Sacramento

Anybody live in or around Sacramento? I have an interview coming up there and was wondering about the town? Any insights would be appreciated. Thanks!

I think manton grew up there. I find it to be a dreadfully boring place.

It is the Paris of the Central Valley.

It is rather boring, but not incredibly so. I have not been in nearly 10 years, but even back then it had come a long way. Tiecollector lives there and he posted about some super-fine-dining restaurant that sounded really good.

I have read that it is one of a handful of ground zeros of the Subprime fiasco, so how that is effecting the local economy I have no idea.

That's not encouraging

I suppose one benefit would be the ability to attend Bay Area get togethers.

Ground Zero of the subprime huh? Sounds pretty much like Phoenix.

It's a potential job with the State Govt and they keep telling me the economic issues aren't a factor for this department. We'll see...

Someone once joked that Sacramento's official motto should be "Yeah, but it's close to ..." Whenever someone slags on the town, this is what you hear. "Yeah, but it's close to Tahoe/Yosemite/the Delta/SF/Napa," etc.

Seriously, if you have kids and are not looking for night clubs and red carpets, etc. it wil be a nice place to live. For all I know there are lots of night clubs now.

There is, basically, no winter. No snow, certainly. A short rainy seasons. Some really thick fog from time to time. Broiling hot -- but dry -- summers. It really cools off at night. And there are so many trees that the whole town seems shaded. I have heard people say that there are more trees per capita there than anywhere. I have no idea if that is true, but there are a lot of trees. When you come in from the west over the river on an elevated freeway, you are above the canopy, and the whole city looks like Lothlorien.

That actually sounds pretty good for us.

With two boys aged 5 & 2 a family-oriented town would be good. Plus, rain would be a nice change from Phoenix and looking at the average temps for the area, even there hot summers will probably seem extremely cool compared to Phoenix.

Maybe the subprime problems will make it somewhat affordable to buy a house.

I imagine that the city has sprawled out badly by now. The cheapest places to buy will be way out north and east, but the commute into downtown, where I presume your job will be, will not be fun.

I used to work at the Capitol and lived in Curtis Park. Very short drive. Nice.

Basically, the areas around dowtown -- Land Park, Curtis Park, McKinley Park, and East Sac -- were all developed pre-WW2 and are beautiful. Except for the real mansion streets like 13th Ave and 45th Street, the houses tend to be smaller than modern homes. But because the areas are nice looking and close in, they are expensive. You can probably get a lot of house out in Roseville, but then you will torture yourself on the freeways every day.

I suppose downtown is a lot better than it used to be, but it's probably still not ideal for a family.

The heart of the city is a 30x30 grid, almost perfectly square. West of 16th is considered downtown proper, east of that is "midtown." 21st street around G is tres ****, but the old Victorians are beautiful. The other old 19th century mansion neighborhood is called Poverty Ridge, around 22nd and S. Lovely homes, I don't know what the crime is like.

There is a small knot of nice restaurants around 28th and M.

For shopping, basically, drive to SF. If you must shop in Sac, Pavilions is the only decent shopping center. You won't find Rubinacci. Julius is the nicest store, and ten years ago, their top line was Zegna.

It's just close enough to San Francisco to be tolerable.

How far is Sac from SF?

Originally Posted by Connemara

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How far is Sac from SF?

About 90 miles. But once you hit Pinole (at least) the 80 stops until you are over the Bay Bridge.

if you ski or golf, close to tahoe...

Originally Posted by dpw

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if you ski or golf, close to tahoe...
Boating on the lake is fun, too.

I think it's probably a pretty good place for a family. Housing prices have been the cheapest among big cities in CA, even before the area was hit pretty hard by the subprime crisis. Median home price is probably around $215K. Weather can get pretty humid for CA.
The CA State Gov is a huge employer, and I've never heard of state employee layoffs, so they probably are on the level when they say the economy is not a factor for your potential job.

It's "close" to Tahoe, but it is still a 2 hour drive, so it's sort of at the edge of day trip range.

I go up for business from time to time. The downtown area is quite nice. I had a very good meal in restaurant there- and I'm picky about food. Worth considering for a family. One and a half hours to San Francisco if there is no traffic. Three and a half awful hours when traffic is bad.