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Everybody here please keep trash talking Cortland. I need that housing market to stay affordable for a little bit longer yet...
It's way too isolated, people. 30-45 minutes from major cities? Completely unmanageable. Plus the whole downtown is under construction due to a huge influx in grant money. Who wants do deal with that?
Then there's the snow, flood zones, radon issues, etc, which all require a tiny bit of research to plan around. Too spooky. Steer clear of this place, guys.
Everybody here please keep trash talking Cortland. I need that housing market to stay affordable for a little bit longer yet...
It's way too isolated, people. 30-45 minutes from major cities? Completely unmanageable. Plus the whole downtown is under construction due to a huge influx in grant money. Who wants do deal with that?
Then there's the snow, flood zones, radon issues, etc, which all require a tiny bit of research to plan around. Too spooky. Steer clear of this place, guys.
it is a college town of sorts and 25-45 minutes to bigger cities isn't that far away. Especially when a couple of those cities you can simply get on I-81 to get to them(Syracuse and Binghamton). Plus, it has enough going on. With that said, I see what you are doing...
it is a college town of sorts and 25-45 minutes to bigger cities isn't that far away. Especially when a couple of those cities you can simply get on I-81 to get to them(Syracuse and Binghamton). Plus, it has enough going on. With that said, I see what you are doing...
Who, me? Not up to anything here
In all seriousness, I've already signed onto a 1 year lease in Cortland to "test drive" the area and CNY. I've had family live in the Cortland area with mostly good things to say about it (complaints primarily being about the job market and winters) and my experience visiting them, along with research, has been mostly positive.
My background is that I'm originally from the Hudson Valley but lived in Madison Wisconsin for the last five years for work. Moving back east because I want to be relatively closer to family, and got a remote job to facilitate that.
Cortland and CNY in general seems to have some of the best elements of Great Lakes/Wisconsin (lower cost of living, more reasonable pace of life) and the east coast (more walkable cities, fantastic scenery) while sacrificing very little. You have decent sized cities that are a short drive away, while the big east coast cities are easily within range of a weekend trip if desired. Plus you have the finger lakes and tons of outdoor activities nearby. New York has higher taxes of course, but the difference is less than you'd think after you run the numbers, plus NY's amenities are better.
What'll likely make or break us are the winters. I suffer from seasonal depression, so I don't know how all the gray skies are going to work out. I'm at least aware of it and know how to manage it, and in reality it's not much grayer than Madison was, but if anything ruins the area for me that'll likely be it.
In all seriousness, I've already signed onto a 1 year lease in Cortland to "test drive" the area and CNY. I've had family live in the Cortland area with mostly good things to say about it (complaints primarily being about the job market and winters) and my experience visiting them, along with research, has been mostly positive.
My background is that I'm originally from the Hudson Valley but lived in Madison Wisconsin for the last five years for work. Moving back east because I want to be relatively closer to family, and got a remote job to facilitate that.
Cortland and CNY in general seems to have some of the best elements of Great Lakes/Wisconsin (lower cost of living, more reasonable pace of life) and the east coast (more walkable cities, fantastic scenery) while sacrificing very little. You have decent sized cities that are a short drive away, while the big east coast cities are easily within range of a weekend trip if desired. Plus you have the finger lakes and tons of outdoor activities nearby. New York has higher taxes of course, but the difference is less than you'd think after you run the numbers, plus NY's amenities are better.
What'll likely make or break us are the winters. I suffer from seasonal depression, so I don't know how all the gray skies are going to work out. I'm at least aware of it and know how to manage it, and in reality it's not much grayer than Madison was, but if anything ruins the area for me that'll likely be it.
I was thinking in terms of keeping the city/area low key.
Thank you for your response, as it can offer context in comparison to areas in other states.
I think Cortland is kind of a sleeper, as you can get to Syracuse, Binghamton and Ithaca within a short drive, while having enough to do in the city itself. Homer just to the north offers another quaint, walkable option as well.
I was thinking in terms of keeping the city/area low key.
Thank you for your response, as it can offer context in comparison to areas in other states.
I think Cortland is kind of a sleeper, as you can get to Syracuse, Binghamton and Ithaca within a short drive, while having enough to do in the city itself. Homer just to the north offers another quaint, walkable option as well.
I've been in Cortland for about two weeks now, which seems like enough to form a surface level first impression of what I like and don't like so far:
Like:
- Being a small, (relatively) isolated city, it's very self contained and immediate, as long as you live in town. Nothing within the city limits takes more than ten minutes to travel to, and it's pretty easy to walk downtown. You can also get this downstate but there's more competition from city commuters. Wisconsin has cities like this but they're less easy to find, and lack some of the other benefits I'll get into.
- Swings above the belt for a city its size as far as restaurants are concerned. This is probably due to the college, but a win is a win. Some things like sushi are just passable (at least it's there), but other places I've gone to (like Doug's Fish Fry) are genuinely excellent. There's a good amount of Italian food in town. Smaller cities in Wisconsin trend toward deep fried American fare and bars, and you'll need to go somewhere quite a bit larger to get the same selection as you do in Cortland.
