This guy sez: 10 worst places to live in NC

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hedge said:
This is true of Southern red states, but Midwest red states (and Montana/Idaho/Wyoming/Utah - are they considered midwestern?) are far below the national average in minority population and certainly in Black population...
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The conversations I allude to almost always were about Southern red states. Point taken.
 
Batt Boy said:
Wow. Silly list but the OP is now racist? I don't buy it. Guess the old ZZLP DNA runs strong here. Anyway, silly list as we can come up with another 10 just as bad. Thankfully, there are some great places across this state.
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It is a silly list. It's so very subjective a topic.

Gastonia was a dump when I lived there, but I'm sure it has evolved over the years.
 
aGDevil2k said:
The whole town has been shrinking. I havent lived there since 87. But Kinston for some reason gets this rap, but look at places like Trenton that, IMO, would be WAY WORSE to live. Nowhere to eat, etc. Some of the school thing is charter, some are some newer high schools, but MOST is that the town just has been shrinking in population
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Dang, I didn't realize Kinston was barely 20K population. I always thought it was about the same as Wilson but that's less than half...
 
theel4life said:
Where is Asheboro?
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Middle of the state near 85.
SnoopRob said:
I understand that you're trying to have an IC ZZLP moderation discussion under the guise of discussing race and income/education.

My thoughts would be to leave that behind with the old board, but if the PTB here are ok with that discussion, I'm willing to have it.
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Needs to be it's own thread.
 
HeelYeah2012 said:
Agreed. High Point isn’t a great place or anything but it’s better than most of the places on that list. There are some really depressing towns in eastern NC that aren’t on the list.
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I've been fortunate to have widely traveled in NC - I had a job in the 90s that led me to most parts of the state - and if we're including smaller towns and cities on this list (I thought the list was limited mostly to larger NC cities) then the worst ones in my opinion were in the more rural, inland areas of eastern NC. At least if your town is in the mountains you've got cooler weather and the scenery and tourist venues and if your town is at or very near the beach you've got that going for you, but a lot of towns in Eastern NC were just not appealing. Of course these lists are always subjective, so I don't really take them all that seriously.
 
UNCatTech said:
It is a silly list. It's so very subjective a topic.

Gastonia was a dump when I lived there, but I'm sure it has evolved over the years.
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It’s still a dump, but it’s a growing one, now approaching 100K people living within its city limits.
 
EyeballKid said:
To each their own.

I love it.

I don’t make 100k. I just listed a bunch of my neighbors and acquaintances who surely don’t make 100k.

That said, obviously the more you make, the more fun you can have. Same is true of any city in America.

To each their own. But you’re wayyy off base.
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How long have you lived in Durham? If you bought a house before the spike in housing prices, you are in much better shape than someone making the same amount of money who is moving to Durham now. Someone making $100k can generally afford a home up to $300k without being overextended. There's essentially zero inventory in that price point in Durham now that isn't a foreclosure or in a higher-crime neighborhood. Plus, you'd have to go to the max of that budget to even afford one of those homes and then you'd be pressed to have money to do any of the fun stuff that you moved to Durham to do.
 
Mulberry Heel said:
I've been fortunate to have widely traveled in NC - I had a job in the 90s that led me to most parts of the state - and if we're including smaller towns and cities on this list (I thought the list was limited mostly to larger NC cities) then the worst ones in my opinion were in the more rural, inland areas of eastern NC. At least if your town is in the mountains you've got cooler weather and the scenery and tourist venues and if your town is at or very near the beach you've got that going for you, but a lot of towns in Eastern NC were just not appealing. Of course these lists are always subjective, so I don't really take them all that seriously.
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I agree it’s all subjective. But there’s no one who could ever convince me that High Point or Winston are even remotely as bad as, say, Kinston.
 
i see this has already been covered but i've spent a LOT of time in Durham, my sister lived there from 2014-2021 and is about to move back this winter.....it doesn't belong anywhere near a "worst places to live" list.

really great small city.
 
Feel like they included WS and Durham just to have some bigger cities represented. They have their problems like other big cities, but they definitely aren’t 2 of the 10 worst in the state imo.

I also need to defend Gastonia here since I’ve seen it mentioned a few times. Most of the neighborhoods directly surrounding downtown are still pretty bad from what I can tell, but I think they are slowly making progress with the downtown core. The rest of the city is mostly fine, and its relatively convenient proximity to Charlotte, Belmont, lots of destinations in the mountains need to be factored in as well. All in all, you won’t find it anywhere near any top 10 cities list, but I can think of dozens of rural eastern NC cities off the top of my head that are much worse.
 
I’m originally from about 15 minutes south of Fairmont, NC, which itself is about 20 minutes south of Lumberton, NC. In fact the house into which I was born actually almost straddles the North Carolina-South Carolina state line. I haven’t lived there since I was a kid but the overwhelming vast majority of my family still resides in Robeson County and neighboring Bladen County, so I have spent a lot of my life down there. I can’t imagine there are too many in North Carolina worse, and I don’t say that to disparage or to put down Robeson County in any way. It’s just that it is extraordinarily depressing in almost every way imaginable: high violent crime rates, extraordinarily low educational attainment, extremely low income, soul-crushing poverty, rampant substance addiction, etc. I shared previously on the old board that I am one of 62 first cousins in my family, 61 of which still reside in either Robeson or Bladen, and to date I am the only one of the 62 that has either attended or graduated from college or university.

To say there has been an enormous difference in trajectory between my life and that of my cousins, would be an understatement. My mom left my biological father who was physically abusive and substance-addicted when I was two, and we moved out of Robeson County when I was 3 and she met the man who ultimately became the greatest father any guy could ever ask for. He lived in the Raleigh area (and had recently moved there from where he was originally from in Western Pennsylvania) so that’s where we moved to. He passed away when I was 19, but for as long as I live I will be grateful to him for saving my life and my mom‘s life and getting us out of a really bad spot. I truly do not believe that I would have made it to Carolina, or met my wife, or had any number of the other wonderful things in my life as a result, had my mom not met him.

