It would need to have a substantial walkable core. That probably means major university our tourism aspects or both. I'd like to be within a transit one-day round trip to a much bigger metro.
I assume you're not counting "metros" that are within larger CSAs.
Asheville, NC
Knoxville, TN
Santa Fe, NM (lived there for a short period of time)
Traverse City, MI
Madison, WI (have already lived there)
Flagstaff, AZ
Olympia, WA
Boise, ID (though may be a bit larger than 500k these days?)
Those are the small cities/metros where I'd live, but I'd also be open to a number of smaller towns provided they have the right attributes.
I grew up in one (Utica-Rome NY) and had it not been for the bottoming out economy at the time, I probably would have never left; natural beauty, four seasons, easy drive to several major cities, affordable, etc.
Technically independent of from Greater LA, though with obvious strong ties. Beautiful weather, scenery, nice little downtown, lots of art galleries, etc.
If not Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo or Monterey.
Just moved to Hamilton, so Hamilton I guess? Really feels like a much bigger city than it is. Just pretty rough around the edges. That’s changing though.
In terms of really small metros, I’ve always thought that Kingston and Guelph were quite nice.
Madison, WI. I have family there and have visited it a few times, it is great. I have known various people who relocated there who had zero previous ties to the Midwest. I think it could be the next Austin or Nashville honestly, assuming US cities in general can keep growing despite a demographic time bomb(falling birth rates and political attacks on immigration). It is about the same size and has a very similar economic profile to Austin around 1990. It's cool, its somewhat cheaper than California, its got a lot to do, etc. I think it could also break the myth that snowy climates are bad for attracting population.
Actually Wisconsin has a wealth of cool small cities. Eau Claire is neat.
Tallahasee, FL. This is an odd choice, but it is a big college town and state capital and that gives it a strong downtown center and makes it more educated, middle class, politically blue, etc. But still has legit southern atmosphere. It's a short drive from gulf beaches but not directly on the coast so it doesn't get wrecked by hurricanes. We briefly lived in a small town nearby when I was a kid, and while that particular town sucked I always thought Tallahasee was a pretty good small city.
Will never happen. Weather is a thing. Beyond that, nowhere near the industry (primarily tech) and corporate base Austin has.
Madison has a decent tech community, although dominated by Epic (medical records tech). The big reason Madison probably won't be like Austin is because Chicago is too close.
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Santa Barbara would be number 1. And it' a quick train ride to LA and SD if you want to get more big city stuff.
For even smaller metros, San Luis Obisipo. I actually did live in the area for a few months between my Chicago - LA transition.
Madison WI is the best/most urban small metro I've seen though. I don't think its close, either.
It would need to have a substantial walkable core. That probably means major university our tourism aspects or both. I'd like to be within a transit one-day round trip to a much bigger metro.
I assume you're not counting "metros" that are within larger CSAs.
Sure. You can include metros within CSA's. I'd pick Sherman/Denison which is in the DFW CSA. Others I'd consider are Las Cruces, NM, Fayetteville, Ark and Colorado Springs
Santa Barbara would be number 1. And it' a quick train ride to LA and SD if you want to get more big city stuff.
For even smaller metros, San Luis Obisipo. I actually did live in the area for a few months between my Chicago - LA transition.
Madison WI is the best/most urban small metro I've seen though. I don't think its close, either.
Boulder might be a contender, although it's very close to Denver.
But of course, outside the US, there are many contenders--places like Groningen or Sibiu.
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Madison should probably focus on competing with Milwaukee instead of aspiring to be like Austin.
Austin is the "hippest" place in a wide radius with tens of millions of people. Madison is not even as "hip" as Minneapolis, much less Chicago, so it has a much smaller catchment area.
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Does Ann Arbor count? I lived there and if I had to live in a small city again, I would consider it. Other than that, it probably has to be a place with really good weather for me to even think of it.
I've lived in one for almost 11 years now (Flagstaff). Before I moved up here from Phoenix, I never thought I could live in a smaller city (previous places lived: Cincinnati suburbs, Orange County CA and Phoenix suburbs), but it's worked out for me. We're still heavily reliant on and influenced by Phoenix (hardly anywhere in Arizona that isn't) but I've turned down job opportunities in larger cities/metros to continue living in this goofy little city.
Does Ann Arbor count? I lived there and if I had to live in a small city again, I would consider it. Other than that, it probably has to be a place with really good weather for me to even think of it.
I think Ann Arbor is a separate metro from Detroit. It used to be. Not sure about now. Anyone correct me if I'm wrong.
Thank you for providing this factual, well-sourced credible data point. Now I get it.
I don't have any statistics but within my personal circles, I know two people who moved there to work for Epic (one from LA, one from St. Louis) and Madison often makes it on lists of "growing tech hubs." Google has an office there: https://careers.google.com/locations/madison/?hl=en
It's not a huge tech hub like Silicon Valley or Boston or NYC, but there are a fair number of tech jobs there.
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In the East, probably Asheville or perhaps Savannah or Charlottesville.
In the Central US, I would have said Madison but it's beyond the cutoff of 500,000 metro population included in the original post. If I'm considering anywhere east of the Rockies, then I'd probably say Boulder.
For the Western US (Intermountain West & West Coast), I'd say Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz, Monterey, or Tacoma (though it's technically part of the Seattle Metro so I probably shouldn't include this).
Real talk, I'd be fine with living in any of these:
Monterrey, CA
Crescent city, CA
Salem, OR
San Juan islands, WA
Visited all of them and found the scenery immensely beautiful, the people friendly, and the culture lively (in a smaller town way). But the issue is, as some of my friends who've moved to similar sized metros have found, it's a career killer. At most there's going to be 2-3 reasonably sized companies in your industry based in the area, likely less, and none of them are going to be making any major expansions. So the job that brings you out there, that's probably the job you're going to be stuck with for the foreseeable future. No promotions, no transfers, few options for increased responsibility. So you either have to be content with a glacially slow career arc, or be willing to move to the next small metro when an opportunity comes up.
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