After 4 Years, My Impression of Roanoke (Richmond, Salem: real estate, 2013, insurance)
Roanoke areaRoanoke - Salem area
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In February, it will mark 4 years since my partner and I moved to Roanoke from Houston, Texas. I figure that is enough time living here to write a report on the experience, and to share it here. I’ll be issuing grades on all areas of the review. Call it a report card on Roanoke.
People. A+ Yep, in my experience the people in the Roanoke area get high marks on congeniality and friendliness. The merchants and retail people I’ve delt with have been mostly warm, helpful and professional. Drivers are usually courteous and thoughtful. More on drivers later, but for now suffice it to say that the people of the Roanoke area have helped make our transition from there to here a good one. Bravo for the people of Roanoke.
Food Scene C+ I have to admit from the start that where it concerns dining, Roanoke did not have much of a chance to impress a couple of Houstonians. We were literally spoiled for choices and used to a stunning variety of regional and ethnic fare at very good prices. Mind you, there are a small handful of very good spots to eat in Roanoke, if you’re willing to pay the arm and leg it takes to eat at them.
The very friendly people of Roanoke have been kind enough to make suggestions on places to eat, and we have learned to ignore them. We developed a “Don’t listen to the locals,” posture about restaurants after going to allegedly “fantastic” Mexican places, only to bite into tacos that tasted like they were filled with sawdust, complimented by bowls of seasoned tomato soup posing as salsa. We did manage to find a couple of mostly authentic taquerias that turned out to be pretty good, but we still miss the really good stuff of Houston.
Weather A+ The complete opposite of our experience with restaurants, it was really hard for Roanoke to fail at this one. In Houston, we had two seasons. January and HOT. Triple digit temperatures with 98+% humidity was the norm. Houston, if you will pardon the grossness, is like walking into someone’s mouth. The heat and the constant threat of hurricanes and flooding is relentless.
This area has actual, distinct seasons, none of them too extreme, with an abundance of days that can only be described as glorious. We still marvel at the days in summer that we can shut down the AC and open up the house, and that is reflected directly in our electricity bill, which is a fraction of what it used to be. All that nice weather with Southwest Virginia’s idyllic scenery is a fantastic combination.
Cost of Living B+ Roanoke gets high marks for real estate values (we bought a great home here), and equal approval for our experience shopping in food and department stores. If anything, our money goes a little further here (if we don’t eat out a lot). Gasoline and all other expenses are comparable to or less than what we had in Houston.
Drivers F- I know, in the real world there is no such thing as an F minus. Still, I could not bring myself to offer something as complimentary as a plain F to the drivers here. Do you know the quickest way to get a Roanoker to hit their brakes? Put them on an on ramp. On ramps seem to be a bit of a conundrum here, a kind of freaky quantum zone where the act of merging isn’t physically possible. In the quantum zone, you must come to a complete stop, turn on your turn indicator and then wait for a car to jump out in front of. It’s the Roanoke way.
Also, I’d really like to acquaint more Roanokers with the notion that yellow stripes are an actual boundary, separating cars going in opposite directions. Way too many people seem to think those lines are something you aim for, like part of your car is supposed to be in the opposite lane. You can see it on almost any road where there isn’t a physical barrier between traffic. People drift over the line into the oncoming lane as if by magnetic force. Or perhaps the voices from their phones tell them to. Either way, they scare the living daylights out of people who actually see yellow lines as a boundary.
Medical Care A What can I say? Roanoke is a great place for medical services. The facilities and the people who staff them are top notch. Carillion rocks, in our experience. There is even a very fine Veteran’s Administration Hospital that I go to in Salem. The care I get there and the quality of staff are far superior to what I experienced in Houston.
Entertainment B For a city of its size, Roanoke (and the surrounding area) have some good entertainment venues. We lucked out a little and bought a home less than 10 minutes from Berglund Center, where some decent over-the-hill acts show up from time to time.
Traffic A++ What can I say? I come from a city where a cross town trip during the average rush hour can take 2+ hours. A place with an abundance of road rage incidents. I have heard Roanokers complain about the traffic here, and I suppose we all acclimate to our own level of misery, but I’ve never experienced what I would call heavy traffic. Four years in and it is still a breeze to me.
Overall grade? I will give it a B+. Not perfect, but not bad by any means. Houston, at the time we left, was a C- or a D+, and only that good because of food and entertainment. So, hooray for us. Our move paid off and overall we are very happy to be here.
