Learn Me: Greensboro, NC

Greensboro, North Carolina - Love it?  Hate it?  Meh?

I setup a simple search at work watching for new positions that might open up and I found one at a different branch that caught my eye today.  Work would be located near the airport on the western side of Greensboro and within driving distance of Winston Salem if I'm reading the map correctly.  I'm curious what the people here have to say about the town and general area.  Where are good neighborhoods where you can own a home and have enough space to keep five cars around?  What is the weather like, is the humidity unbearable? Are there good options for hiking and outdoor activities?  Motorsports?  And a big one for me, is it welcoming to people not from the area?  When I moved to south central PA it took a little time to realize its not exactly friendly to people who didn't grow up here.  I don't hate it, I'd just like a place that is more open and welcoming to transplants.

Weather is warm.  Depends what you thing unbearable means, but it definitely has hot/humid summers.  That said, you can usually hang out outdoors (i.e. get beer on the patio) almost year round, and provided it isn't super wet, hiking, biking, etc. are all good in winter as well as summer.

Lots of transplants in the Triad, nobody will care about that.

I live in Winston currently, so I can't give you a detailed layout of Greensboro.  Its much more of a sprawl/flattened city (IMO) than Winston in the sense that downtown isn't as dense/urban, but its nearly all suburbs.  It does have a couple downtown-ish areas that are cool though, some good breweries, etc.  Just like the other cities around, its a decent spot between "boring" and "insane".  There is stuff going on downtown, but its very accessible.  Not hard to park, not expensive to access, etc.

I'm sure finding a suitable place to purchase a home with space for 5+ cars is not a problem.  

There are plenty of local parks for biking, but you will likely travel to get to the good stuff.  The Piedmont Triad is fairly flat.  Just beyond Winston Salem is where the mountains start, and when you go another hour+ west/north you start hitting the really cool outdoors stuff like Boone, BRP, Asheville, etc.  

GSO is an awesome airport to fly in and out of if you live near it.  Its like a 2 min walk from your car to your gate, security takes 3 mins, etc.  I hear it totally sucks for visitors as the car rental portion of it is slow, has terrible hours, etc.

on a related note, what type of position are you looking at?

Greensboro is a little over an hour from VIR, about 2.5 hours from CMP. Has a pretty good hospital.  Greensboro Coliseum sometimes has big acts or sports. I don't live there and only occasionally visit but it seems nice. If I had to move, Greensboro & Winston Salem would be on my list of places in NC to consider.

I'm a bit further East, in Raleigh, but I go to Greensboro now and then. Greensboro doesn't seem like a bad place to be. It's a college down, with enough to do to keep you entertained. The mountains are a few hours to the West, the beach is 4 hours to the East.

As a Northerner, you'll find winters to be largely a joke, but any kind of winter weather will shut things down for a good reason. Summers are hot and humid. 

Most cities in NC are like islands. If you get 20 minutes outside of Greensboro urban area, the living expenses will be reduced, but you'll be in the *real* countryside. 

There are active Motorsports clubs in the area.


 

My former company had a branch office there and the people from that branch liked it.  Not sure what that means, but they were also good guys.  

Im a northeast transplant to NC and I'll say it was the best thing I ever did.  Im more east near Goldsboro but its been a tremendous change.  For less that I paid for my 1 acre suburban home in a NJ suburb I'm living on 11 acres with a barn and 30x50 shop.  Even in the farmland areas newcomers are welcomed, hell my wife is a few steps away from becoming mayor of our town if she doesnt slow her roll.   Life is different in the south but its a good different.

I live in Winston Salem

Went to university in GSO, play hockey in GSO weekly (just got home from there two hours ago!).

It's like anywhere - good and bad spots. I just prefer the feel of WS more. I like the downtown area more

But, yeah, move here, we could hang.

Thanks for the feedback everyone, I appreciate it! :)

ProDarwin - I'm looking at an engineering role in heavy duty trucks.  While browsing I also found that TRD - Toyota Racing Development isn't far away either...

M2Pilot - The area I'm looking at is about an hour and fifteen to VIR.  Almost exactly the distance from my current home track.  Thats pretty manageable.

Brett_Murphy (Agent of Chaos) - I wasn't thinking about cities like islands, I guess that is a good way to describe it.  I'm currently surrounded by corn fields to the east and west so I'm accustomed to the type of environment you're talking about beyond the city limits.  I would like to get closer to a populated area to have more options for everything close to home.

JThw8 - I have a few friends that have migrated south to NC and SC, and they all seem to love it thus far.  Never thought much about it for myself, but I think its a better fit than my current town.

hybridmomentspass - Hockey?!  I loved watching games when I lived further north, but can't skate worth a crap myself.  Still surprises me to find hockey fans in places where it doesn't stay cold for very long.