WE'RE NUMBER 38 WE'RE NUMBER 38

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WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!

We are the 38th best place to live in America (according to one publication)

Gainesville graduates to best city

THE TOP 50

1. Gainesville, Fla.
2. Bellingham, Wash.
3. Portland-Vancouver-Beaverton, Ore.
4. Colorado Springs
5. Ann Arbor, MI
6. Ogden-Clearfield, Utah
7. Asheville, N.C.
8. Fort Collins-Loveland, Colo.
9. San Luis Obispo-Paso Robles, Calif.
10. Boise City-Nampa, Idaho
11. Santa Barbara-Santa Maria, Calif.
12. Logan, Utah-Idaho
13. Provo-Orem, Utah
14. Corvallis, Ore.
15. Durham, N.C.
16. Olympia, Wash.
17. Charlottesville, Va.
18. Flagstaff, Ariz.
19. Indianapolis-Carmel, Ind.
20. Santa Fe
21. Dover, Del.
22. Oxnard-Thousand Oaks-Ventura, Calif.
23. Sebastian-Vero Beach, Fla.
24. Lexington-Fayette, Ky.
25. Lafayette, Ind.
26. Napa, Calif.
27. Salt Lake City
28. Rockingham County-Strafford County, N.H.
29. Athens-Clarke County, Ga.
30. Richmond, Va.
31. Greensboro-Winston-Salem-High Point, N.C.
32. Iowa City
33. Columbus, Ind.
34. Medford, Ore.
35. St. Louis
36. Columbus, Ohio
37. Spokane, Wash.
38. Cincinnati-Middletown, Ohio-Ky.-Ind.
39. Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton, Pa.-N.J.
40. Fargo, N.D.-M.N.
41. Lake County-Kenosha County, Ill.-Wis.
42. Wilmington, Del.-Md.-N.J.
43. Wichita
44. Louisville-Jefferson County, Ky.-Ind.
45. Ocean City, N.J.
46. Des Moines-West Des Moines
47. Winchester, Va.-W.V.
48. Spartanburg, S.C.
49. State College, Pa.
50. Evansville, Ind.-Ky.


By Bob Minzesheimer, USA TODAY
Gainesville, a "right-sized college town" that's home to the University of Florida, is the best place to live in the USA, according to a new book.
Cities Ranked & Rated (Wiley, $24.99) gives high marks to several other "satellite cities" attracting telecommuters, including Bellingham, Wash., (No. 2) and Colorado Springs (No. 4).

At the bottom of the rankings of 375 metropolitan areas is Modesto, Calif.

The 848-page book by Bert Sperling and Peter Sander rates cities in 10 categories, from the economy to the arts. It gives the most weight to cost of living, climate and one subjective measure: quality of life.

It updates 2004 rankings by the authors, who have given more weight to affordable housing and reasonable commuting times. Sperling says, "Two-hour commutes, one-way, are no longer uncommon."

Charlottesville, Va., No. 1 in 2004, dropped to No. 17 after median home prices doubled.

Gainesville (up from No. 56 ) benefits from "a strong concentration of young people and active retirees." With a population of 248,000, its only drawbacks are hot, sticky summers and a relatively high violent crime rate, most of it drug-related.

Sander says "one bad score on one key fact doesn't severely affect the ranking, so long as it isn't outside an acceptable range." But the high-crime rate helped keep Gainesville off Money magazine's 2006 list of 100 Best Places to Live, based on a different methodology.

Modesto and several other central California cities suffer from high unemployment and crime and expensive housing.

The book, the most comprehensive rating of cities, relies on statistics as well as the authors' judgments of physical attractiveness and "ease of living."

The biggest losers since the 2004 rankings are larger cities with lower scores in the book's "three Cs ? cost, commute and crime." Atlanta dropped from No. 7 to 54, Minneapolis-St. Paul from No. 24 to 262, and New York from No. 40 to 251.

"Rapid growth and sprawl are starting to take their toll," says Sander, who lives near Sacramento (No. 183, down from No. 85). He says it's "expanding faster than the infrastructure can support."

Utah has three of the top 15 spots (Ogden, No. 6, Logan, No. 12, and Provo, No. 13), "affordable places with great recreational opportunities and low crime," Sperling says. "They are hot places for the foreseeable future, until overpopulation drives up home prices and drives down livability."


Given the number of cities in this great nation, I'd have to say that being in the top 50 is pretty good.
Maybe if we tried a little harder we could be in the top 25 by the next time they do this.

[Sean Pa]

where s, Fla

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Fla is the abbreviation for Florida Sean.

She was Mr Evans on good times! [img]graemlins/hmmm.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/sure.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/wonder.gif[/img]