My first thoughts on this would be the Frisco area just north of Dallas. I believe it has been touted as one of the fastest growing areas in the country. The local gov't there is giving away the city just to attract business. Toyota just moved there, the Dallas Cowboys just relocated there, there are others that I'm not recalling and more is in the works. They are close to DFW airport (one of the largest) as well as smaller Lovefield (very appealing after the Wright amendment has been lifted). This airports already offer the required direct flights. As for colleges, there are so many to feed into it, that it's not really a concern. Cost of living in North Texas is very cheap, and other than the occasional tornado, environmentally it is very stable.
The real reason Dallas and Houston are growing fast while remaining affordable is because we can sprawl forever.
The Dallas area has no natural boundaries whatsoever; there are no mountains and no coast, nothing to stop development from sprawling out constantly. I was born in 1984, and I've lived in Dallas my entire life. I've seen the suburbs balloon in size like you wouldn't believe; and I'm not just talking population here, but area. The idea that we have continuous suburban development extending all the way north to Prosper (and soon Celina) blows my mind. Suburban development used to peter out in the northern half of Plano, and honestly southern Plano wasn't fully built-out either (there even used to be huge unincorporated enclaves in Plano).
Another is business culture; companies, especially tech companies, have largely chosen to avoid the central business district and instead locate their offices in the edge cities [0] and the boomburbs [1]. Blame historical happenstance: this phenomenon was entirely thanks to two companies who decided in the 1950s to locate their offices in Richardson instead of Dallas. One was Texas Instruments, which was founded as a startup in Richardson (none of the founders were native Texans, oddly enough), and the other was Collins Radio (now Rockwell-Collins), an established company from Iowa who decided to put their Texas campus in Richardson. Between the two of them, anyone in North Texas who wanted into the tech industry worked in Richardson. After that, the founders of TI decided to start a technology-oriented university so they can grow their own talent right there in Richardson. Soon, they handed over the university to the state, who promptly renamed it the University of Texas at Dallas (despite it actually being in Richardson). Since then, UTD has become the most prominent school for engineering and computer science in the entire southwest (when I went there, the phrase "MIT of the southwest" was bandied about a lot), cementing Richardson as the home of the tech industry in North Texas.
I find it interesting; housing prices actually have spiked in the Dallas area thanks to an unexpected surge of demand (I expect prices to go down soon, as new sprawl catches up to the demand), but Richardson is still one of the most affordable cities in the Dallas area, and it's still recognized as being one of the best cities in the US to live. That combination of affordability and quality of life is rare; usually, the two are inversely proportional. You can still find a good house in Richardson for under $300k, and if you look carefully, you can go below $250k.
Now, I don't know too much about Houston, but it's pretty low on natural boundaries. Sure, it's not too far from a coast, but that's only to the south, and right now Houston's sprawling north and west. No mountains, either. I don't know much about how the business culture evolved, though.
Some of the northern suburbs of DFW have done a good job managing explosive growth. Lots of parks, trails, mixed use development and places to actually live a life and not just work/getdrunk. It wasn’t that long ago when Frisco was just a blinking yellow light and a row of “massage parlors” in trailer homes (quite literally). Now it’s the poster child for successful suburb.
- low cost of living
- low taxes (both business and personal)
- access to tons of large corporations as potential customers (lots of corporate HQs in town)
- a new incubator, Tech Wildcatters, that is hungry for great startups
- great BBQ, beers
- if you're into sports we have all the pro teams
- Two great cities to choose from. Dallas if you want the faster pace, more hipster crowd... Fort Worth if you want something a bit cleaner and laid back.
The list could go on... I'll give you naysayers the fact that the climate here is not as favorable as many other places in the country.
North Dallas is getting crazy crowded, though. Enough that housing supply for their potential workers really should be a concern for any additional company looking to relocate there.
That said, engineer availability should be fairly good when compared to most places outside of more traditional tech hubs (the area is served by TCU/SMU/UTD directly, UT/Texas A&M/additional Texas schools indirectly, is already near EDS and Perot Systems/whatever those two call themselves these days) and the local authorities have shown both a desire and ability to attract major company retractions. You would have to think the North Dallas area is on the shortlist.
- One of the most affordable places to live in the U.S.
- Large number of top tier universities within 3 hours (Univ of Texas, Baylor, TCU, SMU, UNT, Texas A&M, UTD, UTA)
- Massive amount of wealth/wealthy investors, who, are starting to put their wealth into more and more seed start-ups
My point is, many cities all fit the same criteria as he listed. But until the people IN those communities move to make it happen, it won't.
