Hello,

Our family may be moving to Atlanta, and we wondering how people feel like about this city...We're from the West Coast, so this area is mostly unknown to us!

Any help on where to live/schools would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!

I lived in Atlanta for 40 years. Traffic is bad. You have pockets of good schools. Walton High School is the best public high school in the state. Its located in Cobb County. You may want to check out public charter schools. Those schools have the most parent envolvement. There are a handfull of great schools in atlanta, but most are over crowded and are fair to poor.

Where's the job? Traffic is bad but it's not worse than LA, NYC, etc. Live by where you work. Commute should take precedence over schools if at all possible. Even if you move to a great area for a school, if you have to commute 1 hour + each way, you aren't going to see much of your kids and your quality of life will suffer.

There are some good public schools in the Atlanta area, mostly in the northern suburbs. Many Atlantans send their kids to private school. Georgia ranks 50th in education.

There are lots of other threads here about relocations to Atlanta. Search and research!

POSITIVES: Nice weather (particularly springs and fall), lots of trees, great restaurants, close to N. Georgia mountains, cost of living seems reasonable, (some) friendly locals, becoming more cosmopolitan.

NEGATIVES: Crowded, horrible traffic and commutes (make sure you live close to where you will work if possible), the as-mentioned poor education statistics for the state (though some areas are exceptions), very materialistic, "Georgia" political climate, increasing pollution.

Spend some time here if possible before you move and check it out.

Philsbert: nice post. I live in Greenville SC, used to go to Atlanta alot for fun, had not been in 4 years when we went this past weekend. You mentioned two of the things that stood out to me:

The traffic on Peachtree makes you want to kill yourself. Suddenly, i lost my desire to shop.

And as for materialistic...around Greenville, sometimes I feel like a conspicuous consumer. In Atlanta, I'm worried someone is going to hand me their spare change.

dlai - As I said, I'm just an ATlanta tourist, but if could afford it, Virginia Highland is where I would like to live...assuming the job is in the downtown area.

I lived in Atlanta for about a year. Shopping is great! Traffic is horrible. Summers are very hot and humid.

I drove the perimeter road just this past week (285 I think) on a wednesday and I hit the wall of traffic at 3:30 in the afternoon! I didn't expect to be sitting still in traffic that early in the afternoon. You have to plan everything you do around the time of day/traffic situation.

I lived in Atlanta for about 2 years. I loved it. I lived in Buckhead, close to everything including my job. I found it easy to adapt since most people are transplants. I agree with the fact that most people are very materialistic. But I still loved it and would move back in heartbeat! For neighborhoods, Virginia/highlands would be my first choice and brookhaven would be my second.

This is most probably the last place in the US I would choose to live (all 50 states included). It is bad enough that I live in Charlotte & they try to copy Atlanta - ie. over-development w/no controls or infrastructure in place, horrible traffic, little used or ineffective mass transit, general wastefulness, little if any 'green' efforts, schools are horrible, + the afore mentioned materialism. etc. etc.

Thanks so much everyone!
My husband would be working downtown, though I'm not sure exactly where yet. Too bad about the traffic! How far would Peachtree be from the city-more than an hour? Is there any public transportation from the suburbs to the city? )sorry for the naiive questions-I've never visited Atlanta!)

What are other nice suburbs? Areas of good schools?

Peachtree St. is one of the main north-south streets in the city, but most people outside the perimeter (the perimeter = 285, the highway roundabout that circles Atlanta) don't use it for daily commutes. Unfortunately, MARTA, the mass transit is very weak....the bus system slow and the subway/rail very inadequate as far as coverage. Bottom line: most people who don't live extremely close to one of the MARTA stations end up driving---hence the traffic. Some of the better school systems are in outlying counties...e.g., Cobb, and Forsyth...as well as North Fulton. So, as other posters have pointed out, the option usually is short commute but questionable school system, or very long commute and better schools. You had mentioned that this was only a possible move? So you have the option of elsewhere? I will again say that if at all possible, take a week of vacation and come visit---drive around, particularly near the areas where you might be working and living, before committing to a move here.

What's your price range for a home? It's difficult to give advice without having an idea of where you can afford to be.

Friends who lived in the burbs for years were amazed to find that when they moved inside the Perimeter, they can get almost anywhere in 10 minutes.

If the job is in Downtown, just buy a place inside the Perimeter. Traffic won't be a complaint for you if you are moving from LA.

I feel sorry for the poor soul that bought my house in Stone Mountain and commuted for a job in Alpharetta. Ouch!

I've lived in Atlanta for 20 years, having grown up largely in the midwest. I've lived in California and Europe as well.

Assuming you can afford it, living in Atlanta is great: lots of cool neighborhoods right outside of downtown, each with its own "feel". We could easily afford to send our kids to private school but don't, choosing the local public schools instead for various reasons.

Great restaurants, shopping, cultural stuff, weather, airport (so easy to get anywhere you need to travel, particularly convenient if anybody travels for work).

