Yesterday I came upon an article which named 5 surprisingly cool towns where you can buy a home for $150K or less.
The towns were Little Rock, Arkansas, Rockford, Illinois, Syracuse, New York, Topeka, Kansas and the cool town I currently live in...
Wichita Falls, Texas
What follows is the blurb in the article about Wichita Falls...
Home prices in Texas spiked 23.3% in the last year, making many cities unaffordable if you’re working with a $150,000 budget. Not Wichita Falls, however, which was an oil boomtown in the early 20th century. Named after a historic waterfall that was washed away by a flood in the 19th century — and replaced by a 54-foot-long manmade cascade in 1989 — the city is about halfway between Dallas-Fort Worth and Oklahoma City. Wichita Falls has plenty of local attractions, including the River Bend Nature Center, which houses a butterfly conservatory; and more than 40 parks. There’s also the Kemp Center for the Arts, which showcases symphony and ballet performances, as well as art exhibitions. The town has two live theater troupes — Backdoor Theatre and the Wichita Theatre Performing Arts Center — and a ballet school, the Wichita Falls Ballet Theatre. For less than $150,000, you can buy a newly renovated 3-bedroom, 1200-square-foot home in the city. Along with excellent Tex-Mex, the city also offers quality steaks from nearby cattle farms at restaurants like McBride’s Steak House. One of the main downsides is that Wichita Falls is hot in the summer; temperatures in the city climbed above 100 degrees for 100 days in 2011, a Texas state record.
More than 40 parks? I must do some park searching, because I have not visited anywhere near that many parks in this town.
Even though I've not been to anywhere near that many parks here, I have wondered if Wichita Falls has more acreage devoted to parkland than any other town in America. Because this town does have several large parks. Lucy Park and Lake Wichita Park come to mind.
I have not heard of any plans to have a city wide celebration celebrating Wichita Falls being a cool town with affordable housing. I suspect such will not occur.
Early on in my experience of finding myself appalled by another Texas town, called Fort Worth, there was an amusingly embarrassing incident where Fort Worth did have a city wide celebration over such a thing.
A Washington, D.C. lobbying group promoting the concept of towns having what are known as Urban Villages named Fort Worth one of America's Top Ten Most Livable Cities With Urban Villages.
Fort Worth city officials acted like a homely girl waking up one morning to find herself in the Top Ten in the Miss America pageant, actually breathlessly asking how long this honor was good for. To be told, ten years.
I suspect Fort Worth was the only town, so enamored of this imaginary honor, that it was asked how long the honor was good for.
During the time this was happening I found myself up north, in Tacoma, a town with actual Urban Villages, which also was in the Top Ten of this D.C. lobbying group's bogus list.
At that point in time, whilst in Tacoma, I found myself visiting Tacoma's Deputy Mayor. He was driving me around town in his Prius. He had recently been to DFW and asked how I could stand living where there was no scenery, asking me this as we were looking directly at Mount Rainier. I replied that the wildflowers are scenic.
I then asked if Tacoma had itself a citywide celebration when Tacoma got that Most Livable Urban Village accolade.
The Deputy Mayor replied that no, there was no celebration. We politely thanked them, and that was it.
When I told the Deputy Mayor Fort Worth had a citywide celebration he thought I was joking, and didn't believe me til I showed him my blog posts documenting the ridiculousness.
I remember him asking me if Fort Worth actually had any Urban Villages, to which I told him not of the Tacoma sort, nothing like Old Town or Proctor, but Fort Worth does have a somewhat Urban Village in what is known as the Magnolia neighborhood.
Fort Worth's ten years of being a Top Ten Most Livable Urban Village city must be about up.
I wonder if the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island Riverwalk District Vision will one day be known as an Urban Village? More likely it will one day be known as a vast wasteland which once was one of America's Top Ten Boondoggles...
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