Evergreen Cemetery

[second_pancake]

Likes:

• Activities - LOTS of things to do, even in the small towns and you know about them all because they're advertised in the papers, on tv, on the radio....a major station here was advertising the Rocky Horror Picture Show live production taking place at the Plano Community Theatre.  When's the last time you ever heard someone on a Jax radion station talking about a play at the San Marco Theatre or some small event taking place in Springfield?
• Mass Transit - We have the DART in Dallas which extends well beyond Dallas and connects historic areas like Carrollton (opening early next year), Plano and Frisco, and connects to a commuter rail called the TRE which takes you into Fort Worth and the cities in-between
• Sense of Pride - Namely in Fort Worth.  The city knows its history and completely embraces it.  It is not uncommon to see a guy or gal riding their horse directly into downtown.  The Stockyards area especially is as western as they come (and I DO mean "western" not redneck...iron-pressed wranglers and polished belt-buckles).  Fort Worth has markers and tourist information where they talk very openly about "Hell's Half-Acre" which was a red-light district type area with gambling, drinking and brothels.  The Stockyards has an area where they've recreated that type of night-life (less the brothels), as well as real rodeo shows every single weekend.  It's really nice to see a place not looking to take their queue from other places, but to have done research on their own history, what made them who they are and be completely unashamed and PROUD.
  

Things I DON'T like:

• Lack of History - With the exception of a few small areas and the major areas, Dallas and Fort Worth, North Texas is relatively new...most places having become established and recognized cities only in the 50's and 60's so there aren't a lot of quaint historic areas like we have in Jax with Avondale, Riverside, Springfield, San Marco, etc.  The only place here that we really like is Grapevine (a lot like a busier Fernandina Beach), but the historic homes are only about 20.
  
• McMansions - This kind of goes hand-in-hand with the lack of history thing because these McMansions (homes in excess of 3000 sq ft crammed into a small residential neighborhood) are usually replacing historic homes.  It seems people are more interested in having the biggest and newest rather than preserving and restoring.  When the house is in a designated historic area, people can get around the law of having to restore the previous property by tearing it down to the foundation and just building on top of it.  Of course, no one sees the foundation.
• Roadways - There are far too many interstates here.  There is an interstate called 35W and one called 35E but they run north and south, not east and west.  And when you travel a route one way, you can't simply retrace your route and go back the same way.  For instance, I took I-183 East to I-30 East into Dallas so to go home, I got onto I-30 West and was thinking I'd be able to get back onto I-183 but noooo.  It was nowhere in sight.  Instead, the interstate split off to take I-635 North or I-635 South.  I ended up in Plano...an hour and 15 minutes from home.  The interstates are also smaller than JTB.  There are fewer lanes (2 on each side divded by a concrete barrier) and the lanes seem tighter...closer together.  They also don't like to use painted lines, but rather, big white raised dots...or yellow dots.  It's really hard to understand where you are and where you're going.
• Horrible Drivers - It might be because of the tight lanes, all the dots and the confusion about where to go, but every time of every day, someone gets into a major wreck on the interstate and the entire highway closes down...yes, even the lanes in the opposite direction.  The drivers are infuriatingly SLOW!!!  If the speed limit is 40, they go 30-35 mph...in the left lane.  On the interstate, they drive no faster than 55 mph.  Seriously, North Texas transplants to Jax would have a freakin heart attack driving I-95 north into downtown...especially at the Prudential/Riverside/Main St. cluster.
  

So, all-in-all I would say, if Jax could have the North Texas entertainment and the pride of history it couldn't be beat...well, ok, we'd have to buy some nice Wranglers, shiny new cowboy boots as well as teach manners to all the rednecks, THEN we'd really have something