I so enjoyed reading this!!! Both in terms of accuracy and use of snarky metaphors. Well done. Full 100% agreement for almost every category from another ex-Texan (now fast approaching the start of year three).
People really are super friendly here like many places in the south, but without any hint of that faux-warmth thing (i.e. Dallas where people want to be seen as "warm" but could not be happier if you flew off the highway into a drainage ditch saving them 3 seconds of commute time). Truly a live & let live vibe here. It's really nice.
Food scene in total agreement. Damn, I miss having authentic and plentiful Tex-Mex, Ethiopian fare, countless Indian buffets and, gosh, anything! Texas is a crazy place but they sure know how to eat. At least Inka Grill has been a wonderful local culinary antidote to the "general meh", but they can't do it alone. Needless to say, with the covid raging, lately I've been teaching myself how to cook with varying degrees of success. Also eating Domino's pizza more often than I ever imagined... and kind of liking it. Uh oh. I'm beginning to forget what I'm missing!
Weather? Perhaps only San Diego has it better. We get four real seasons, all lovely, all without the arctic blasts pouring down the middle of the country or the coastal baking humidity of Raleigh or Richmond. Nevermind those tornadoes or hurricanes; they remain at a comfortable distance unlike Texas where you can set your watch to their arrival. An abundance of natural beauty in every direction doesn't hurt either. Clean air, beautiful skies, lots to explore and enjoy. Roanoke region really is one of America's best places & I hope it stays this way forever.
Cost of living is great! I have noticed an uptick in house prices lately, but the property tax rate is about half of what it is in Texas. Yes, we have income and car property taxes, but factored in there's no comparison. When I changed my address, my auto insurance dropped by half! Below $50/month in 2020 (Geico)? Fine by me! And those low utility bills? Not even $100 month averaged across the year... thank you mother nature.
Drivers really do suck, but F-? Maybe more like a D+. They generally drive like people with dementia. Worst and most common offense is slow driving. Very slow. I mean a kind of slow that doesn't even exist in Texas, because some hothead in a giant black pickup truck with a 12-gauge shotgun would've blasted them off the road by now. In Roanoke, people drive slower than sucking molasses through a crazy straw. Slower than carrying a piano up three flights of stairs. Slower than inflating a hot air passenger balloon with a foot pump. Slow enough for Christmas to arrive in June. THEY. JUST. DO. NOT. GO.
The rest of the offenders? Mostly asleep at the wheel, maybe a drunk driver or two, and veering a bit too close to pedestrians and bicycles. Yes, that middle-stripe veering issue is real. All in an absent-minded kind of way - not in a white-knuckle psychopath I75 move-over-or-die Central Expressway way. Oh well. Can't have it all.
Medical care totally agreed. I am reassured we have such phenomenal resources at our disposal, particularly in covidville!
Entertainment also agreed a solid B. More going on than most small cities of this size, but of course hard to judge with covid raging. If you think about it, small cities rarely ever get more than a B-rating anyway... the bigger the pool = the more the options. Just goes with the territory of small-town living.
Traffic couldn't agree more. There isn't any. I stopped checking my traffic analysis map shortly after I arrived. Have not launched it since. I cannot believe how relaxed I have become; the satisfaction is real and settles into your bones. Whereas in Texas my daily moods were constantly rattled by the number of near-death situations I escaped from. All of that fight-or-flight is now gone. A transformational gain that I had not anticipated before moving here and sincerely appreciate.
Overall agree with your B+ rating and a darn strong one at that! If the food kicked up to near-Texas quality across the board, it would be an A-. By any measure, a good improvement over the C- I escaped from.
Glad to see ya'll like it. I grew up in Salem.... that was a long time ago! Lived 7 years in the midwest; glad to get back to the mtns. I live up in the Shenandoah Valley now, and Roanoke/Salem are way crowed compared to growing up, but it's good to hear it has not lost it's character. It was always a pretty good place to raise a family. And yes, a real 4-season place for weather! Probably won't see the big blizzard of '58 again there for a long time LOL.
I've been to 'Big D' a lot fork business; I can see the driving there is like Atlanta.... you can spend a lot of your life sitting in a car. Sounds like Houston is just as bad.
Moved here from Texas in 2013! We really need to have a meetup PaulFromHouston and ExAustin!
