Tampa is OK part 2
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7/13/2006
city w/ 325,000 people (the metro area is much larger 2.6 million), drive north of Ybor City across I-4 or off of I-275 between downtown and Westshore and you'll know what I mean, it seems as you get further away from the city core things get nicer, unfortunately Tampa has done an overall poor job at preserving its historical districts, with the exception of Ybor City and Bayshore (South Tampa), many of these neighborhoods are rundown, but they're trying to do something about it now, lots of old cigar factories they are turning into apts...2) Sprawl....many of the NW (Carrollwood, Citrus Park, Lutz) NE (New Tampa, Temple Terrace and Eastern suburbs (Brandon, Seffner) are nice, but lack any sort of identity or cultural anything b/c they are so new, all chain restuarants and strip malls.....unfortunately this is way Tampa has grown, unlike many of our northeastern and midwestern cities which have more history..3) Lack of mass transit....there is a comprehensive bus system that covers many areas of Hillsborough County, but the area grown too fast for anyone to agree on anything more for the future though there are always talking about, my opinion is that this area won't have some sort of elevated train system or light rail for 30 years, when they have no choice.......
4) traffic is pretty bad for a city this size, not as bad as Orlando though...I-275, I-4, malfunction junction (I-275, I-4 interchange) Dale Mabry, S.R. 60, and I-75 can all be pretty bad...plus drivers are pretty bad but I think that can be attributed to b/c theres such a mix of people in the area (seniors, lots of transplants, locals 5) Little of Old Florida left in the area, no Southern Hospitality in this town....the city has no Southern identity, so if that's what you are looking for you are better off living in eastern or northern Hillsborough, or Pasco, Hernando, or Polk County....very little common courtesy, again probably due to the area's transient population, maybe if you from the Northeast you are used to that, but I think it's garbage and its not the way it used to be, but there are some friendly and great people here to meet here...6) not the most educated of cities but OK....partially due to large immigrant population, lots of blue collar types and people in service industry, also white collared professions....everyone bitches about the lack of descent wages here, if you are service industry it sucks, but if you are skilled labor or white collared, you can make it OK.....real es
John | St. Petersburg, FL