Ex-Western Washingtonians........why did you leave???

[jskiing]

Place is capitalist ****show. Use scarcity to charge seattle pricing. Then you scrounge for a min wage job gives 15 hours a week.. Employers are idiots, and know they can take advantage of you. Pathetic. So far north.

[rantiquity]

Originally Posted by carolochs

Curious....if any care to answer, why did any ex western Washingtonians leave?

I assume you are talking about Seattle?

Actually after 35 years in South Seattle area I just moved further west to the Olympic peninsula. Absolutely nothing like the I-5 corridor. Thank the powers to be.

I study this forum, read comments, and some of the stuff said doesn't always ring completely true for me.

For example, like weather. Yea....I know WA is gray and drizzly, but I also watch the actual weather reports for the region, have for a year, and it's not nearly as bad as many make it out to sound like. ::head scratch::

Wondering what REAL reasons are for people leaving.....

For one, the weather, I for one can't understand why people complain about the weather. For crying out loud we live in a maritime climate. Where I live (rain shadow) we get about 16-17 inches of rain a year whereas Seattle get about 38 inches.
Now why people leave the Seattle area...easy..Number one is the traffic and continuous road construction which doesn't seem to make any improvement in traffic patterns or congestion. Number two is housing cost. Number three is the politics. All were the reason I left and

[Taz22]

The main reason we’ve decided to move, is my spouse doesn’t like the rain. The rain never bothered me much, but everyone has a different rain tolerance. He grew up in both Hawaii and Phoenix and really misses the sun. We dislike the isolation and having to drive to Olympia for even simple errand runs. Then, there are neighbors who use their yards for a dump and the barn area turning into a deep giant mud puddle every winter.

The people who designed Olympia parking lots didn’t plan for parking, just try parking at TJ’s on a Saturday. Homeless camps have sprouted up everywhere and it’s worrisome to think how things will look in another few years. There are too many drugs here for comfort, add people firing guns at night, which goes on a lot, and it gets scary.

Before Christmas, we were in downtown Olympia doing some shopping. My spouse suddenly said ‘keep walking and get in the car’. Afterwards, he said we were the only people on the street who weren’t homeless. He was freaked out about it.

It would be nice if there were more grocery stores. Fred Meyer is always crowded. Haggen was a nice find, it reminds me of Whole Foods. Everything is expensive, but that’s no surprise.

Washington is incredibly beautiful and rural Washington would suit someone who likes the wild, fireworks on Holidays, shoot em up lifestyle.

My spouse may not like the rain, but having four seasons is important. Currently looking at drier places with more sun in Winter. Bend sounds promising, so do Flagstaff and Spokane.

[blau808]

Originally Posted by Taz22

The main reason we’ve decided to move, is my spouse doesn’t like the rain. The rain never bothered me much, but everyone has a different rain tolerance. He grew up in both Hawaii and Phoenix and really misses the sun. We dislike the isolation and having to drive to Olympia for even simple errand runs. Then, there are neighbors who use their yards for a dump and the barn area turning into a deep giant mud puddle every winter.

My spouse may not like the rain, but having four seasons is important. Currently looking at drier places with more sun in Winter. Bend sounds promising, so do Flagstaff and Spokane.

You may be surprised to learn that Honolulu is actually rainier on average than Olympia. Granted there are probably more gray and overcast days in Olympia, but it actually rains much more in Honolulu. Also there's only two seasons in Hawaii. Rainy and hot.

I'm just saying this because when people say it's too rainy in the PNW, they usually just mean lack of sun, not actual rainfall.




Source: weather-us.com

[dav51lin]

Originally Posted by PS90

I lived on the West side for four years, and was never happier than when I saw Western WA in the rear-view mirror.

Weather was, of course, the main factor, and like Seacove said - it's more the lack of sun for months at a time, than it is the rain.

The second factor for me was traffic. In Eastern WA, traffic can be bad in Spokane, in Yakima, etc, but the rest of the East side is basically smooth-sailing. The time required to get to a destination is based on the distance to get there, not the number of cars and stoplights in your way.

In Western WA, however, there are very few places it seems, even in the rural areas, that don't have tons of traffic at all times. I traveled back to Olympia just this last weekend, and I got depressed as soon as turned off of I-90 onto Highway 18 to Auburn - the bumper-to-bumper traffic just instantaneously appeared.

Granted, those factors are certainly relative, i.e. Western WA's traffic may be great compared to Los Angeles, but you asked for reasons.

almost as bad as LA

[Taz22]

Originally Posted by blau808

You may be surprised to learn that Honolulu is actually rainier on average than Olympia. Granted there are probably more gray and overcast days in Olympia, but it actually rains much more in Honolulu. Also there's only two seasons in Hawaii. Rainy and hot.

I'm just saying this because when people say it's too rainy in the PNW, they usually just mean lack of sun, not actual rainfall.




Source: weather-us.com

My spouse lived in Kaneohe, on the opposite side of Honolulu. Not sure what the rain quota is there, but it’s a pretty place.

Good point about gloom being worse than rainfall. When it rains here, cold and dark weather comes along with it. In the tropics, it rains frequently, but it’s warm and the sun comes right back out, so it’s all good.

[rkcarguy]

Originally Posted by Taz22

My spouse lived in Kaneohe, on the opposite side of Honolulu. Not sure what the rain quota is there, but it’s a pretty place.

Good point about gloom being worse than rainfall. When it rains here, cold and dark weather comes along with it. In the tropics, it rains frequently, but it’s warm and the sun comes right back out, so it’s all good.

There is a huge difference between 80* pouring rain for a few hours in Hawaii and 40* drizzle and darkness for weeks on end in the PNW.

[rkcarguy]

Originally Posted by jskiing

Place is capitalist ****show. Use scarcity to charge seattle pricing. Then you scrounge for a min wage job gives 15 hours a week.. Employers are idiots, and know they can take advantage of you. Pathetic. So far north.

But the transplants keep pouring in.

[Baldy]

Originally Posted by carolochs

Curious....if any care to answer, why did any ex western Washingtonians leave?

I study this forum, read comments, and some of the stuff said doesn't always ring completely true for me.

For example, like weather. Yea....I know WA is gray and drizzly, but I also watch the actual weather reports for the region, have for a year, and it's not nearly as bad as many make it out to sound like. ::head scratch::

Wondering what REAL reasons are for people leaving.....

Since the first post in 2015, Western Washington has dramatically changed.

Biggest changes:
1. Private liquor stores.
2. Legal homosexual marriages.
3. Legal pot.
4. Economy boom (unstoppable apartment and housing construction.

From outside looking in, you can't realize the combined impact those four things have done.

Let me try: Imagine a small working class town being physically dropped into San Francisco and the residents are told to deal with it.

Or having a Whole Foods down the street filled with California transplants with pink hair, nipple rings, and loudly insisting on being called non-gendered pronouns.

Yeah, the reasons for leaving Western Washington state may have changed in the last five years.