The food is definitely something we miss the most. We did not get to take our summer 2020 trip back to Texas, so we are way overdue. Make sure you hit up Mama Jean's BBQ food truck for some pretty good Texas-style brisket. Their schedule is posted on their FB page - designated days only - sometimes on Brambleton in Grandin Court area and sometimes in downtown Salem.
Oh my yes - the people who come to a full stop on a merge ramp. Especially the one on 581 at Orange Avenue. Terrifying.
Having said that - I cannot get F to the drivers because they are so much more docile than Texas drivers. There's some places where a lane ends shortly after proceeding through the traffic light. I notice the Roanoke drivers dutifully get in the main lane rather than trying to sneak ahead in the right lane. It took me a couple of years to acclimatize to that one. After all of those years in Houston traffic, I realized that driving and lane jockeying is not an Olympic event in Roanoke.
Haha. Great write up. Only been through Roanoke a few times. The driver section was pretty damn funny. I see that applicable up in Notthern VA as well. Somehow people just forget how to drive and that the left lane is a passing lane vs. max out at 65mph lane, etc. Then on I-64 it is back to normal and with 2 vs. 3 lanes each way, people actually move out of the left lane when they detect a faster moving vehicle behind them.
Haha. Great write up. Only been through Roanoke a few times. The driver section was pretty damn funny. I see that applicable up in Notthern VA as well. Somehow people just forget how to drive and that the left lane is a passing lane vs. max out at 65mph lane, etc. Then on I-64 it is back to normal and with 2 vs. 3 lanes each way, people actually move out of the left lane when they detect a faster moving vehicle behind them.
I guess people here have their own spin on how to drive, however it’s like the cars here don’t have horns since it’s a rarity to ever hear one when driving. After spending most of my years driving in NY and NJ, the sound of horns was constant background noise and it’s definitely a sound that I don’t miss.
That said, talking on a non hands free cell phone here is still legal, so perhaps that leads to some of the yellow line wandering since some drivers let their emotions play out as they are attempting to drive
Drivers F- I know, in the real world there is no such thing as an F minus. Still, I could not bring myself to offer something as complimentary as a plain F to the drivers here. Do you know the quickest way to get a Roanoker to hit their brakes? Put them on an on ramp. On ramps seem to be a bit of a conundrum here, a kind of freaky quantum zone where the act of merging isn’t physically possible. In the quantum zone, you must come to a complete stop, turn on your turn indicator and then wait for a car to jump out in front of. It’s the Roanoke way.
No way Roanoke is the worst place for this in VA but no doubt the ones you see could compete with NOVA. I live north of you on 81 but used to live in NOVA for many years. Way too many people are clueless on how to enter a major highway from a ramp. But keep in mind, NOVA is made mostly made up of drivers from all over the US and multiple countries. But your assessment of Roanoke is pretty well written. I've only been to Houston for work and I thought VA's heat and humidity was bad until I visited there. But I ate some of the best food there.
Drivers F- I know, in the real world there is no such thing as an F minus. Still, I could not bring myself to offer something as complimentary as a plain F to the drivers here. Do you know the quickest way to get a Roanoker to hit their brakes? Put them on an on ramp. On ramps seem to be a bit of a conundrum here, a kind of freaky quantum zone where the act of merging isn’t physically possible. In the quantum zone, you must come to a complete stop, turn on your turn indicator and then wait for a car to jump out in front of. It’s the Roanoke way.
No way Roanoke is the worst place for this in VA but no doubt the ones you see could compete with NOVA. I live north of you on 81 but used to live in NOVA for many years. Way too many people are clueless on how to enter a major highway from a ramp. But keep in mind, NOVA is made mostly made up of drivers from all over the US and multiple countries. But your assessment of Roanoke is pretty well written. I've only been to Houston for work and I thought VA's heat and humidity was bad until I visited there. But I ate some of the best food there.
Roanoke is growing and the roads and infrastructure are definitely in need of change and modernization. Almost all of the entrance snd exit ramps on 581 ate shared ramps which is really a “no no” engineering wise. If you give it a minutes thought and realize it’s a shared/common lane for those accelerating to enter the highway as well as a deceleration lane to exit. Not an up to date design.
At least the Roanoke Rt 81 improvements will eliminate the left lane exit for Roanoke onto Rt 580, another antiquated road design. Regardless of the road engineering in the Roanoke area, there are no shortages of bad driver as PaulFromHouston clearly pointed out!
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