Cincinnati vs. Columbus (Cleveland, Reading, Union: middle-class, crime, roughest)

[Inquisitor]

Hi everyone,

I was wondering if anyone with knowledge of these two cities could give a comparison of the two. I am most interested in the relative job markets, costs of living, libraries, culture and cultural attractions , and educational opportunities(in roughly that order). But any sort of comparative information about the two would be useful to me. From the preliminary information I've been able to gather, they both seem like pretty good places to live, but I wonder what considerations might make a person choose one over the other.

Thanks very much.

[JefferyT]

Job market...I think Columbus would be better. I don't know about cost of living.

Both cities have public librarys of good size, and both have academic librarys you can use via a community borrowers card. This card will give you access to academic librarys (public and private) statewide via the Ohiolink master catalogue, permitting you to borrow books from across the state and have them delivered to your library for pick-up. This is an absolutely outstanding service if you need some specialized information that is not available locally.

Cultural and cultural attractions:
Cincinnati probably has the deeper cultural tradition with an excellent symphony, and also an opera and ballet company. There is also a professional theatre in town. There are three good art museum, the most innovative being the Contemporary Arts Center, which is more of an exhibition space than a collecting museum. They have this avant garde "Fringe Festival" in Cincy, too., which isnt really a musuem thing, more like an indy/arts thing.

Columbus' version of the Contemporary Arts Center is the Wexner, but they also have an regular (small) art museum. I am pretty sure they have a ballet, symphony, and opera as well, but Im not that aware of that scene in Cols as I am in Cincy.


Columbus, though, seems to be developing more of a gallery scene in some neighborhoods north of downtown.

In terms of pop music of various sorts, both seem to have good music scenes, with maybe Cols being healthier due to the college population. There is a definetly a strong interest in live blues in Columbus. Cincy has two good venues for touring acts....Bogarts and Southgate House. Personally I dont like the atmosphere in Bogarts, but this is where you will see the bigger names in alt/americana/indy music in Cincy.

Columbus' version of this is Stash's & Littel Brothers. Same type of acts.


In terms of academics, Columbus has Ohio State, which is the big flagship state university. There are also smaller private four year colleges in town, too, like Capital U. Ohio State is the big kahuna, though, and has plenty of opportunities for graduate and undergraduate degrees of various sorts. Columbus sort of trumps the rest of the state in academic opportunity due to Ohio State.

Cincinnati has University of Cincinnati, which is one of the larger state college, and some private colleges, Xavier being the best known.

The big differences in the two citys is in appearance. They are night and day. Cincinnati is very old, industrial, and is very dense and built-up, and built on hills, sort of like Pittsburgh.

Columbus is mostly flat and more suburban in feel, and the old parts are not built as packed-in as Cincy is.

[MattDen]

I think Cincinnati has more of a business base actally, Columbus is more a state government city with lots of colleges. It does have some big companies but not as much as Cincinnati. I would say Cincinnati has a better economy.

Cincinnati however has alot of social problems and I mean alot it has a extremely rough and dangerous inner-city. Over the Rhine, Reading Road and a lot of inner city areas are just plain scary. Columbus has bad neighborhoods and social issues also, but not anything near on the scale of inner-city Cincinanti. Cincinnati is probably in the top 5 as far as roughest midwestern cities.

Cincinanti seems like it has rich and poor with no middle-class. I guess all the social problems happens when they ignore the social issues or distance themselves from them by far away in the suburbs.

Its really a shame with them ignoring all the social problems in Cincinnati it would be such a great city with the hills, economy, cost of housing, cultural amenities and architecture if not for the extreme amount of social problems. The city in its current state has a very low quality of life.

As far as library, Cincinnati's is considered one of the largest in the country. Columbus has great libraries also, but the main one is smaller then Cincinnati's in my opinion.

As far as culture goes, Columbus is alot more liberal then Cincinnati and has alot of great areas along High Street which has basically full of galleries, restaurants and movie theatres. Anything, you could basically want for entertainment is along High Street in Columbus. Not really familiar with Cincinnati's neighborhoods as much though.

As far as cost of housing they are both about the same, rather affordable midwestern cities. For metro areas around 2 million people its very affordable overall.

I would say even though Columbus has good architecture, Cincinnati's architecture is completely amazing especially Over the Rhine (which is a rough neighborhood though)

Personally, I prefer Columbus to Cincinnati. I lived in Columbus been to Cincinnati several times. Overall, Columbus is cleaner, easier to get around in, more liberal and cultured and nicer neighborhoods overall (not architecturally, but culturally).

[zorst]

I live in Cincinnati, visit Columbus regularly and have a standing job offer in Columbus. I choose to live in Cincinnati because of the weather and local motorbiking roads. It will be five to ten degrees F colder in Columbus in the winter on a consistant basis. It snows a lot more in Columbus than it does in Cincinnati. Cincinnati does get the occasional ice storm wearas Columbus rarely gets those. The roads within an hour of Cincinnati and in three directions are awesome. I can't say that about Columbus. What I can say the roads in only one direction from Columbus are awesome.

Pretty much what the above posters say is true. However, I might take exception to MattDen's view of the crime and social problems in Cincinnati. I live here and I feel pretty safe.

[Inquisitor]

Thanks for the replies, everyone. I appreciate all the detailed information and input.

Originally Posted by MattDen

Its really a shame with them ignoring all the social problems in Cincinnati it would be such a great city with the hills, economy, cost of housing, cultural amenities and architecture if not for the extreme amount of social problems.

