Rochester, MN? Birmingham, AL? Memphis, TN?

[John Many Jars]

My workplace has officially entered a period of chaos, and I've been looking around for ways out and up. Some of the best jobs out there right now are in the places named above, about which I know little to nothing, so I thought I'd solicit general comments from people who know.

I'd be interested in any impressions of/comments on liveability, "feel," what kind of people live there, whether the chicks are stacked, etc.

[Jason McMaster]

I lived in Birmingham most of my life and I love it. It's a quiet city with the metro going over a million poeple. There's not much racism left and the peopel generally get along. It's also one of the best cities for food in the country.

[balut]

Hey, it can't be that bad if they managed to drive out McMaster!

[John Many Jars]

I lived in Birmingham most of my life and I love it. It's a quiet city with the metro going over a million poeple. There's not much racism left and the peopel generally get along. It's also one of the best cities for food in the country.

Cool!

Is there any public transport?

[SlyFrog]

From Rochester I would imagine you are talking about IBM, or possibly Mayo.

I think it's a nice city; good schools as I understand it because of the higher than average white collar population (due to Mayo - doctors want their kids to go to good schools). It's a pretty "generic" city otherwise; low crime, nice to live in, but don't expect to get Vietnamese food at 4 in the morning. This doesn't bother me (I don't use all the cool crap that some people apparently die without from New York City, like Vietnamese food at 4 in the morning, but I've been around enough to know that some people just can't stand living in a "boring" average city).

[Jason McMaster]

There's buses but not really anything else. What part of town are you looking at because I can be very specific

[Robert Sharp]

Birmingham is big though. A lot depends on what part of the city you would live/work in. McMaster's picture of it is very different from how the rest of AL tends to view Birmingham. That's not to say he is wrong, only that his statements are a bit skewed toward the positive aspects.

Memphis is pretty cool. Like most places in the deep south, there are a lot of annoying redneck types (that applies to Birmingham too, btw, depending on which part of B'ham). But great food, great music (blues/jazz in particular). Close to gambling places ;)

[Jason McMaster]

Yeah, I'm pretty pro-Birmingham. I've lived in a few other places and I've always liked Birmingham the best.

The food is really good, though.

[Jason McMaster]

http://www.highlandsbarandgrill.com/press/index.html

[Stroker Ace]

Memphis is cool. About 1M people, and I'd never lived in a place with more than maybe 250k before. Good eats, nice zoo, decent number of art shows. Concerts etc.

The buses that I've seen mostly appear to exist to shuttle minority housekeepers out to the burbs, but I guess that's how it is everywhere.

My favorite thing about memphis is that it has a pretty deliberate sprawl. Atlanta is the most fucked-up city to navigate, and memphis seems to have grown in a much more controlled fashion. It's got a million people, but you won't find many skyscrapers or crammed areas other than a few business districts.

[John Many Jars]

I don't know what part of Birmingham that job would be in, because the search is being done by a staffing agency --- the actual employer is a medical association that publishes a journal, but I don't know which one. What parts of town are nice? "Nice" for me would mean pleasant, good eats around, easy access to other parts of town, book and record stores a plus.

SlyFrog, I'm not really a 4 AM kind of guy anymore, and I don't expect to find Manhattan in Minnesota anyway. In fact, I'm surprised to hear Rochester described as a city; I thought it was a small town with a big hospital! Is it actually fairly urban?

[John Many Jars]

Memphis is cool. About 1M people, and I'd never lived in a place with more than maybe 250k before. Good eats, nice zoo, decent number of art shows. Concerts etc.

The buses that I've seen mostly appear to exist to shuttle minority housekeepers out to the burbs, but I guess that's how it is everywhere.

My favorite thing about memphis is that it has a pretty deliberate sprawl. Atlanta is the most fucked-up city to navigate, and memphis seems to have grown in a much more controlled fashion. It's got a million people, but you won't find many skyscrapers or crammed areas other than a few business districts.

Hmm, sounds cool. Do you know where the St. Jude research hospital is?

[Stroker Ace]

Yeah, downtown. It's a minute or two away from the western intersection of I40 and I240.

PS - Memphis is cooler than Birmingham. My sister used to live there - It's too hilly. And lame ;)

If you are young and hip you can get a flat downtown. If you've got kids you could consider one of the suburbs like West Memphis, AR.

Here's a map from my zip code to the hospital: http://tinyurl.com/f8czx

I live on the SE side of town cause my wife goes to the U of Memphis.

[John Many Jars]

Wuh-oh, time for Southern feudin'! ;P

If you are young and hip you can get a flat downtown. If you've got kids you could consider one of the suburbs like West Memphis, AR.

