Austin TX to Pittsburgh PA
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7/26/2015
I am a college educated mellennial who moved from Austin to Pittsburgh in 2013 and this city is freakin' awesome. Here's why:
-this is one of the most friendly places I have ever been.
-the entire area has unbelievable character, the architecture makes you feel like you have steped back in time to a late 1800s industial city. Everything is brick, there are old smoke stacks and remenants of the steel industry everywhere.
-in TX the weather is great but it is unavoidable that the sun will fry your skin. In Pittsburgh it is cloudy a lot but that results in people staying way younger looking. I often can't tell if a woman is 45 or 30. When the sun does come out the landscape around Pittsburh is beautiful lush green mountains checkered with patches of golf course like grass around the houses.
-it is not unbearably crowded like Austin and other "hot spots" (bay area, Seattle)
-the art and cultural scene is good with a bunch of museums left over that rich industrialists built long ago, the Andy Worhol museum, etc.
-A lot of the main stream restraunts in Pittsburgh are overrated but if you do some digging there are amazing smaller places few people seem to know about. It also seems like great new restraunts are poping up everwhere.
-lots of good microbreweries.
-very affordable housing and robust housing market, houses in Austin are 20% over valued, here you can find a great house easily and it seems like everyone and thier dog is making money off an investment property. With Google expanding and Uber moving into the area it is going to keep pushing values up even faster in many parts of Pittsburgh.
-there are blue collar locals who love sports and hip, well-read folks so you get both ends of the spectrum.
-top schools, both primary and secondary with CMU having the top Computer Science graduate program in the world. There are a lot of sharp people around.
-Pittsburgh learned from the past and has a diversified economy making it more resiliant to economic downturns.
I sound like a Pittsburgh spokesperson but I am really happy I moved here. My only con is to steer clear of the Clairion area as the factory there gives off too much air pollution and drives down the air pollution average readings for the area, which aren't great anyway. The air in Pittsburgh in general is getting cleaner every year. With that getting under control Pittsburgh is going to stop being the best kept secret and really start booming. You can see the begining of the Pittsburgh renasissance already with all the construction and outside investment. I'm glad I got in early.
TX 2 | Pittsburgh, PA