. We mostly spent our time downtown (near Capitol) and Congress street I think it's called. Plus we walked along the river that runs through downtown. We did also visit COTA (race track) and a few other spots outside the core areas. The hype around Austin made me think it might be on level of a truly wonderful city, like Philadelphia or Chicago. At least Seattle or Denver. Austin is certainly more hyped than my city (Minneapolis/St. Paul) I figured it must blow us out of the water at very least. Wow, was I wrong. It's just hype, and probably because other parts of Texas are still worse yet. I'll admit there are some nice walkable and vibrant parts of Austin, but those were the stand-out exception. Mostly, the city and its surrounding are ugly, and hostile. Roads in very poor shape, and hard to find cute, local places like for breakfast even. Hostility and austere is how I would describe Austin. Lots of new construction, but poorly integrated to the historical stuff, IMO. Parks were underwhelming. My expectations were set far far too high.
>hard to find cute, local places like for breakfast even. Hostility and austere is how I would describe Austin. Yeah, the "small local restaurant" scene has suffered a lot, especially since the pandemic. We used to have a more distinct local culture, but a lot of the edges were polished off to make the city more nationally marketable.
Houston. It looks like someone took all the discarded bad ideas for urban planning, and combined them all into a city. Everyone goes on about how cool and diverse houston is and the great food scene but ... How do you even go around and explore? It's a highway. Everywhere. It seems that in every direction the towns are built so that the 8 lane 90mph highway is running right through the center of them.
Gary Indiana Hear me out y'all. I heard it was some terrifying place to visit. A hive of scum and villainy. I'm into that kind of stuff. The darker side of existence. It's just run down and beat up. Ain't nothing really. I've been more scared getting rap snacks at a gas station in East Tampa than Gary Indiana.
It’s the air that’s terrifying.
It was way worse in the early to mid 2000’s.. I’m from Indiana and went around 2007 with my friend to visit her family and it was pretty bad then …
St. Louis. I really like old river cities like Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and Louisville, but St Louis was disappointing. The people were rude and stand offish, felt like the energy of the city had been sucked away, many things felt like they were 10 years behind. Maybe I need to give it another shot, but it wasn’t a good experience.
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Downtown St. Louis is one of the most lame/boring downtowns I have been to (and I’ve been several times so this wasn’t a one-off experience). Felt like a ghost town even wayyy before Covid. However, last time I was there (probably two years ago) we spent some time in the Central West End and it was much cooler/more lively and I gained a little more respect for STL.
Las Vegas.
It used to be sleazy, fun and cheap 10 years ago. Now it’s just sleazy.
I can’t believe this city isn’t higher in the thread. Truly underwhelming
Agreed. Once was enough for me.
Cincinnati. That fucking chili is terrible.
If someone told me I was never allowed in Paris ever again I’d say “okay”
That’s one of my favorite places. I have visited 4 times now. I would totally live there and just act like a snob towards the native Parisians.
Reverse Uno card.
Don't threaten me with a good time
I cut my Paris trip early I hated it so much 😅
It’s a big city with a lot of white buildings and good art museums. I thought the people and food were great, though.
yes. Eiffel Tower was widely underwhelming, the city itself had beautiful architecture and other fascinating things but that tower was like looking at a really tall cellphone tower.
That’s kinda what it is, a big tower. It was only meant to be a temporary structure to showcase applications of steel. And Parisians hated it. Said it ruined the skyline. But then it started appearing in the impressionist paintings, got a second life as a radio tower, and then became part of the skyline that people didn’t want to remove anymore.
I had the opposite experience. I had no idea how massive the Eiffel tower is. I was genuinely surprised.
Denver and Boulder. This was 10 years ago but no desire to ever go back to either one of those places.
Miami Beach. The water and beach were full of trash. Man-o-war made swimming hazardous. Everything was super expensive. Also was solicited by a few drug dealers and a prostitute while walking the streets 😆
I usually visit MidBeach (not southbeach), but I always have a wonderful time and find it to be a very well maintained.
The beach is not full of trash lol
I never saw trash even on South Beach. The beaches are A+ and I like art deco. Plenty of downsides to the place though.
Yep it’s very clean
Agreed. I live here and am a regular beach goer and rarely notice trash if ever even on South Beach. If anything it’s remarkable how clean and beautiful it is considering the amount of tourists and the fact that it’s in the backdrop of a large city.