I'm no longer young...The dew is off the lily...Out! Out, brief candle!...But I still live like a young scumbag, and have never acknowledged any of the kids alleged to be mine, and I hate commuting, so I'd probably like to live downtown.

[Jason McMaster]

Stroker is a nancy.

Anyway, Homewood is fairly nice and it's about 5 minutes south of downtown. Hoover is also very nice and is close to downtown, just south of Birmingham. If it's medical, its gonna be near the center of town because that's where all the hospitals are.

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=birmingham+alabama&ie=UTF8&ll=33.508194,-86.832848&spn=0.093895,0.21698&om=1

Ok, if you look directly south you'll see homewood, directly south of it is Vestavia Hills and then southwest is Hoover.

Homewood is fairly urban and is a mix of lower cost, crappy apartments/housing and older quaint housing and apartments. Homewood can be a fairly nice place to live if you take the time to check out where you're living.

Vestavia Hills is a fairly wealthy part of town. Nice but expensive, same can be said of Mountain Brook/280 which is where I lived for quite a while when I worked for Just For Feet Corporate. You want to avoid 280 if possible because it's supposedly one of the most heavily traffic highways of its size in the world.

Hoover is nice and quiet. Not many problems there and it has relatively decent access to food and whatever you may need.

Those are all nice places to live and fairly reasonable in the rent range. 400-1000 for 2 bedroom places.

More south you find places like Pelham and Alabaster, which is where I grew up. They're nice but not really apartment heavy.

Fun facts: Taylor Hicks is from Hoover and Reuben Studdard is from Homewood. If I remember correctly, Joe Namath and Charles Barkley are from around the area too, though north of town I think.

I can, of course, list more restaurants and attractions.

[Stroker Ace]

Graceland.

[Jason McMaster]

and??

[Stroker Ace]

The Mississippi River.

[Stroker Ace]

Oh and the Statue of Liberation.

http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/state/article/0,1406,KNS_348_4810670,00.html

http://mas.scripps.com/KNS/2006/06/29/0629memphisfoot_w500.jpg

http://mas.scripps.com/KNS/2006/06/29/0629hsliberty2_w500.jpg

[SlyFrog]

SlyFrog, I'm not really a 4 AM kind of guy anymore, and I don't expect to find Manhattan in Minnesota anyway. In fact, I'm surprised to hear Rochester described as a city; I thought it was a small town with a big hospital! Is it actually fairly urban?

When you grow up in a town of 2,000 people, just about anything with an Applebees is a "city." But Rochester does fall into the city camp reasonably enough I think, it has close to 100,000 people and as obviously mentioned, at least two world class employers.

I actually know a little bit about it because I was considering a job there for awhile myself (to the point of interviewing there), and because I drive through it about 5 times a year. Therefore, while I can't say that I really know the city, I would say it is about what you would expect in Minnesota for that type of population - no real "cultural" monuments (sure, there may be a true live performance theater or two, something that calls itself a symphony, etc., but you get my point). At the same time, it is large enough to have all of the Wal-Marts, McDonalds, shopping centers, and easy access to other mass market stuff, and probably one or two of the types of things you would standard not expect to find in a place of 10,000 or less (things like EBGames, etc.). I think it has some decent restaurants; again, from my understanding but not first person knowledge, the city is skewed by the population of physicians and other professionals caused by Mayo and IBM being such big players, so there are actually some decent restaurants and other experiences to be had due to the demand of such individuals for more than McDonalds and a Tom Cruise movie as entertainment events.

I don't know if that helps; the nature of the city was a major plus when I was considering a job there, but I do not want to give the impression that I was a resident or had really in depth knowledge or something.

[JoshV]

WTF is that picture? Its like a Ninja Liberty Statue crossed with Jesus.

[Robert Sharp]

Memphis has about 650k people, NOT one mill.

[amiller320]

I live about 40 minutes east of Rochester. It's a nice enough town -- I think Sly described it quite well. It has everything you need, but isn't a metropolis of any sort. Some nice places to eat & good things for the kids to do (if you have any). It's almost always in the very top rankings of "best places to live" because of the high quality of living and very low crime rates.

It's a very vanilla place, though. It's pretty much shut down by 7pm any day of the week.

Keep in mind the weather -- it's in MN. It's cold. Very cold. I think they probably get a bit more snow than Minneapolis. Summers are nice, but get humid.

I think that I'm sounding pretty negative here, but I don't mean to. It is a very nice place to live, as long as you're not looking for exciting night life. As for the chicks... well, as long as you like your women in scrubs, it's not too bad.

If I lost my current job, I'd definitely consider taking a job there.

[CindySue22]

Best thing about Rochester is that it's a nice place to live, and it's only 60-90 minutes to the Twin Cities. You can have your cake, and eat it, too.

[John Many Jars]

Thanks, everybody. All three places sound good.