re: America's Next Great Metropolis Is.....Austin

Nope. DFW is winning this race big! Northern area.

It's expensive as frick here to live now. Mopac expansion it seems will never get finished, great job expansion especially with. Companies like VMware, Dell is going through it's transition with EMC, and sudden expansion in the financial, investment banking sector. But it's losing its live music status as the live music capital of the world. Other regional markets are more competitive and Austin cannot book bands historically like they did on the cheap. Musicans are moving out faster than most thought sending Mayor Adler to act fast to save the music scene. It's losing it's weird Vibe for more of a hipster vibe which sucks. They need to do more to preserve austin's historical districts like Red river. East Austin is coming along but at the expense of losing some long time atx icons. Still love the outdoor scene and they just added a neat surf Austin Establishment. I love it, but it's becoming More like Dallas.

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Also, I think you said you work from home. I swear everyone I meet works from home, so how the frick is there traffic?

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A lot of people do work from home here because there are a lot of "consultants" here or because their companies either don't have offices here or they are given flex hours to account for the traffic.

There's still traffic because the freeway "system" really is THAT bad. In fact, it isn't a *system* at all - there's no logic or cohesiveness to it. It's a city of over a million people without a single actual loop freeway.

The truth is that the city council was "at large" until a few years ago and all always from the very central part of the city and dedicated to being anti growth. They tried to keep the inevitable from happening by blocking the infrastructure. Their slogan was "if we don't build it (roads) they won't come". But they came anyway. Trouble is, they went so far as to designate wildlife preserves in the logical paths of future freeways so that in many ways we're locked into it being this way.

Im in tech and looked into moving out there but The wages in Austin aren't high enough to justify the move.

My guess is that the place is already flooded with younger people who will work for less and who have moved there without lining a job up first.

I've had some tempting job offers from places in the Dallas area though and it appears job security and wages are higher there in my field. Austin is hyped more than other cities because it became a cool thing to do.

Charlotte, Phoenix, Sacramento, Atlanta, and SLC would all be better options for most tech folks that are over 30 but that's not to say Austin doesn't have a lot of positives.

A festering shithole would be like Little Rock or perhaps Montgomery, AL. Traffic sucks, but nothing like Houston and I would say Baton Rouge at times has worse traffic than Austin. I telecommute 2 days out of the week. Very easy to meet people with a lot of events, HH specials places where it's easy to conversate. I lived in The Arboretum, but now live in south Austin in the Barton hills area on the greenbelt and love it. South Austin is still very much Austin minus the condos popping up all over. You can get around south atx pretty easily. North Austin is getting more like Dallas especially around the Domain. And a festering shithole wouldn't have the Highland lakes system, nor tons of outdoor stuff to do.

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It's a festering shithole.

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No.

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but its losing its charm with as big as its getting.

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Yeah it is. The music scene actually is starting to go down as a result. Still great and much better than vast majority of other cities. The Austin sound venues also are starting to vanish. Granted Antoine's made it's comeback, and the Mohawk is still strong but Red 7 is gone, the Gypsy Lounge and a few of the others in the red river district.

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quote: my favorite thing about Austin is the 130 loop.

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It's sucks for the most part, but if you need to get from north Austin let's say around North parmer, RR Or off the 45 toll to Ben White or Way south it's the way to go.. I just don't like how it goes out the way south of the airport and it goes through an area with ton of feral hogs all of the place. TX Dot fricked up with the layout, but hey the speed limit is 85.

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i went to shoal creek for a saints game and it was awesome. Felt like I was back home.

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Sitting at the bar if anyone's watching here.

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come at me bro, i live and breathe this city and i can tell you its NOTHING like BR or NOLA or HOUSTON

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You're right, it sucks..