- Cortland's urban core is compact and fairly intact compared to other small cities in NY and WI. They don't have mandatory parking minimums downtown, so there aren't acres of asphalt like you see all over the country. The highway luckily bypasses the downtown instead of bisecting it.
- Speaking of the highway, the town is relatively easy to get to being right off of 81. Getting to 86 or 90 is dead simple so the whole state is pretty accessible for day/weekend trips.
- People here seem genuinely nice, maybe even more so than the stereotypically nice midwest. Everybody wants to have a conversation. I see allot more active people here than in the midwest: kids riding bikes, people walking dogs, talking to neighbors, etc.
- Surrounding area is very scenic at this time of year. The finger lakes and southern tier Appalachian mountain ranges are beautiful. The Catskills are close by.
- Cities like Ithaca and Syracuse aren't really that far if you can get work in Cortland and only go there for the occasional visit or shopping trip.
- Still very affordable here.
Dislike:
- While some parts of the city are well kept, on the whole it feels like the town needs a coat of paint. There are allot of condemned houses sitting on the main streets that make a bad initial impression, and run down looking neighborhoods. Traffic lights are dated and in some cases barely visible, and the sidewalks are uneven and crumbling in allot of places. This isn't too uncommon in upstate NY, but doesn't really exist in the smaller cities I've visited in Wisconsin, so it's jarring coming directly from that area. Some of this is being addressed as we speak (see my next point) but not all of it.
- This one is temporary, and I understand it's ultimately for the best and there were unforeseen reasons why it happened this way... but the construction downtown is pretty insane. Main Street is a madhouse right now with barely obstructed open pits and washed out gravel everywhere. They let you go down the street in your car while construction is active, so you're dodging around construction vehicles. They're going to start on Groton Avenue (a heavily trafficked street) just as the college students get back while Main Street construction is still ongoing with estimated completion being late next year. I cannot wait to see the finished result, and what they did finish on Clinton Street looks very nice... but yeesh.
- While the people are nice, there seems to be a subset who are very pessimistic about the area and very vocal about it. There's this undercurrent of "Cortland/upstate is terrible, it'll never get better, there's nothing anybody can do about it, etc." It's annoying because the area genuinely does have potential, and in some ways is doing better than other parts of the country.
- On the urban sprawl side of town: what's with all of the derelict strip malls? Nearly every strip mall on 281 needs to be bulldozed and rebuilt, or at least heavily repaired. Parking minimums in that area need to be rethought, because there's just acres of cratered lots serving absolutely no purpose except to waste space and make that street look awful. This is more on the town than the city, because the actual downtown is nice.
- This doesn't impact me personally since I work remotely, but I don't get the impression that the job market here is thriving. I haven't lived in Cortland long enough to have real opinions on why this is or how to fix it, but the local economy feels unbalanced in favor of the school. It seems like most of the housing near downtown is rented out to students, and while that's fine to a degree there needs to be balance. I'm reserving full judgement on this though.
- I have admittedly not witnessed a Cortland winter yet. Very curious to see how that compares to Wisconsin and downstate. On paper, it's just "more snow than Wisconsin, but slightly warmer"... but in practice, how does that effect seasonal depression and mental health? How does it effect travel? We'll see.
Neutral:
- Taxes/CoL. Everybody complains about this aspect of New York state, but honestly this is only slightly higher in NY than it was in Wisconsin, and the public services here seem genuinely better for that slight increase. At my tax bracket NY's income tax is about the same as WI, sales tax is technically higher (5.5% vs 8%) but New York has way more exemptions on theirs so it washes, property tax is only slightly higher in NY, vehicle registration is way cheaper in NY but they require annual inspections and the gas tax is higher, NY tolls their roads but does a way better job at snow removal (from my experience downstate), WI has more expensive gas/electric utilities, housing is about the same when you get out of the NYC metro area and do apples-to-apples comparisons to similarly sized cities... you get the idea. FWIW Cortland's DMV is the politest and least hectic I've ever been to, so there are some benefits to paying a little bit more.
- Public transit: equally bad anywhere I've gone outside of the NYC metro area.
That's what I've got so far. Overall, Cortland seems like a pleasant place to be. You can find the bad anyplace you go, and Cortland has some areas that need improvement, but the city's accessible cost of living and functionality seem to make up for it. Maybe I'll have a different opinion after living here a bit longer or after having suffered 6 months of nonstop snow and clouds. I'm keeping an open mind about it and being optimistic.
I've been in Cortland for about two weeks now, which seems like enough to form a surface level first impression of what I like and don't like so far:
Like:
- Being a small, (relatively) isolated city, it's very self contained and immediate, as long as you live in town. Nothing within the city limits takes more than ten minutes to travel to, and it's pretty easy to walk downtown. You can also get this downstate but there's more competition from city commuters. Wisconsin has cities like this but they're less easy to find, and lack some of the other benefits I'll get into.