I really hopeful that the growth of and around UNCP will help to bring better fortune to RobCo. The place is full of really good people who have just had some really bad luck economically, with hurricanes, local government corruption, etc.
 
2ManyBlueCups said:
How long have you lived in Durham? If you bought a house before the spike in housing prices, you are in much better shape than someone making the same amount of money who is moving to Durham now. Someone making $100k can generally afford a home up to $300k without being overextended. There's essentially zero inventory in that price point in Durham now that isn't a foreclosure or in a higher-crime neighborhood. Plus, you'd have to go to the max of that budget to even afford one of those homes and then you'd be pressed to have money to do any of the fun stuff that you moved to Durham to do.
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Again, the same can be said of any city in America. The national housing crisis is a hot topic in virtually every discussion centered on politics or the economy. So let’s not pretend that this is some Durham-specific issue.

Fwiw, I’m roughly in the group you mention. I’ve lived in Durham for 15 years. The first 10 10-11 of those years, I was living fairly hand-to-mouth; I rented because I couldn’t afford to buy. I was able to save up a good chunk of cash, and have been looking to buy over last 4 years, but the market has been nuts…as you note. So I’m still renting, waiting for the market to cool a bit. And there are signs that it’s doing just that.

I’ve had a lot of fun in Durham, for fairly cheap. Between the city and Duke, there plenty of free concerts, lectures, readings, etc. The restaurant scene is great, and not too pricey. Good bars and breweries. Plenty of outdoor activities.
 
2ManyBlueCups said:
I don't know either, we stopped off of I-40 in Winston Salem and it was one of the worst places I have been to in North Carolina, and I have been to RobCo so that is saying a lot. I'm sure there are nice parts too but I have never experienced the locked restroom thing before.
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If you got off 421 (old 40) around US 52 I could maybe see what you are describing. I have no idea where that would be off of regular I-40. Maybe off 109/south Main area but that's not a get off the highway for food or bathroom exit. Other exits off I-40 in Winston to restaurants, gas, etc. are Silas Creek Parkway, Peters Creek Parkway, Hanes Mall Blvd, and Stratford Road. That's it. None of those remotely match what you are describing.
 
greenville should be on this list LONG before Durham.

total hellhole. the highlights are a directional school with that will admit anyone and a hospital.

hotter than the pits of hell during the summer and no nice natural areas. close-ish to the beach MHC/AB area is all its got going for it.
 
4thgenheel said:
greenville should be on this list LONG before Durham.

total hellhole. the highlights are a directional school with that will admit anyone and a hospital.

hotter than the pits of hell during the summer and no nice natural areas. close-ish to the beach MHC/AB area is all its got going for it.
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Agree with this. I lived in Greenville for four years while my wife was in medical school at East Carolina. I will say that I deeply enjoyed those four years, but not because Greenville is nice (it isn’t) but because we and our group of medical school friends/classmates all lived together in the same apartment complex across from the medical school and those folks are probably the closest friends we have to this day. So I’m sure Greenville is fun if you are a college or professional school person, but as you said I see zero appeal to it otherwise- besides being close in proximity to the Holy Mecca of The Greatest Barbecue In The World, Ayden, NC!
 
CFordUNC said:
I’m originally from about 15 minutes south of Fairmont, NC, which itself is about 20 minutes south of Lumberton, NC. In fact the house into which I was born actually almost straddles the North Carolina-South Carolina state line. I haven’t lived there since I was a kid but the overwhelming vast majority of my family still resides in Robeson County and neighboring Bladen County, so I have spent a lot of my life down there. I can’t imagine there are too many in North Carolina worse, and I don’t say that to disparage or to put down Robeson County in any way. It’s just that it is extraordinarily depressing in almost every way imaginable: high violent crime rates, extraordinarily low educational attainment, extremely low income, soul-crushing poverty, rampant substance addiction, etc. I shared previously on the old board that I am one of 62 first cousins in my family, 61 of which still reside in either Robeson or Bladen, and to date I am the only one of the 62 that has either attended or graduated from college or university.

To say there has been an enormous difference in trajectory between my life and that of my cousins, would be an understatement. My mom left my biological father who was physically abusive and substance-addicted when I was two, and we moved out of Robeson County when I was 3 and she met the man who ultimately became the greatest father any guy could ever ask for. He lived in the Raleigh area (and had recently moved there from where he was originally from in Western Pennsylvania) so that’s where we moved to. He passed away when I was 19, but for as long as I live I will be grateful to him for saving my life and my mom‘s life and getting us out of a really bad spot. I truly do not believe that I would have made it to Carolina, or met my wife, or had any number of the other wonderful things in my life as a result, had my mom not met him.

I really hopeful that the growth of and around UNCP will help to bring better fortune to RobCo. The place is full of really good people who have just had some really bad luck economically, with hurricanes, local government corruption, etc.
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Bro, you left when you were 3? I knew you didn”t smell like Robco.

Black ankle?

Jortsforall in a previous life.
 
fourheels said:
If you got off 421 (old 40) around US 52 I could maybe see what you are describing. I have no idea where that would be off of regular I-40. Maybe off 109/south Main area but that's not a get off the highway for food or bathroom exit. Other exits off I-40 in Winston to restaurants, gas, etc. are Silas Creek Parkway, Peters Creek Parkway, Hanes Mall Blvd, and Stratford Road. That's it. None of those remotely match what you are describing.
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Believe it was off NC-150.
 
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