Danger, hazardous to health.
-
12/14/2021
I lived here all my life and I can ONLY think of other places I would rather be.
I’ve traveled the country for many things and even traveled internationally for business and in my 20 years of life there hasn’t been a worse place to live in Florida.
Section 1: infrastructure.
The city demonstrates a total lack of proper planning and locational understanding, with confusing roads that lead in wavy unfocused routes to roads that you can tell we’re made in the 30’s and have just been paved over, the southern tip of Tampa floods at even the slightest downpour making driving nearly impossible in some areas, with main roads flooding from an overcapacity drainage system that hasn’t been maintained or updated since the 90’s. The major roads tend to have nonsensical center turn lanes and the number of decrepit and abandoned buildings is absolutely deplorable.
Not only that but the most cultural part of the city is Ybor where outside the tourist areas seems to simply be a Party district mixed with lower income housing. The amount of poorly maintained buildings is also incredibly high, with some places that look as though they haven’t been detailed or thoroughly cleaned in DECADES. Not to even begin on the massive buildup of towering condos and apartments for “high class” individuals being built within spitting distance of houses that look like they sell crack (and some probably do) the entire city has very little in regards to actually pleasant views, with views of old Tampa bay clouded by the mountains of soil the phosphate mines heap like giant pimples on the land, and the rest being either concrete jungles or a rampant green jungle.
As for important locations such as stadiums concert stages and arenas the events are almost always in downtown and cause traffic problems all over Tampa when they happen.
Section 2: amenities.
The city has a number of problems with amenities, from the monopolized electric/gas amenities coming purely from TECO who are generally unhelpful and very frustrating to deal with, to the city’s Purified water, which is constantly full of Sediment and often stinks, the hard water leaves spots everywhere and causes your showerheads and faucets to become caked with chalk like sediment. I run through a 3 month water filter in a month with average levels of usage.
In addition to this there public transit system isn’t even a joke, it’s practically nonexistent. It’s substandard for even a similar town like Newport Richey or port Richey a half hour north of Tampa.
The only real transit systems are the buses and in Clearwater/Ybor the trolley. That’s literally It.
Section 3: TRAFFIC.
Hardly a day goes by without a Horrible likely fatal car accident somewhere in Tampa. There’s probably an average of 30-50 accidents a day, maybe 60 on a holiday.
Everyone’s constantly driving well over the speed limit sometimes over 50 MPH over (looking at you veterans expressway drivers) constant bumper riding, people going 15-30 UNDER the limit, the number of people who don’t use signals is more than people who do, people constantly force themselves into lanes or try to block people merging, people ignore hazards and try to scare you into moving when unsafe at turns, road rage is constant, in the spring the love bugs cover your windshield and can make it hard to focus, in summer it pours like the oceans falling on you and everyone loses their MINDS, in fall it rains occasionally but it’s mostly just hot and bright, and in winter it’s cool and dry mostly with the occasional wild fire, no matter what season though people lose their minds over nothing.
The amount of uninsured drivers is skyrocketing, and at night on the weekends there are street racers at every gas station being loud and obnoxious from 6 in the evening till 4-5 in the morning (excluding sunday nights) the light cycles are constantly a pain and some just don’t make sense, driving is also a problem because of the constant Jaywalking by homeless and regular pedestrians alike.
If you drive a bike, be the most vigilant driver on the road in Tampa, I have seen more bikers killed here than anywhere else I’ve been.
Also, rush hour is usually 07:00-09:00 then 13:00-15:00 and then again from 17:00-20:30, don’t expect to really get anywhere fast in that.
Section 4: Environmental Dangers.
Tampa really doesn’t have that many Natural environmental dangers, except the occasional feral pet packs and the alligators in the lakes there’s not much to worry about, notice I specified NATURAL environmental dangers.
The man made ones are a serious threat, if you live here and don’t have a gun, your crazier than the crackheads.