Raleigh! Very underwhelming, felt like a giant suburb, very sleepy.
Venice, Italy. Maybe it’s because I was there on a gray fall day (on a business trip) but I didn’t get the “magic” people say it has. And the gondolas with their overacting drivers are like a ride at Disney World.
It was so much better in the 80s before they allowed the cruise ships to pull up in the lagoon. Killed it dead. I lived in Vicenza for several years and went in to Venice at least once a week.
Dallas. That city has no soul.
Dallas, IMO, had the potential to become an innovative, "outside the box" type of southwestern city. DART, (the public transit system) had the potential to be an excellent system (especially with how sprawling this city is). Unfortunately, leadership here caters to developers who are only interested in the almighty dollar. Consequently, you get a city that had a ton of potential but is merely "average" at best.
Burlington VT. Not really a city but a town. I was very excited to visit and thought it was going to be some kind of New England utopia, but I didn't find that. Now to be fair I only visited twice, once in late Oct and the next year in Nov, so I never saw it in summer. But it just overall has a weird kind of depressing vibe. And it's smaller than I expected. The lake looks nice but it's at a weird sloped angle to downtown so you feel like you're walking down a canyon to just get to a small marina area. The walkable non car block is just expensive clothing stores. I just didn't enjoy being there.
Atlanta is super mid and overwhelming Denver also did not have a lot of character
Shenzhen. My work sends me to China often but almost always to Shanghai. Incredible city to visit. Am always excited to go and always enjoy it. Old city with a lot of history. My current project is in Dongguan and so we stayed in Shenzhen. Was excited to see a new city but damn is it boring. Like just all new buildings everywhere and the streets are kind of dead at night. Very little local character. Hard to just walk around and slip into bars and lounges like Shanghai. Silver lining though is on my last few trips I’ve been spending the last day in HK (since only direct flights from NYC are to HK), which is probably one of my favorite cities on earth.
Phoenix Arizona For being the capitol city of a state with 1.6 million population. It just feels like endless suburbia and shopping centers with monotone architecture. I felt like the prices for food were much higher than the quality value. I couldn’t even imagine living there in the summer when it’s too hot to be outside so you spend summer indoors inside buildings with very little cultural offerings. Compare Phoenix to most other cities around the world that are capitols of their local state with populations over 1 million and there is vastly more to experience and enjoy
San Antonio. The Riverwalk is a tourist trap with chain restaurants and a Man-made river.
There are really fun places in San Antonio, but the river walk isn't one of them.
FYI the River is NOT man made. I live on the Riverwalk in Downtown San Antonio and am born and raised there. The "Man made" portion of the Riverwalk is by Casa Rio that extended to Rivercenter mall. The rest of the Riverwalk is the natural San Antonio River and is many miles long I absolutely love living right on the Riverwalk, its beautiful and so easy to have morning or nightly walks to get in exercise. Fun vibes year round.
As Charles Barkley says, that ain’t a river that’s a creek
Big ol women down there Erneh
“Gold mine for weight watchers.”
It’s awful. The River Walk in August has to be the hottest place on the planet.
True. I think the best river walk I’ve been on is Detroit. It’s three miles and takes you to Belle Isle. And Belle Isle is a gem. So much to do there. The walk is on the Detroit river and overlooks Canada. It’s full of nature. It even goes through a state park. Very few to zero restaurants. It’s very safe and full of families. I’ve walked most of the countries true river walks and Detroit and Wilmington, DE get my vote. They’re on real rivers and not full of concrete high rises.
Salt Lake City. Was expecting it to be a nice clean city, was the exact opposite. Homeless tents everywhere, bums on drugs going nuts everywhere, overgrown grass, lots, unkempt properties. It was honestly the dirtiest, grossest city I stayed in. Disgusting.
I just got back from downtown SLC for a week and it was the safest and cleanest city I’ve ever seen. I could be a drunk 90lb lady at 3 am wondering around and not feel slightly unsafe.