To be avoided at all costs is a long commute. Traffic bad at rush hour, otherwise not usually bad at all. I'm rarely on the freeway, and pretty much never end up having to wait through more than one stoplight when using surface roads, except for near the freeways at rush hour.

In town neighborhoods to search on jennypruitt or similar relator website.

1. Druid Hills
Historic homes with character, where Driving Miss Daisy was filmed, winding roads, mature trees, near Emory University and several "back roads" to downtown area.

2. Morningside
Upscale of Virginia Highlands

3. Virginia Highlands
Hip, yuppie families and gay communities, mix with college students to form this hip neighborhood with "no-brand" restaurants, college bars and unique shops

4. Midtown (condo or home)
This area has changed, and will continue to change, new condos with concierge services, city views and older homes that have been updated and close in location make this a hit. Still seedy in areas but friendly bumbs ("I'm local, leave me alone") make you wonder why city has not cleaned the joint up more.

5. Atlantic Station
Home at a mall, good location

6. Inman Park

7. Edgewood

8. Candler Park
Hippies turned Yuppies live here. Cool cafes, hair salons and so close to city make it a joy. Neighborhood pride.

9. Vinings
A quaint village anchor this upscale neighborhood where familes live. Good drive to midtown.

NOTE: Other than Druid Hills (and you would want to check this with locals) you most likely will be sending your kids to private school. Atlanta is not known for good public schools, private schools.

Out of Town

1. Duluth

2. Cobb County (popular, good schools, killer drive)

Thank you Amandaamanda and those of you who wrote with helpful comments!

I was starting to be a little depressed hearing about long commutes, and so-so schools.

This will be a huge help when we go check things out in a couple weeks. We've never even been to the South!

dlai: Don't be depressed -- Atlanta is a great place to live and I've been here 13 years now. It's got all the benefits of a big city with an amazingly affordable cost of living, especially if you're coming from CA or other parts of the ridiculously expensive West Coast. Sure, traffic sucks but it's not like traffic is a breeze in NYC or LA or DC either.

I will echo what everyone else has said: the key to enjoying Atlanta is having a managable commute. Live as close as possible to your job and you can be very happy here (I work downtown and my commute is 10-15 minutes with no freeways required).

There are plenty of good private and public schools both in the city and the suburbs, although the better public *high schools* tend to be in the northern burbs (Roswell, Alpharetta) and Cobb County. Gwinnett Co. has some good public h.s. also (Parkview and others).

If you can afford private school, you will have an abundance of housing options within a reasonable commute to downtown (try Morningside, Druid Hills, Vinings, Sandy Springs). If you can't afford private school and you have a high school-aged child, look in Roswell or East Cobb.

If you do live in the city, the Morningside Elementary, Inman Middle and Grady High School area is a good school cluster in Atlanta City Schools.

dlai,

About 17 years ago my husband transferred to Atlanta with Delta Airlines, from the Los Angeles area, we lived in Irvine, Calif. We're not Californians, but (way back) New Englanders that have lived in Alaska to Florida and a few places in between, as well as Germany, England, Taiwan, Hong Kong, West and East Africa etc. The first thing we thought was "Oh no, no way do we want to live in Atlanta!"

Hartsfield airport, where my husband worked is located south of the city. So, people in his office recomended that he check out a city about 20 miles south west of Atlanta, a lot of the airline people, especially pilots lived there. The company gave us the usual one week trip to find a home etc.
We flew in to Atlanta on a rainy, dull March day, checked into a lovely hotel and explored "Peachtree City" in our rental car. This city is a well kept secret, most visitors and new residents of Atlanta don't learn about it, since the south of Atlanta is (was)considered backward and barren. We loved the quiet streets, the planned city broken up into four villages, each with it's own schools, shopping and well planned neighborhoods. No large tacky signage, or gas stations in subdivisions etc. At that time there were two lakes, one golf course (there's three golf courses now), great schools and everything was green and well kept, with lots of flowers and neat shrubs all over the city. Most of all, reasonably priced housing, especially noticed since we were coming from Calif.
We knew we had to live here. We spent a day and found a rental house we liked in a neighborhood where there were children our daughter's age.

We've lived here longer than any other place during our long marriage. Our children are grown, married and live here with our grandchildren.

This area now boast really great shopping in "The Avenue", good restaurants, book stores, about 75 miles of paved bike paths, that weave all over the city. We now have one of the best hospitals in the country Fayette/Piedmont with it's doctors and other medical teams. There are great homes in all price ranges, lots of parks, planned sports activities for children.

If you'd like to know more about "Peachtree City", e-mail me at [email protected], I'll answer any questions you might have.

You do need to be careful of the commute you may have from your jobs though. The traffic through Atlanta can be really bad mornings and evenings, but if you are lucky enough to work on the south side, you'll find the drive from the airport area only about 30 minutes. We do know people who prefer to live here, even though they have a really long commute every day to the center of Atlanta.

This part of the country does have hot, humid summers, but mild winters and lovely long autumn and spring. Plus we have Lake Lanier to sail on all summer long and into the fall.

Best wishes whatever you decide. - Joan