The Tampa bay’s water is tainted by radioactive waste, a byproduct of the phosphate mining industry that is also in the aquifers now to thanks to poor management, meaning when you drink the water (waste management purified or straight from the well) your drinking radioactive water. Not enough to give radiation sickness yet but enough to be concerned, and After that the people are crazy, in the ghetto and slums you’ll find many homeless druggies and lots of crime, from **** and murder to robbery and shoplifting the ghettos are to be avoided at all costs, being in a car won’t protect you. There’s also large amounts of racism on all sides both to and from POC.
The city just like the rest of Florida has a huge drug problem. Especially for things like Flakka, LSD, PCP, Methanphetamine, and crack cocaine.
In addition human trafficking is a major problem, definitely don’t let your kids out of your sight or out of the sight of a trusted adult, even in good neighborhoods.
Section 5: The Police and Sheriff’s.
Out of the entire US Hillsborough county (one of the counties in the wider Tampa area) is probably one of the best police forces, with huge community outreach and constant crime fighting they are always vigilant and will always be supportive of the community, the city of Tampa is pretty similar as well, though the response time of the city police is significantly higher than the Sheriffs response time, with one example being: at 8 PM one night while I was driving I had a handgun pulled on me driving down a moderately lit road, when I called 5 minutes later after having gunned it away the police took 2 hours to come retrieve my statement. Alternatively, when a neighbor in Hillsborough had a domestic problem and the police were called, it only took 10 minutes for 2 squad cars to be parked out front and engage the situation.
However no matter what the police in Tampa and the outlying suburbs are always professional, courteous, and helpful.
Section 6: Cost of living VS Pay
Tampa is a high cost low income city, meaning if you don’t have a high paying job coming into the city your going to be stuck working multiple jobs paycheck to paycheck to make ends meet, it’s not uncommon for a 1 bed 1 bath in a decent location to be between $1,500 and 3.3k a month. Literally just look at R/Tampa.
Also, Minimum wage isn’t even half the cost of living from 2 years ago, with waiters and delivery making even less ($5.68 an hour) if you don’t tip someone might not eat that week.
Gasoline and AC/Electricity skyrocket in summer months and don’t ever really go down to a reasonable price, and living without AC will be horrible at best and possibly fatal at worst, with summer heat reaching 110’F with 95% humidity in some places it’s a serious threat of heatstroke and heat exhaustion.
Section 7: activities.
There really isn’t that much to do in Tampa outside of Busch gardens, Lowry park zoo, Clearwater marine aquarium, see the sports teams play (lightings, Buccaneers, and the rays) or go to the clubs in Ybor, it’s definitely not a place for people who like to explore, camp, or go for a casual drive.
Section 8: hurricanes.
We don’t get ‘em, like ever…. Even the hurricanes know to avoid this place.
Section 9: purposefully ignorant people
Many people here refuse to see any problem and hold Tampa up like the golden child, pretending anyone who is from out of state that doesn’t like it here is snobby and entitled when at the end of the day they go and complain about the same damned thing when they get home.
Section 10: Education
So the kids here are literally just evil too each other, and the schools don’t really do anything about it except punish anyone who says the school isn’t doing a great job.
Literally, speaking from first hand experience, this place is F*******, homeschool your kids if you can, and encourage them to learn social skills outside of school, because I wouldn’t put baby hitler in school here. (For the record teacher here are hit and miss on quality, either they are great and do a seriously good job or they suck and don’t care about the kids at all)
Section 11: food.
If nothing else the Cuban food in Tampa is Phenomenal, with things such as the Cuban sandwich and Cuban coffee being staples, when I finally escape this trap state it will be the only thing I’ll miss.
Section 12: Tampa international airport.
One of Tampa’s few redeeming factors Tampa international is a top of the line beautiful airport with a streamline design and almost everything you could want/need available inside the terminal, the airport has a few parking and pickup/dropoff issues but outside that it’s pretty good!
Closing statement:
Tampa sucks, if you like it here congrats, you like to settle for dirt poor quality of life, or are one of the rich folks who helped ruin it for everyone else. Enjoy the sinkholes that’ll keep popping up till the city fully collapses, since the limestone/sandstone honeycomb of caves under the state weren’t designed to handle these cities weights.
Lena | Town n Country, FL