after 4 months of living in rochester, i KIND OF have a hang of where things are and how to get places. i’ve also had a chance to poke around at the overall scene of the place (as scene as i get, anyway) to get a sense of how things compare to ol’ cloudtown.
surprising things about rochester:
1. the generic shopping is not that great. i feel like i have to drive all over town to get the same experience as i did at crossroads mall in STC. maybe it’s because there’s no target anchoring one end, but the mall in STC is grossly superior to apache mall here in roch. not that i am that enthralled by malls, but when i’m christmas shopping with my mom, the mall is the mainstay.
2. the downtown is awesome though. downtown STC is all about friday and saturday nights and the bars. sometimes the paramount. and mexican village. but downtown rochester is full of people, mostly because mayo is downtown. there is a galleria mall down there as well as some upscale clothing stores and some fancy schmancy restaurants. plus it looks better.
3. the amount of bike/walking trails around here is AMAZING. not surprising since it’s the health capital of the world, but i still shocked me, especially when i went into the running store and they HANDED ME A MAP of the trails. 😮
4. the amount of post-secondary education opportunities is astoundingly low. STC has 2 private universities, state university, state 2-year tech, rasmussen (for profit?), MN school of business (def. for profit), not to mention the beauty schools. here in roch we have RCTC, MN school of business, UofMRochester. i think it’s odd there are no privates here (well, SMU has a “presence”) and no 4-year state school (UMR is very medically oriented, and WSU has a “presence”). but winona is only 45 mins away and that town has the missing pieces. just weird,though.
5. the library here is abysmally outdated. not in books terms, but in terms of look and construction. granted, STC just built a brand new library, but you would think a town of this size would keep the look and feel of its library up-to-date. it could certainly use a facelift.
6. the cost of a house here is on par with, if not lower than STC, which i find really really really confusing. rentals are about the same, if not a little bit higher, but from looking at houses in the area, i feel like i could get more of a house down here than up in STC.
7. my outside running routes here suck 🙁 i miss st. joe traffic.