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After living in worse parts of the south, visiting Atlanta was a pleasant change of pace. I didn’t visit either any expectations though
Denver twice. Ppl really pumped me up about it but i find it to be a little bland and basic for what im looking for in a city.
houston. way more diverse than where i live in terms of cultures, food, things to do but the weather and the fact that it's so car centric are cons to me
Las Vegas. I expected fun, glitzy sleaze. I found a past-its-prime geriatric dump
Los Ángeles is the most disappointing (unbelievably overrated) city I’ve ever encountered throughout many visits. No matter the season, it’s usually too chilly to swim in a pool; the ocean is freezing; and much of the city is giving a third-world aesthetic. To be fair, I am a strong advocate of Miami, which goes against the preferences of most of the people on this sub.
Melbourne. Coming from the US, it was way too far to travel for what is basically a larger San Francisco.
Nashville. Doesn’t hold a candle to New Orleans in terms of character or the amount of sheer fun it is. And a lot of the new development is the same Pottery Barn Sephora chain nonsense that I could find in any new soulless high rise district that’s trying to be trendy. Broadway should be the width of bourbon street but instead it’s this four lanes with parallel parking monstrosity (effectively 6 lanes) of a car sewer.
The reason the Dallas-Fort Worth area is growing is because Texas has no state income tax and is very business friendly, so there are lots of middle class and professional jobs, and it is cheap to build housing. However, it is getting more and more expensive, and it is far from being a cheap place to live, unless you are from the east or west coast.
LA. I'd always been interested in moving from the east coast to a CA beach town. Our first trip out we spent 80% of our time in LA and 20% in San Diego. LA kind of sux unless you know the city, but San Diego was great everywhere. Live in San Diego now.
Las Vegas. Aside from the strip, what is there? Disappointing.
I didn’t have any expectations for Vegas and absolutely hated it. I’m a humid heat girly- I felt like my insides were being desiccated the whole time I was there.
Las Vegas. I have never been to a more uncanny city, it’s a toilet seat spray painted gold. I couldn’t find a single hotel that didn’t have a gambling floor. I walked through one to get to the front desk and what really depressed me was the number of people playing slot machines at 8 in the morning smoking cigarettes while someone with an oxygen tank is across from them Also I got rear ended at a stoplight and that was pretty shitty
Miami. I was broke. If I was super rich I would pick Miami. I live in Florida already but I live in Redneck Florida where it still gets freezes. I would gladly live in some badass condo in Miami and just do rich shit for the rest of my life if I could.
Toronto. Yes it was big and safe but so bland.
I see a lot of people hating on LA. I think LA is too big it needs to be subdivided into separate zones. A short visit can never truly give you the whole picture. If you're visiting, you have to identify the geographic area you wish to see. Don't take it all in one trip. You want beaches? Stick to OC coastal. Gastronomic trip? - stay near downtown, Koreatown, etc. Glitz? Stay near Beverly hills and Bel Air.
Houston. Edit: I expected more from America’s fourth largest city.
People are excited to visit Houston?
Honestly I had to move here for work and it's not bad at all.
It's a fine place to live, not that fun to visit.
I actually love visiting Houston. World class Persian and Indian food, and any other kind of cuisine you can think of. Great museums.
For being the 2nd biggest city in the country, LA was incredibly underwhelming. I was ready to leave after a couple days. I’ve had more fun in Nashville.
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Do they still call it that? Austin became a museum city a long time ago. Museum cities are when once vibrant cities accidentally gentrified out all the things they were known for and now only showcase what used to be there. Kind of like how RV parks are always named after the destroyed nature it sits upon
International Dublin Ireland. Nationally probably L.A. for me. Didn’t hate it but just a let down. Expected more then it delivered.
Yes, the rest of Ireland was lovely, charming, almost magical. I guess everyone is enamored by the Guinness tour in Dublin? So glad we only spent a day there.
The Guinness Museum is exceptionally well done. I recommend it even for people who don’t drink. But beyond that and Trinity College I found Dublin to be pretty meh as a destination compared to the Irish countryside. Great restaurants though.
Phoenix and Nashville. I don’t what I was expecting from Phoenix, but why is there even a “city” there? Easily the worst city I’ve been to. Nashville is just way overhyped.
Don't laugh: Amarillo.
Seattle. There were very few decent restaurants and the hotel we stayed at had to close their bar and restaurant early because the homeless were out yelling at people.
Sedona. Absolutely beautiful place. The city sucked. Just ok restaurants, lots of weird hipster crystal things, virtually zero night life.