In the last 3 years, I've seen a magnitude increase in Start-up/entrepreneur activity happening in Dallas. And I believe much of the criteria PG said is right and a good part of the reason, but those things won't just "make" it happen.
Well a counterpoint would be the northern suburbs of Dallas like Plano, Richardson, and Frisco. They have so much economic activity that I would not be surprised if more people commuted from Dallas to those suburbs for work than vice versa. Also, I bet the people living in the far north exurbs are commuting to the suburbs and not all the way to Dallas proper.
I wonder if they meant the city of Dallas itself. I'm not really sure where they'd even put a large HQ campus. Frisco/Plano/etc? absolutely. But in the City of Dallas proper?
Also the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex is growing like crazy and there are cranes everywhere from downtown Dallas out 20 miles north where even the suburbs are getting high rises along the highways.
Dallas has a substantial high-tech background and has an interesting creative class, but there's not much intersection between the two. It also doesn't help much that the business attitudes in Dallas are very traditional and "corporate" (not sure how else to explain it). It's a shame, too, because there are 2-3 decent universities here, and various swarms of talent, but absolutely zero community.
Plano and Richardson probably fare better than most places with respect to interesting new companies and tech startups, but they've got a long way to go. I'd probably bet on Plano, if I had to choose. They've got some cultural outlets, an interesting historic downtown, a handful of technology companies, and it's a nice place to live with decent local governments, and it's nearby UT-Dallas, which is the best technology school in the Dallas Metro area (although not flagship like UT and TAMU).
Everyone is talking about and gravitating towards Austin but the DFW area is an absolute hotbed for jobs. It seems like every other month some large corporation is moving their HQ to Dallas or the suburbs. It's a seller's market for labor.
Texas is growing in general. People, especially younger people, are moving to Dallas, San Antonio, and Austin proper, not just the ‘burbs. There have been problems with this though. Apartments are going up like crazy in these cities, but they are mostly single and two bed room (roommate style), at least slightly upscale, apartments. A lot of us millionaire are finding we have to move to the suburbs, not because we want to, but because it’s the only place where there is housing that exists at all for families.
Also Dallas has the DART rail and it’s great. I do wish there were a lot more stops, but it’s well loved by millennials.
- Currently has a large Amazon distribution center in the suburbs
- Strong tech workforce and universities in the area. Other Tech companies in the area Dell(formerly EDS), ATT. Regional centers of Verizon, IBM, Microsoft, Alcatel/Lucent
- Low property values and favorable tax structures. Plenty of areas to lease locations or to build in the suburbs or downtown.
- International airport that is the hub of American Airlines
- Toyota (North America HQ) recently moved to Dallas suburbs. Google HQ2 is rumored to be looking at Dallas.
Haven't seen it listen much but it is probably one of the top contenders. There is a reason Toyota, along with many others, moved their (U.S.) headquarters here.
Dallas vs Austin is like Enterprise vs Startup. DFW is where the most growth is and by end of the decade DFW will be hitting 8 million. Texas boom may have slowed in Houston because of Oil woes, but DFW and Austin are still high-flyers. Lot of OLD MONEY in DFW though.
I’m biased, but I’ve had a feeling in the beginning it was always going to be Dallas in some capacity:
1. DC area may have three potential cities, but Texas is the only other region that has two cities being considered
2. DFW airport is one of the US’s busiest airports, and American Airlines is headquartered there, so you can get a direct flight to anywhere in the country in 3 hours tops. Amazon already has multiple warehouses here and also ships freight through DFW and other airports in the area.
3. Public transit (Dallas has the largest light rail network south of DC), continued investment, world class museums, and honestly a pretty hip city with a lot of activity in the center, not unlike Seattle. Also lots of millennials moving there for its low cost of living and ample jobs.
4. You can’t beat Texas’ business environment — Bezos even praised it when he spoke at a business conference at SMU earlier this summer.
5. Establishing two offices will give Amazon influence in two places, and covering Seattle (West Coast), DC/NoVa (East Coast), Texas (South) gives them nationwide influence.
Yep. I'm in Plano TX 30 minutes from Dallas. Now increase your salary number by 75%. I have no formal education, however I do have about 11 years of full spectrum full stack experience and am currently in the DevOps space. Forget Dallas and check out Plano/Frisco. It's exploding. Your mileage may vary though because housing prices here are getting ridiculous as well, the worst offender being Dallas.
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