Besides snow (assuming you don't like it), what are Colorado's negatives? Both the state in general and the cities mentioned.
- snow/cold (however its the mildest you will find for a place that gets snow). But snow is snow if you don't like it
-if you are from the coasts (say CA) you may not dig the politics - mainly b/c its not a one sided echo chamber like I find CA to be. I found it to be a decent mix of both major parties. Some may not like this, but personally I found it refreshing.
- no oceans - land locked
- fairly isolated... besides Denver there are not a lot of large cities around to easily travel to. But the counterpoint to this is that DIA is a major airport with lots of flight options.
- public transportation is not really great - you will need a car, especially in the winter. But it is better than many major US cities (US public transportation is pretty awful in general anyway). This is one area I really wish CO would do a bit of forward thinking on building this out quickly now before it becomes CA bay area/LA. It is disconcerting considering that it would be fairly easy to accomplish since most of the populous cities in CO are located in a straight line North/South along the mountain range. Ideal for a high speed train with east/west light rail into the city cores. But, I digress... :)
- depending on the city/area you decide to settle in, pay is not quite where it needs to be to support the quickly rising housing costs. I visit probably 1-2x per year and it is amazing the amount of growth and population surge that has occurred in the past few years. Denver is experiencing a huge boom right now and housing is not keeping up. Outside of Denver or Boulder proper I found salaries to be pretty low compared to cost of living. For instance, I lived in one of the cities mentioned in the article (Fort Collins). Although IMO a great city to live, the IT job market is horrible. It may have a high concentration of intelligent people, but many of those are stuck working at coffee shops just to live in FC. But I guess that says a lot about FC and CO , people are willing to do that to live there...
These are just a few negatives that honestly may not really be negatives to many people. Of course there is no perfect place to live - you can spend your whole life searching for that. I'd list out the positives too, but this post would get really unruly :)
I've seen this before, but never quite understood what it means- lack of a 'night life?'
However the positive is the people in CO are the fittest in the nation due to this love of the outdoors.
So I asked somebody in a store if there was a race or something.
They looked at me funny and, no, it's just Saturday in Boulder.
Work seems to go slower here. It seems even the frantic pace of startup life takes a back seat to work life balance.
People aren't usually in a hurry on the sidewalks downtown. It can be infuriating if you have somewhere to go.
But if you are used to high stress and crappy work/life balance (or have adapted to that lifestyle) I can see how it would try your patience.
Other than that, I'm not sure. Everywhere except Colorado Springs is pretty liberal, which not everyone loves. We've also gotten a lot more homeless people since weed was legalized.
- Not much diversity aside from a large Hispanic population
- Sprawl. Endless repetitive suburbs
- I've heard people from large cities complain about it being boring
- Increasingly crowded
- Hard to make long term friends. Most people seem to stay 3-5 years and then go home or elsewhere
- Food is getting better but not great
- I-70 is a shitshow. Don't be surprised when at some point it takes you 8 hours to get back from skiing on a weekend
- Lack of water, closest ocean is 1000 miles away. No big lakes
I-70 Denver to Summit county really needs a freaking train... Ugh
Go up into the mountains 15 minutes away and that is another story...
Wildfires in the foothills, but not as points near the west coast.