Board 8 > What is the most UNDERRATED American city?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Like, a city that has a reputation for being either shitty or boring, but you think is actually interesting and cool or a nice place to live. I just feel like the reverse of the overrated question is more interesting to me

Detroit or Cleveland

Probably some smallish city nobody is going to think about like Tallahassee Florida or Savannah Georgia or something

Cleveland is a good pick.

I would almost say Cincinnati. Almost.

Portland Maine IMO

Actually most non Boston New England cities are good answers

Ann Arbor

My pick is Seattle but I think that is more just me having an unusually high amount of love for that area than anything.

Milwaukee was much nicer than I expected it to be (though I was only there for a week for a conference)

Boston

it has a really bad rap but I love it

Cleveland doesn't have much of a nightlife. They've prettied up Downtown, but it costs entirely too much to do anything there. As against that, they've got Slyman's and For Goodness Jake's (the latter being a favorite of mine after watching a ball game).

EDIT: My pick is Duluth. They worked a miracle with their lakefront.

Probably some random city in Hawaii

masterplum posted...

Probably some smallish city nobody is going to think about like Tallahassee Florida or Savannah Georgia or something

Tallahassee is a terrible example, one of my friends lives there and she feels like she lives in hell

My gut reaction says Pittsburgh or anything in Ohio.

scarletspeed7 posted...

Ann Arbor

Thought about this but I think it's perceived pretty positively

azuarc posted...

My gut reaction says Pittsburgh or anything in Ohio.

Can confirm, except for Toledo. Fuck that place.

From a Jersey standpoint, meanwhile, I'll go for Camden. They cleaned up quite a bit in the last few decades, and I was always a fan of the area by the baseball stadium and aquarium.

Of the cities I've been to...probably Oakland, CA? I feel like it mostly has the perception of being a crime-heavy place, but it's got a lot of cool spots

Chattanooga, represent

Indianapolis

swirIdude posted...

Indianapolis

You're in the wrong topic

Proof that I am in fact in the right topic

Fite me

Isquen posted...

From a Jersey standpoint, meanwhile, I'll go for Camden. They cleaned up quite a bit in the last few decades, and I was always a fan of the area by the baseball stadium and aquarium.

So funny story. Apparently people I know just can't follow the signs to/from the concert arena on the waterfront because it's happened twice.

The first time, my friend was driving a car of four to a concert. It must have been winter because it was already full dark as we were heading in. Anyway, we get off the bridge into NJ and soon after find ourselves driving through random streets in Camden. Four scared white high school kids, looking around wide-eyed at everything, terrified that we're going to get shot or worse because everyone knows you ONLY go to the waterfront area in Camden and somehow we missed a turn. There's people on the street occasionally -- all of them black -- and while we're pulling up to a stop sign on a one-way road, another car comes up beside us and honks the horn. Nervously, we lower the window, and this dude in his fifties or sixties looks at us and says, "You want to turn that way." We thanked him profusely and ended up at the concert in another two or three blocks.

Fast forward a couple years, and I'm at another concert with two different friends. This is an afternoon concert in the summer, so it's still light when we're leaving. The driver misses the turn to get onto the bridge, and starts panicking. The other friend, in the passenger seat, starts freaking out. Meanwhile, I'm in the back, cackling at them because this is nowhere near as scary as the situation I'd been in and we could see the giant F'ing bridge overhead, so it's not like we were completely and utterly lost. Also, U2's Sunday Bloody Sunday was playing on the radio, which is what day it was. My friends were not amused when I pointed that out.

Both of these incidents were over 20 years ago. I don't think I've heard anyone say anything negative about Camden, its crime, its schools, its poverty, or take a dig at its racial make-up since. So for anyone who remembers those days, yes, it's probably extremely underrated. But it's still in New Jersey.

Kent, Washington.

When I lived there, I loved it. But everyone Id meet in the surrounding cities shit on it constantly, lol.

Or if you want a big city answer. Albuquerque, New Mexico. Best food of anywhere Ive ever lived.