Reasons NOT to move to DC

I know I’m supposed to be pro-DC since I make my living here and raise my family here. But every city has things that aren’t great and DC is no exception

1. Traffic

I don’t want to look back wistfully on the early days of Covid but from a traffic standpoint, I miss it. When there was NO ONE on the road, and I could get places in record time. Because that’s also the 2 month time period where I got 6 speed-camera tickets. But it was sort of nice. Anyway, traffic here is terrible. And the drivers here – 1/3 of them are terrible. I’m looking squarely at you Maryland.

If you type in “why are ma..” it auto fills with Why are Maryland drivers so bad. I found this gem on Reddit, courtesy of Mad Money Mcgee.

Here’s my grand unified theory of area drivers.

In town:

DC drivers: fairly normal, you have to be defensive no matter what Va drivers: really seem to hate the idea of city streets and generally act confused. Maryland drivers: They have no fear of death or regard for the lives of others.

On Highways:

DC drivers: slower than average, as if they spend so much time on city streets they don’t know what to do on a road with a speed limit higher than 25. (my take is that we’re so used to speeding cameras that we think if we can speed on the open road we’ll be caught.)

Va  – drivers: aggressive but generally predictable. You just assume that they’re going to make the aggressive move.

MD – drivers: Complete wildcards. They do whatever is the opposite of what you’d like them to do. Again, no fear of death.

Reason I have a dashcam? The Maryland Uber Driver.

2. Politics

Do you care about what happened on the Hill today? You might, but if you live here, you’ll hear about it. Many people here work for the Federal Government or with an associated Government Contractor. Regardless of your thoughts of politics itself or political issues, every breath you take here is 17% oxygen, 22% pollen and 61% politics.

3. People Leave

Don’t bother making friends. Hardly anyone has roots here, people get transferred out all the time, and then new people show up. They leave too. Over the summer, I was at the pool with my crazy neighbor Gupi and she said, “Are you guys planning to move? Because I’m not making anymore friends with people who are going to move.” I got ya girl. We’re not going anywhere.

4. Crime

DC was murder capital in the 90’s. Things were so much better for so long, and then, covid. This isn’t just a DC problem, and Realtors are not supposed to discuss crime because it’s subjective. But, we have had a wave of carjackings by teenagers! Where are your parents, teen car-thieves.

The premise of being carjacked with my kids in the car is for sure something that keeps me awake at night. We’ve had to work on paying attention to surroundings, keeping shoes on in the car, getting out as soon as we get to our stop. These are not things my mother worked on with me as a 9 year old in Connecticut. But they are things we work on here.

5. People

I don’t know if it’s because there’s not a core group of people with roots in DC but people aren’t particularly friendly here. It could be that they are just more reserved and I’m all out there and in your face. But I find more often than not that people are inconsiderate.

I also find a bigger serving of hypocrisy here but maybe I never paid attention to people in other places I lived. Like – people like to show their social activism in signs, bumper stickers etc. But – walk the walk if you’re going to talk the talk. That means every day, even when people aren’t looking. They call these people NIMBY’s

I see a lot of people who jump on that bandwagon du jour, but it’s not genuine. Because you can’t say how much you want to lift others up but then do things that totally contradict that. make up some reason why you need the covid vax first, meanwhile, that person you claim to support is going to work unvaccinated because they have kids to feed and didn’t get a spot in line.

6. Expensive

Check my cost of living videos for the area, it is expensive.

Lots to love as well and I have a ton of videos on that.