Jump to content

America's 50 Hottest Cities

bobliocatt

By bobliocatt
in Urban Design & Architecture

Recommended Posts


  • Replies 24
  • Created
  • Last Reply
sleepy Burg

sleepy

Posted
Posted

I don't understand how some of the cities at the top are hot cities. I don't exactly see people flocking to Nashville in droves. I tend to question these lists. What exactly was the critera for ranking these cities?

Those rankings were based on what businesses perceive as a good city to expand to. It doesn't mean that any business is expanding anywhere. Nashville and Memphis were probably ranked high because of their reputations as distribution centers.

It doesn't have anything to do with people flocking to a city. But Nashville did grow by 25% during the 90's.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Matthew Whistle-Stop

Matthew

Posted
Posted

Incentives, how the state and it's cities work with it's employers, what other companies are there, highways, ports, airports, higher education, cost of office/industrial space, taxes, major rail lines and education level of citizens, just to name a few, will play a role in what goes where.

It's usually a group/firm hired out to find locations. They use these magazines/lists, promotional data from cities, what data the companies give them and their own data to find the best location. Some cities/states will visit these relocation firms and try to give them reasons why their city/state is the best to locate certain companies.

I think you can make a list, but it needs to be narrowed down from everything to one type of company. A city that's great for a warehouse/distribution center may not be great for a large headquarters. A city that's great for a financial services company may not be great for an energy company.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
rocket9561 Whistle-Stop

rocket9561

Posted
Posted

I don't understand how some of the cities at the top are hot cities. I don't exactly see people flocking to Nashville in droves. I tend to question these lists. What exactly was the critera for ranking these cities?

I guess you missed that Nashville had SIX Corporate Headquarters relocate to the city over the past year and one was a F500 company. The Metro grew by 25% in the 90s and the Metro is projected to grow as fast as that or faster for the next decade...

Hot Spot for Relocation? Definitely.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
rocket9561 Whistle-Stop

rocket9561

Posted
Posted

More like a hot-spot for tax evasion - like a caribbean island. :D

Note they are moving to Nashville with only a handful of corporate exec jobs. Adds to the narccisist Franklin, nothing to the rest of the metro.

Well the offices in at least 5 of them have agreed to offices in the city. The 2 largest will be downtown. I think these will add around 3,000 high-paying jobs to the city and these are just from those 6 HQs, there are more jobs coming into Nashville.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 4 months later...
BrandonTO416 Burg

BrandonTO416

Posted
Posted

Some legitimate things I find questionable on this list include:

*Proportion, for one. I do not understand how they can put places such as Roanoke, VA inbetween all these cities which obviously had more business coming in - like Boston or even Houston.

*How they consider one or two relocations that may have brought only several employees, such as Nashville's CaremarkRX deal, as the holy grail of growth. Or the fact that Nashville has "3 interstates" - yea, more cities have that then they think apparently. LOL

There are some legitimate things that stand out as being pathetic in this ranking.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Spartan Gigalopolis

Spartan

Posted
Posted

For some reason I was thinking temperature, not growth, so I was really confused at first....

There aren't many cities that have 3 interstates intersecting it. Columbia, SC uses that as a market tool as well since so few cities have that feature. I thought I read somewhere that there are only like 15 cities or so that have 3 or more interstates intersecting them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Richhamleigh, DC Burg

Richhamleigh, DC

Posted
Posted

Overall, I'd rather be in the Top 50 from among thousands. No reason to gripe. In this context, is being #1 really all that more significant than being #50? I wouldn't think so...again, consider the thousands of cities NOT on the list. :D If you folks are interested in the "my city is better than your city" debates that's cool, but can we please do that over with the children at the skyscrapercity.com site? B)

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 2 months later...
mjtinmemphis Unincorporated Area

mjtinmemphis

Posted
Posted

This is a very interesting debate about what city is best to relocate a business to. I can see why Nashville and Memphis are both on the list of corporate relocations. I know that both cities have a very low corporate pay scale because they are smaller markets. Tennessee also has some of the most employer friendly work-at-will laws in the nation. Also there has been a major issue with corporate wellfare in our state. Companies move in. The city gives them free land and tell them they don't have to pay taxes. So yes I can see Nashville and Memphis being in the top 5.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
DBR96 Whistle-Stop

DBR96

Posted
Posted

There aren't many cities that have 3 interstates intersecting it. Columbia, SC uses that as a market tool as well since so few cities have that feature.

Pittsburgh has three Intertsates that bypass it. The Pennsylvania Turnpike (I-76) passes 15 to 20 miles north and east of downtown; I-79 passes six miles west of downtown, and I-70 passes 25 miles south of downtown. So what is the city itself left with? Three "3di" Interstates that lead into the city, with two of them very substandard in design. :unsure:

Link to comment
Share on other sites
cityboi Metropolitan Area

cityboi

Posted
Posted

Obviously I'm shocked that Greensboro ranks #24 nationally above many cities including Charlotte. But I guess it makes sense because its Greensboro transportation infrastructure and Greensboro's central location along the east coast seaboard that has lured FedEx and potentially Dell. The Triad's low cost of living and educational base and excellent qaulity of life is also an attraction despite the fact that the region is not perceived as a "major league" region like Boston or Atlanta. I guess the list indicates that bigger is not always better or "hotter". But I do think Greensboro and the Triad will be a part of the next wave of cities that arrives to major league status and will be mentioned more among the likes of Cleveland, Boston, Atlanta, San Diego, Nashville ect.

Greensboro is already home to two fortune 500 companies and Winston-Salem is home to two as well.

Greensboro

1. Jefferson-Pilot Financial (the nation's 12th largest life insurance company)

2. VF Corp. (maker of Lee, Wrangler and Grirbaud Jeans as well as other major apparel brands such as Nautica, Tommy Hilfigar, JanSport, Brittania, Vasserette, Vanity Fair, Lily of France, Rusltler, Rider) The Greensboro based company is the world's largest apparel company.

Winston-Salem

1. BB&T bank

2. RJR Tobacco

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.