That seems to be the main drawback to Cincinnati that I'm picking up on here and elsewhere. If it's a serious problem, then I have to agree about it being a shame, because otherwise the city seems to be fantastic.

But is it really that bad? I wonder if statistics or whatever don't make things seem worse than they really are. I once read that Atlanta was rated really high in crime according to one study, yet I'm not too afraid to drive through the vast majority of the Atlanta metro area. If it's bad enough that I would feel unsafe driving through downtown at midnight, then that's a serious drawback. I just don't know how to judge the seriousness of the problems there. I'll visit and check it out myself when I find time.

Thanks again. Any additional information, inputs, or opinions on these two cities is most welcome. Thanks.

[LancasterNative]

Although I'm in Columbus now, I really prefer Cincinnati for the following reasons:

It's soooo much prettier!
Cincy has hills, charming older homes, beautiful churches, the Ohio River and stern-wheelers. Columbus has strip malls, big-box stores, chain restaurants and McMansions everywhere.

It's more conservative.
Cincinnati has a well-deserved reputation for conservatism, especially on social issues. It has a more Southern feel to it, and has always had closer historic ties to the South. They have a freeway named in honor of Ronald Reagan. Many Cincinnatians are open about their Christian faith, and will gladly share it. I love all that! Columbus, on the other hand, is very open to sexual perversion and weirdness. That's proudly paraded down High St. every June in big, loud, obscene "rainbow"-colored glory.

It's friendlier.
Probably another manifestation of Cincy's aforementioned ties with the South. It's awesome! Columbus, meanwhile, has lots of uptight yuppies, self-important corporate hacks, and the rudest motorists I've ever seen in the Midwest! Many of these latter like to flip you off as they fly by in their Lexus, BMW or other imported snobmobiles.

It has better culture.
As other posters already touched on, Cincinnati has world-class cultural institutions. Cincy's art museum is top-notch, while Columbus' is rather dinky. Cincy's symphony is one of the oldest and best. While Columbus has come a long way in that area, you still won't see too many orchestra concerts where they don't throw in at least one OSU Buckeye song. Cincinnatians seem to really relish old-world art, architecture and craftsmanship—whereas Columbus has a thing for bizarre, freaky modern "art" (see Wexner Center).

And finally...

Where the trains used to come in...
Cincinnati wisely and beautifully renovated its historic Union Terminal into the Museum Center, a flourishing cultural landmark which incorporates history, art, science and just about every aspect of human achievement. Columbus bulldozed its historic train station in the 1970s. It featured surface-level parking for awhile, then local bigwigs decided on a convention center—by the same architect who gave us the Wexner monstrosity! The result: the place where locomotives once rolled into Columbus now looks like an architectural train wreck.

[MABCle]

I agree also with everything here especailly that Cincinnati and Cleveland have a much larger white collar job opportunities, They also offer more cultural opportunites. Cincinnati is definitely more conservative, while Columbus is more half n' half lib/con. Its easier to get around in Columbus as the roads don't have to curve around all those hills. Cincinnati has the feel of a city moreso than Columbus. Overall you can't go wrong with eiter.

About driving through downtown Cincy at night.
The actual downtown meaning south of Central Parkway you should feel real safe, though you'd probably be the only one down there anyway as most of Ohio's downtowns close up shop after 6pm. Over-the-rhine, which is immediately north of Downtown is where you'd have trouble if any, though you should be ok, but the rule about being in urban areas across the US apples here meaning keep your wits about you.

[streetcreed]

Columbus has some great safe urban hip neighborhoods.

I say that if your looking for a more liberal/moderate climate, with young people/ hip shops and restaurants, and a decent job market pick Columbus

Cincinnati is an ok place to live, but both cities have very drastically different political climates, Cincinnati is much more conservative, and most of the neighborhoods surrounding downtown are a mess, while in Columbus most downtown neighborhoods are gentrified. Columbus is also great for families, the newer sections of Columbus do resemble a suburb, but there are older pretty areas as well..

Also, Columbus does have many professional theater companies and arts organizations. I would say that Columbus leans toward the modern while Cincinnati leans toward history and the past. Just generalizations there

COlumbus has a lot of corporate jobs, Columbus does not have one center. Many people I know live around downtown but work in suburbs or suburban Columbus. Columbus' corporate jobs are spread out across the city. Downtown is the hub for some corporate jobs, but mostly the government jobs.

[JoeP]

It's more conservative.
Cincinnati has a well-deserved reputation for conservatism, especially on social issues. It has a more Southern feel to it, and has always had closer historic ties to the South. They have a freeway named in honor of Ronald Reagan. Many Cincinnatians are open about their Christian faith, and will gladly share it. I love all that! Columbus, on the other hand, is very open to sexual perversion and weirdness. That's proudly paraded down High St. every June in big, loud, obscene "rainbow"-colored glory.

A Ronnie highway? Oh the irony... talk about obscene.

Regarding the economy, actually Columbus is the only metro in Ohio that has an economy that is on par (maybe even slightly better than) the U.S. average.

[UNT_Eagle]

Although I only lived in Columbus for about a year and a half, I was not impressed overall, but I did come from the Dallas area, too and those are two totally different places! Although I've only visited Cinci a few times, it definately does feel larger and more built up than Cols. and there is a "Southern" feel to it. Cinci seems more industrial, though as you travel around the North and West side, but the downtown view coming from KY on I-65 is breathtaking at night.
When living in Cols. I felt that everyone was preoccupied with work and acted too materialistic. Seemed to be a general lack of politeness. I had a few people flip me off on the highway, and I was even going over the speed limit. Never got that in Dallas or Nashville, where I currently reside.