Experience in Austin, United States by Joel

What is it like to live in Austin? Would you recommend it? What is the city like?

I've lived in Austin (Texas) from birth, with a few extended exceptions. But I have experienced early childhood, adolescence and adulthood in the city. Austin is very kid-friendly and I would recommend Austin's public education system, and I definitely recommend the University of Texas at Austin to the extent that you can afford it, since it may be getting more expensive these days (as most public higher education is).

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People:

The people are generally friendly, and promote the idea that Austin is very open-minded. I agree with that statement only so far--within the past four or five years, Austin has become a very popular destination for wealthy young families from Silicon Valley. Most of the famous attractions have been or are in the process of being torn down and replaced with exhorbitantly-priced downtown high-rise condominiums. Right now (2014) in Austin, there is a prevailing sense of "cool", and people are going very far out of their way to create and market a contrived, trendy sense of cool insofar as entertainment and night-life are concerned. If you are a millennial from a somewhat successful family you will probably love it, especially if you're only here for a short time. Austin is currently being inundated with branding and marketing campaigns aimed at young hipsters with money.

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Speaking of money, Austin has a very significant wealth gap. The city is composed of distinctly rich or poor areas, with no real middle class to speak of, and the poor areas are prone to crime to a lesser extent than say Houston or NYC. However, Austin is easily the least racist community in Texas in general social interaction, and minorities in Austin can expect to be treated with equality as valued members of the community (although the wealthy neighborhoods are generally white).

Politics and Traffic:

In political terms, Austin can safely be considered to be democrat, and it is the most liberal and progressive city in Texas. Unfortunately, that isn't really saying much, since Texas itself is competing with Louisiana to be the worst polluter in America among other things. The public transportation in central Austin is acceptable with the new "Metro Rapid" bus system and some minor light rail experiments, but if you will drive a car, Austin is gridlocked for the majority of any given day (with delays of an hour or more during breakfast, lunch and dinner windows) and the city is desperate to solve this problem.

Parking downtown is nearly impossible to find, and free parking does not exist. Almost every business has a tow sign and will really tow you at any time.

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Social services:

The Austin Police Department is excellent and the individual officers are very polite, respectful and disciplined, especially when compared to those of neighboring counties. Austin has an excellent food bank, and almost every church in Austin offers free grocery bags of food to the homeless as needed. Austin has a very large homeless shelter right in the center of the downtown area along with a food kitchen, and it is almost always full, especially in winter months. Austin does have a very large homeless population.

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Cost of Living:

The cost of living in Austin is extremely high near the center, and almost manageable in South Austin, but rent in particular is horrific all over town. Unless you make a reliable 50-60k per year you will need a roommate in order to live in Austin, and it is very common for established adults to have roommates in order to afford the steep prices. Apartments that seem dilapidated or "slummy" (including run-down small single trailers with holes in floor, which I've lived in) will generally never dip below the $400/month mark and most of the cheapest apartments are in the $600/month range, and all of this generally radiates out from the center of the city. One exception is the entire West side of Austin, which is exclusively wealthy (luxury gated communities) and becomes more expensive the farther West you travel, even until Fredricksburg, Tx.

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Entertainment/Night Life:

6th Street is the low-hanging fruit for anyone who wants to check out the bar scene in Austin, with lots of interesting dance clubs, bars, and restaurants, and you really can see some strange things/events there most nights, but in my experience people tend to go out with a group of close friends and then proceed to not talk or make eye contact with anyone else no matter where they go. East 6th street is a somewhat less expensive bar scene and you might find a more sociable and intelligent crowd there (less frat-boy).

Austin is dominated by the "craft beer is so cool and brewery micro homebrew blah blah blah watch me grow a beard" Portlandia attitude, and I'm really sick of that, and I think anyone who stays here for more than a year will also get sick of that. It really gets pounded into you here. People love to eat out of food trailers, which is fine and some of them have truly delicious over-priced small-portion food. If you use the words yuppie, trustafarian or hipster to describe something you don't like, you might not like Austin.

Events:

Austin constantly has really fun, great events which are always cheap and open to anyone. People are really great at these events. Austin has a lot of attractive women, and a very friendly LGBT community who are treated with respect until they try to marry, at which point they should blame Texas as a whole rather than Austin.

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What is the student lifestyle like in Austin?

Shucks I put it all in one comment box, just see above

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