Sprawl, traffic, low pay, climate is warming
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8/2/2019
The vast majority of reviewers that rate this city with five stars and glowing reviews I suspect are individuals that retired here or reside here on a seasonal basis. Tucson a dozen years ago was a much more liveable city than now for a host of reasons. 1) Tucson is growling quickly, many of the new residents have migrated here from Southern California and when purchasing a home they often pay over the asking price thus driving up real estate prices and artificially skewing the market, rents are escalating quickly as well, Phoenix is becoming another LA, Tucson another Phoenix. 2) Tucson should have built one or two highways surrounding the circle to encourage better traffic flow, believe it or not Tucson actually has real traffic problems now and terrible roads as well. 3) Besides U of A, Rayeon, and a few city/county/state jobs there is little industry here, and the pay scale here is about 3/4 or less of what you would make in Phoenix, in fact probably 80% or more of the positions at U of A pay 30-40K. 4) Tucson has its fair share of crime so you do have watch your step. 5) Tucson had adequate shopping and services for the most part but Tucson is very spread out. 6) Lastly Tucson doesn't have a real actual monsoon season anymore, U of A Dept of Atmospheric Sciences has the details. Tucson hasn't had a normal monsoon flow since the year 2000, so what you get are brief spotty shows here and there throughput the city with little accumulation but significant humidity in the evening plus the last four summers have been the warmest on record, Tucson's climate is decent from November to April but even October and May can very warm, and it's gets old scurrying from air conditioned places 24/7 for six months. Sorry to say Tucson had so much more going for it 20 years ago than now. It's more of a sprawling urban/suburban congested city now that will only get worse.
Joe | Tucson, AZ