Your Favorite Progressive Small Towns in America.

[rapidsquirrel]

Not at all Rapid, you and Irish's feed back are most welcome

Really you sort of confirm something that was a bit of realization to me. For a while I always assumed all aspects of a big city had to be somehow mirrored in a small town, but in a smaller fashion. The truth I find, is that the aspect of living in a small town makes many of these simply not needed at all

Traffic is something I try and wrap my head around. I live in Phoenix, and the idea of having a city with roads LESS the 5 lanes seems unthinkable. Looking at maps of places like Burlington and Decorah, I'm amazed the towns can function with mostly 2 lane roads of course as you say, if traffic is really that low, it isn't a problem.

I actually just started a new city based on Decorah's road map. Don't suppose the town has a map for tourists or something that shows individual shops and such I could use for recreating it

Heh, it's a traffic jam here if you have to wait more then 3-4 minutes at a stop sign. As for pictures and maps, I'll see if I can find anything for you, though as a starting point, Google Street View has a couple of Decorah's streets in it. Otherwise, http://www.decoraharea.com and http://www.decorahareachamber.com might have what you are looking for. Also http://www.luther.edu for pictures of the local college.

How long have you lived in Decorah? My wife went to Luther College for two years.

I'm constantly amazed how such a small college like Luther gets around. As for how long, I've been here since '99. When did she attend?

[irishmick79]

Not at all Rapid, you and Irish's feed back are most welcome

Really you sort of confirm something that was a bit of realization to me. For a while I always assumed all aspects of a big city had to be somehow mirrored in a small town, but in a smaller fashion. The truth I find, is that the aspect of living in a small town makes many of these simply not needed at all

Traffic is something I try and wrap my head around. I live in Phoenix, and the idea of having a city with roads LESS the 5 lanes seems unthinkable. Looking at maps of places like Burlington and Decorah, I'm amazed the towns can function with mostly 2 lane roads of course as you say, if traffic is really that low, it isn't a problem.

I actually just started a new city based on Decorah's road map. Don't suppose the town has a map for tourists or something that shows individual shops and such I could use for recreating it

Heh, it's a traffic jam here if you have to wait more then 3-4 minutes at a stop sign. As for pictures and maps, I'll see if I can find anything for you, though as a starting point, Google Street View has a couple of Decorah's streets in it. Otherwise, http://www.decoraharea.com and http://www.decorahareachamber.com might have what you are looking for. Also http://www.luther.edu for pictures of the local college.

How long have you lived in Decorah? My wife went to Luther College for two years.

I'm constantly amazed how such a small college like Luther gets around. As for how long, I've been here since '99. When did she attend?

'99-'00. She has fond memories of the Whippy Dip and the vaguely dirty billboard signs.

[Alphawolf55]

I'm trying to decide if Portsmouth, NH should be considered a small town or not.

Portsmouth the city itself is about 20,000, which is damn big for New Englanders but is pretty small in comparision to everything else. Go a few miles north and you'll see York, which is 40k but still indubitably a small town. So I'd say "Yes". (As for how small town varies across areas, I'm told by a New Yorker that anything under 100,000 is 'small' and that mayor or not, you can't be a city until you reach a million).

Add pretty much everywhere in a straight line between Portsmouth and Portland to the list of nice small towns. I grew up somewhere in that range and it's nice- though granted it's kinda "Live here if if you like Boston but are terrified of large buildings".

True, Im from Dover, and I know so many people with that attitude, it's kind of becoming a big hipster/indie location.