- Swings above the belt for a city its size as far as restaurants are concerned. This is probably due to the college, but a win is a win. Some things like sushi are just passable (at least it's there), but other places I've gone to (like Doug's Fish Fry) are genuinely excellent. There's a good amount of Italian food in town. Smaller cities in Wisconsin trend toward deep fried American fare and bars, and you'll need to go somewhere quite a bit larger to get the same selection as you do in Cortland.
- Cortland's urban core is compact and fairly intact compared to other small cities in NY and WI. They don't have mandatory parking minimums downtown, so there aren't acres of asphalt like you see all over the country. The highway luckily bypasses the downtown instead of bisecting it.
- Speaking of the highway, the town is relatively easy to get to being right off of 81. Getting to 86 or 90 is dead simple so the whole state is pretty accessible for day/weekend trips.
- People here seem genuinely nice, maybe even more so than the stereotypically nice midwest. Everybody wants to have a conversation. I see allot more active people here than in the midwest: kids riding bikes, people walking dogs, talking to neighbors, etc.
- Surrounding area is very scenic at this time of year. The finger lakes and southern tier Appalachian mountain ranges are beautiful. The Catskills are close by.
- Cities like Ithaca and Syracuse aren't really that far if you can get work in Cortland and only go there for the occasional visit or shopping trip.
- Still very affordable here.
Dislike:
- While some parts of the city are well kept, on the whole it feels like the town needs a coat of paint. There are allot of condemned houses sitting on the main streets that make a bad initial impression, and run down looking neighborhoods. Traffic lights are dated and in some cases barely visible, and the sidewalks are uneven and crumbling in allot of places. This isn't too uncommon in upstate NY, but doesn't really exist in the smaller cities I've visited in Wisconsin, so it's jarring coming directly from that area. Some of this is being addressed as we speak (see my next point) but not all of it.
- This one is temporary, and I understand it's ultimately for the best and there were unforeseen reasons why it happened this way... but the construction downtown is pretty insane. Main Street is a madhouse right now with barely obstructed open pits and washed out gravel everywhere. They let you go down the street in your car while construction is active, so you're dodging around construction vehicles. They're going to start on Groton Avenue (a heavily trafficked street) just as the college students get back while Main Street construction is still ongoing with estimated completion being late next year. I cannot wait to see the finished result, and what they did finish on Clinton Street looks very nice... but yeesh.
- While the people are nice, there seems to be a subset who are very pessimistic about the area and very vocal about it. There's this undercurrent of "Cortland/upstate is terrible, it'll never get better, there's nothing anybody can do about it, etc." It's annoying because the area genuinely does have potential, and in some ways is doing better than other parts of the country.
- On the urban sprawl side of town: what's with all of the derelict strip malls? Nearly every strip mall on 281 needs to be bulldozed and rebuilt, or at least heavily repaired. Parking minimums in that area need to be rethought, because there's just acres of cratered lots serving absolutely no purpose except to waste space and make that street look awful. This is more on the town than the city, because the actual downtown is nice.
- This doesn't impact me personally since I work remotely, but I don't get the impression that the job market here is thriving. I haven't lived in Cortland long enough to have real opinions on why this is or how to fix it, but the local economy feels unbalanced in favor of the school. It seems like most of the housing near downtown is rented out to students, and while that's fine to a degree there needs to be balance. I'm reserving full judgement on this though.
- I have admittedly not witnessed a Cortland winter yet. Very curious to see how that compares to Wisconsin and downstate. On paper, it's just "more snow than Wisconsin, but slightly warmer"... but in practice, how does that effect seasonal depression and mental health? How does it effect travel? We'll see.
Neutral:
- Taxes/CoL. Everybody complains about this aspect of New York state, but honestly this is only slightly higher in NY than it was in Wisconsin, and the public services here seem genuinely better for that slight increase. At my tax bracket NY's income tax is about the same as WI, sales tax is technically higher (5.5% vs 8%) but New York has way more exemptions on theirs so it washes, property tax is only slightly higher in NY, vehicle registration is way cheaper in NY but they require annual inspections and the gas tax is higher, NY tolls their roads but does a way better job at snow removal (from my experience downstate), WI has more expensive gas/electric utilities, housing is about the same when you get out of the NYC metro area and do apples-to-apples comparisons to similarly sized cities... you get the idea. FWIW Cortland's DMV is the politest and least hectic I've ever been to, so there are some benefits to paying a little bit more.
- Public transit: equally bad anywhere I've gone outside of the NYC metro area.
That's what I've got so far. Overall, Cortland seems like a pleasant place to be. You can find the bad anyplace you go, and Cortland has some areas that need improvement, but the city's accessible cost of living and functionality seem to make up for it. Maybe I'll have a different opinion after living here a bit longer or after having suffered 6 months of nonstop snow and clouds. I'm keeping an open mind about it and being optimistic.
Seems like a fair assessment. By the way, if you like BBQ, check out Bob's in Homer north of the city.
Binghamton is another pretty close option as well.
I'm wondering if the strip mall issue is a result of how retail has been changing across the country too.
Last edited by ckhthankgod; 08-17-2023 at 08:54 AM..
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