Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Move to SF and hate it?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 172 posts

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#91

Post by percept »

_corbett wrote: post #89
percept wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anything more you can share about Zurich? I know it ranked in the top three with Geneva in the last Mercer survey . . .

Sure-advantages include a great mixture of being near to much of Europe, a short train ride from the alps (I do lots of hiking in the summer, skiing in the winter), very high salaries, no poverty, great universities, intense work ethic, etc. I don't by any means need a car, and if I did there's Mobility (the Swiss analog to Zipcar). Disadvantages include having an older population, being small compared to New York, h…

Thanks. I plan to visit the country one of these years.

Good luck with your startup!

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#92

Post by michaelhalligan »

geebee wrote: post #59

I live in SF because I grew up here and have family around, not because I think it's "better" than other places to live. If I weren't so anchored here, I'd probably look around. That said, I like it a lot more than the OP here... * I think the food options in SF are actually pretty excellent. I'm going to agree that "late dinner" options are limited - I guess I just see that as a relevant but not defining criteria. O…

By diversity, do you mean "lots of people of different races and ethnic heritages live here in harmony" or do you mean "lots of ethnic food to eat"? Because I would call hijinx on the former, this city is pretty white, at least all of SOMA/FiDi, North Beach, NOPA, The Sunset, most of the Mission, most of the excelsior, and at least 70% of every other neighborhood is white. Having been here a decade I feel this city is far more segregated than others I've lived in, and I've lived in 7 different neighborhoods now.

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#93

Post by rdouble »

michaelhalligan wrote: post #92
geebee wrote: post #59

I live in SF because I grew up here and have family around, not because I think it's "better" than other places to live. If I weren't so anchored here, I'd probably look around. That said, I like it a lot more than the OP here... * I think the food options in SF are actually pretty excellent. I'm going to agree that "late dinner" options are limited - I guess I just see that as a relevant but not defining criteria. O…

By diversity, do you mean "lots of people of different races and ethnic heritages live here in harmony" or do you mean "lots of ethnic food to eat"? Because I would call hijinx on the former, this city is pretty white, at least all of SOMA/FiDi, North Beach, NOPA, The Sunset, most of the Mission, most of the excelsior, and at least 70% of every other neighborhood is white. Having been here a decade I feel this city i…

San Francisco proper is one of the most diverse cities in the country. It is only 45% white. Over 30% of the residents are foreign born. These stats are from Wikipedia.

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#94

Post by tptacek »

seldo wrote: post #86
tptacek wrote: post #14

Spent several years in San Francisco. Hated it. Moved back to the midwest (Ann Arbor, then back home to Chicago). What don't I like about SFBay? With the caveat that it's been almost 10 years since I lived there, let me make you a list: * It's expensive. What that means is, you have fewer options on where to live, and the options aren't as nice. * Apart from tacos, the casual food options are much worse. Concrete exa…

Wow. I guess it's all about what you're used to. I've only ever lived in London (and Trinidad), and my experience was mostly opposite. Remember, this is all relative to London: * SF is super, super cheap. My apartment was the same size for half the price and in a much better area. * Food is so plentiful and cheap, it is EVERYWHERE. The portion of my budget devoted to food fell by 75%, even though I eat out all the ti…

I'm not at all surprised to hear someone point out that London is more expensive than San Francisco. I am shocked to hear someone from London say that San Francisco has better cab service.

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#95

Post by ScottWhigham »

mershad wrote: post #73

The OP is just completely wrong about performing arts. The SF Opera and Symphony are absolutely two of the best in the country and competitive on a global scale.

Wait a minute... look at his quote: "* There are very few decent music venues. Among my many complaints about SF, this is one that appears to have gotten much worse since I left; read JWZ's blog on SF's "war on fun"."

You mentioned two groups that are fairly specific in genre/taste. The OP says "There are very few decent music venues..." How does what you mention invalidate what he said? "Two" is a "a few" in my book.

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#96

Post by alanthonyc »

geebee wrote: post #59

I live in SF because I grew up here and have family around, not because I think it's "better" than other places to live. If I weren't so anchored here, I'd probably look around. That said, I like it a lot more than the OP here... * I think the food options in SF are actually pretty excellent. I'm going to agree that "late dinner" options are limited - I guess I just see that as a relevant but not defining criteria. O…

Cool, thanks for the detailed post. I live in socal, but my family is up there as well. I've been thinking about moving up there, and you hit a lot of points I've been considering.

