I don’t live in California but visit[ed] a bunch for work and family reasons. San Jose has essentially always felt like a rust belt city with better weather. Even up until 2020 the downtown restaurant and bar scene was like going to the cool part of Toledo. I don’t understand why that is, but it’s not surprising to me that any small economic downturn would result in flight.
Ive lived in San Jose and I can assure you that besides jobs, San Jose kind of sucks as a place to live. It's mostly just strip malls and good weather, imho. Campbell was a little nicer and had some cute shops.
At least San Jose is in a pretty nice area, with a good climate, and access to some nice places (beaches to the SE, San Francisco an hour north, hills to the west and east). That's got to count for something.
i love san jose, and the whole bay area. i feel so deprived not being in cali right now. i would state reasons but i don't really know them. my best guess is the mesh of civilization and nature. the hills are so beautiful, the trees are lush, starbucks is on every corner yay!
I moved from Toronto to South Bay for work a couple of years ago. I couldn't face the commute from San Francisco to San Jose, so I decided to live close to work in San Jose. I almost cried when I first visited San Jose's "downtown".
The descriptions of the link are pretty much bang on, although I don't find the smog in San Jose so bad. And San Jose does have one attribute that's better than San Francisco: the weather. It's sunny and warm in San Jose with cool nights. Whenever I go to San Francisco, it is cold, windy and foggy. The San Francisco Zoo is situated close to the ocean in a part of the city that is seemingly permanently overcast and cold. I feel sorry for the animals.
Other than the weather, the best thing that can be said about San Jose is that it is close to a lot of interesting events and places that are not in San Jose.
Disclaimer: I live next to downtown by I-35. Did move during the pandemic from NorCal to TX. (Have family in TX.)
Many issues:
The charm is gone with too many highrises like San Jose downtown.
It's hot AF. 110 F for 3 months every day. 100 F every day for another 2 months on either side of that.
In winter, it can randomly freeze down to 11 F, and say "hello" to no power and no water for 2-3 weeks.
The housing is slapped together and lacks architectural design. The new apartments are tiny and expensive, and not very good.
There's just as many homeless as SF, including rampant retail theft.
The costs are just as bad as the Bay Area.
The roads are worse than those in Bay Area, and I didn't think that was possible without snow and ice.
Lots of tourists, which could be a negative for some people.
The schools are so-so.
It's Texas and abortion is illegal.
Fewer batshit insane people than LA but more than Denver. And anyone can CCW or open carry without any documentation. If you have no criminal record, you can buy a handgun over at Academy without any waiting period at all.
Property taxes are absurd. If you think Palo Alto is bad...
APD is critically underfunded, understaffed by 200-250 officers, morale is terrible, and non-life-threatening calls have a 48 hour backlog. If you have an AirTag on an item, it's stolen, and the location is known, the police won't lift a finger. There is zero routine traffic enforcement.
Crowded with 2nd- and 3rd-tier school tech bros, corporate clones, and dumb money lazy people... people who are simultaneously uncool and boring.
Don't go to Whole Foods because it screams conspicuous consumption. The HQ is unimpressive.
There isn't much of a tech scene compared to the Bay Area.
On positive notes: Even though TX-35 is a national gerrymandering joke reaching from downtown Austin to downtown San Antonio by an "umbilical cord" along I-35, Greg Casar is one of the most reasonable, ballsy, sharp, empathetic, and progressive reps in Congress.
H-E-B.
There are a few used bookstores still in operation.
Plenty of vinyl shops, although none compares to Discogs.
Absurd number of tall people compared to anywhere else in the US and the world, including Oslo.
One impression I got of San Jose was that it IS the sticks. Climate is nice, but culturally it is about as exciting as Omaha (no offense to Nebraska meant).
I live near San Jose, and I agree with jwz - the South Bay isn't exactly a shining testament to beauty. There are pockets of habitability (I'd like to think I live in one, but of course I'm biased), but that's about it.
San Jose is heaven compared to anywhere in NJ. That place reeks, ancient infrastructure, tolls everywhere, dirt everywhere and not to mention awful weather for the better part of the year. I'd rather live in the Bay Area with more expenses on the same pay than anywhere else in the east coast. Although, I concur Austin, Vegas and Phoenix are fantastic places to live.
This makes me want to check out Southern California more again once it's more feasible.
I'm up in Silicon Valley, and... would say some things have gotten better in 10 years. The craft beer explosion has definitely hit here, too, and even more so around Sacramento.
A terrific new tiki bar opened in Oakland (The Kon-Tiki) and multiple terrific new tiki bars opened in San Francisco (Pagan Idol, Last Rites, Zombie Village; Smuggler's Cove opened in 2009, so not technically within 10 years, but they're considered one of the best bars -- not just tiki bars -- in the world).
As much as San Franciscans like to dump on San Jose, I think downtown San Jose has actually gotten pretty cool in a lot of respects, and that's entirely in the last decade.
There's a fair number of other smaller towns scattered around the Bay Area which are seeing some silver linings of gentrification.
I could probably come up with a more detailed list, but despite some very real downsides, particularly economic -- real estate prices really are out of control (and there is no One Single Cause to point to, despite a lot of folks trying); homelessness has become a genuine epidemic -- it's still a great place to be, and it's hard for me to think of another place in America where I'd genuinely rather be. (This is distinct from "another place I'd still like.")
I have been here for the better part of a decade, it's pretty nice. Even in San Jose, the capital city which people seem to like to talk a lot of trash about without even trying a moment to experience it, has been really good to me.
I find most people here with disparaging remarks to say about the place seem like they could benefit from getting out of their smelly basement and check it out for themselves. There's many cities in the USA which are less safe than this place.
The only thing is for the time being they're doing their best to manage covid by curfews, I'm taking a break until I can go back and actually leave the house to get a beer past 9pm
I've never lived in NYC, but I did live in the Boston area for 10 years, then moved to Northern California. For a while I was flying back to Boston every couple of months. I definitely noticed the difference in mood in Boston Logan airport vs. San Jose. The grumpiness of Bostonians was particularly evident compared to the relaxed, upbeat mood of Californians. Maybe it's partly the weather, but I suspect it's also cultural; I didn't notice it being any better in spring and summer.
San Jose is not a nice looking place. However, the locals are pretty cool. There are nicer places on the peninsula and in the south bay, if you are looking for suburbs. Menlo Park, San Mateo, Mtn. View, Palo Alto etc.
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