lrfox you seem not to like portland that much. is it perhaps because you expected something more like providence when you came to college here and instead got portland
I went to college in another town in new england with less population and compared it to portland and so thought it wasn't much, but the two are apples and oranges and analyzed as the town it is, my college town was great. maybe you are thinking the same way by comparing portland to providence, which is basically where you are from. Providence is alright, but rough around the edges.
and people don't expect good restaurants in burlington vt more than portland. burlington is a town.
This is a tough question to answer. The short one is, no.. I don't love Portland (but don't dislike it either).
The long answer is that while I didn't expect a big city (or even a medium sized one), I didn't expect Portland to feel as small as it does.
Portland to me feels like a big town more than it feels like a small city in almost every way. In many ways, that's not a bad thing. For one, crime here is next to nil. Two, there's a friendliness and warmness and overall slower pace that you don't get in bigger cities. And three, it seems everyone knows everyone here. It's amazing how after such a short time here, I bump into someone I know everywhere, even across town or 1 hour away. Going out in the Old Port with friends who grew up all over Maine is like a big high school reunion and they seem to love that. It's an all around close-knit community feeling here and one that you don't get in bigger cities.. even the only slightly bigger cities.
However, there are other things that feel more like a town than a city that DO bother me. One, there seems to be a real self-congratulatory nature here and it's, quite frankly, off-putting. Community pride is good, and Portland doesn't lack that at all, but there's a BIT too much of it at times. It really feels like the people here (in town, not necessarily this forum), love to brag about this community. And I can see why someone who has lived here their entire life would enjoy that, but sometimes I feel like enough is enough. There's a strange outlook on the outside world here, and many Portlanders seem to think Portland is better than all the rest with little justification.
Diversity. This is a touchy subject and the lack of it is no fault of Portland. Due to a lack of opportunities for immigrants, and a good distance from the areas where many immigrants come from (i.e. Mexico, the Caribbean and Central America) there really aren't many diverse populations. Despite the fact that I don't think it's any fault of Portland that there aren't immigrants here, the city lacks the diversity and misses out on the culture and customs that various ethnic groups bring to their new locations.
The local media is really amateur. It's really hard to watch the local news on TV... I feel like I'm watching a A/V hobby group presenting news to a high school. The Portland Press Herald is terrible as well. Everything that's not very local is an AP story. I feel like Portland deserves a better paper.
I also feel like people here LOVE to hype up certain things beyond the hype it may deserve. A few examples:
-Minor league sports are treated like major league sports here. That's not necessarily a negative (to each his own), but it's frustrating when the Pirates are the headline over the Celtics or professional sports (Same goes with high school sports taking a headline away)
-The arts. Portland has a good arts scene, but not really one that's too much better than what you'd expect from a metro area of 250,000 and the cultural and economic center of a state of about 1.2 Million people.
-Dining. Again, it's good, but over hyped. Hugo's, Fore Street and a few other restaurants are GOOD, but not top tier (can you REALLY compare Hugo's to a place like L'espalier or Ten?). Dining out is a hobby of mine and I really think Portland gets a LOT more hype than it deserves (partially due to connections in very public places). If I were given the opportunity to choose between a meal in Portland or some of the other cities in New England... Aside from Boston or Providence, I'd go out in Newport RI, Hyannis, MA or Portsmouth NH and those towns are much smaller than Portland and provide equal or better dining options. Burlington may be small, but it's not TOO far behind Portland in the culinary regard, it really isn't.
-nightlife... it's just plain bad here. There's a nice little live music scene, but little else (except the pub scene) yet people up here treat it like a night out in South Beach. For a guy in his early 20's, this is bothersome. If I were 40, it probably wouldn't be an issue.
Like you said, when you look at Portland by itself (a city of 63,000 people on the coast of Maine), it's a great little place.
Providence is rough around the edges, but find me a city of nearly 200,000 that isn't. I love that. I like a little grit in my cities (hell, I love the grittyness of New Bedford, a city most people wouldn't touch with a 10 foot pole), and Portland lacks any real grit (though I hear it had some in the past). Portland also lacks a real sense of urbanity. Aside from the Downtown area (Old Port/ Arts District), only Portions of the East End, West End, and a LITTLE of the Bayside neighborhood have any urban feel. The rest of the city is really suburban. Deering has some beautiful old homes as does the area along Baxter Blvd, but those are VERY suburban neighborhoods and the rest of the city's neighborhoods feel even more suburban (almost rural at times). Even the Old Port has WAY too many surface parking lots, exposed power lines and things that really don't exist in a dense, downtown area.
In the end, it's not that I dislike Portland, nor did I ever expect a mini Providence. I just feel it gets a little more hype than it deserves in some regards. It's a safe place, a nice place and perfect for families, there's no denying that. But as someone who's enjoying his early 20's, I hoped for a little more.
I hate going on these rants because I feel like people get the impression that I dislike Portland more than I do. It's a nice town, but I wouldn't want to stay here.