(Hey, can you hit me up about the surf on my email? Was gonna contact you, but no email on your profile.)

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#97

Post by sabj »

tptacek wrote: post #60
rdouble wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I lived around the corner from the Haight, too and I'm not sure what would make the area a "red light district." The hippie hill drum circle? Guys selling weed? American Apparel? Ben and Jerry's? The Gap? The worst aspect of the Haight is the gauntlet of gutter punks between Cole and Clayton. It's actually a very nice, dare I say, "gentrified" area, aside from that particular stretch.

I'm referring to the open-air drug market (and, more importantly, the crowd that market attracts). I'm not suggesting that it's a haven for prostitutes. The drugs don't bother me; it's the people sitting on the curbs, pissing on the sidewalks, accosting strangers for change, offering drugs, asking for drugs, hiding in the bushes, howling at the moon that bother me. Ironically, I've never had a problem in the Tenderlo…

I've had bad problems in the Tenderloin but during the daytime I really enjoy upper / lower haight, find it to be very lovely. Beautiful houses and lots of nice shops and restaurants.

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#98

Post by uuilly »

houseabsolute wrote: post #78
uuilly wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an SF resident I concur w/ most of what you're saying. For me it's not a deal breaker, but I can see how it could be. Almost every one of your bullet points can be explained by the phrase, "Liberalism gone nuclear." [Expensive] -> Rent control and Private property restrictions. Housing supply is limited w/ endless permits and restrictions on building additions or subdividing space. And rent controls not only creat…

Re: cabs, it seems like the price is plenty high from the perspective of a buyer. The real problem I suspect is that the city limits the number of medallions issued to 1,500 per year. There are people who wait years to get a medallion. http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/iteam&id=6... -- "The city of San Francisco limits the number of cabs on the streets by handing out 1,500 permits or 'taxi medallions.' Dr…

Wow, nice find. So they fix the price AND the supply. Our urban overlords have reached a Soviet level of confidence in their ability to manage an economy.

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#99

Post by houseabsolute »

uuilly wrote: post #98
houseabsolute wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re: cabs, it seems like the price is plenty high from the perspective of a buyer. The real problem I suspect is that the city limits the number of medallions issued to 1,500 per year. There are people who wait years to get a medallion. http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/iteam&id=6... -- "The city of San Francisco limits the number of cabs on the streets by handing out 1,500 permits or 'taxi medallions.' Dr…

Wow, nice find. So they fix the price AND the supply. Our urban overlords have reached a Soviet level of confidence in their ability to manage an economy.

The cabbies are in on it too. The prices are higher than they would probably be in a truly free market for cab fares, and that situation can be maintained more easily when the incumbents can prevent new competitors from entering the market.

Re: Move to SF and hate it?

#100

Post by evgen »

tptacek wrote: post #14

Spent several years in San Francisco. Hated it. Moved back to the midwest (Ann Arbor, then back home to Chicago). What don't I like about SFBay? With the caveat that it's been almost 10 years since I lived there, let me make you a list: * It's expensive. What that means is, you have fewer options on where to live, and the options aren't as nice. * Apart from tacos, the casual food options are much worse. Concrete exa…

The original question was about the bay area and not necessarily SF itself. You have identified several downsides to living in SF, but few of them apply to the bay area as a whole. In fact, one can walk down the list to see that most of them are very specific to living in SF.

* [...] fine dining in San Francisco is, if you properly exclude Yountville from your definition of "San Francisco", simply not as good as NYC or even Chicago.

Let's revisit this one after Michelin hands out stars for Chicago in November. I am betting that just the south bay will have more than the entirety of Chicago. (Seriously, other than Alinea you really don't have fine dining in Chicago :)

* San Francisco doesn't have world-class museums.

The SF bay area has a lot of good museums and several world-class ones for specific niches -- the Monterey Bay aquarium is easily the equal of the Shedd and The Tech in San Jose and Computer History Museum in Mountain View are some of the best technology museums in the world. For art we have fewer impressionists, but much better asian art.

* It doesn't have a noteworthy theater scene, or (to my knowledge) excellence in any of the performing arts.

This is one of those odd things where I would have said the same thing about Chicago in comparison to San Francisco. SF Opera is not the Met, but more than a few people would put it above the Lyric Opera in most rankings. SF tends to fall down a bit when it comes to plays (ACT being the local exception to this general rule) but does better than most places when you add musical theatre into the mix. Comedy is really the only performing art that Chicago seems to do better than the bay area...

Post reply on HN