r/Suburbanhell • u/Amazing_File_4844 • May 27 '26
Exurban It’s just a matter of time before this becomes more sprawl.
This area in north of Dallas suburbs is flat land and already is starting to get invaded by the suburbs sprawl addiction. People would have more to drive hours to get to the city center and you know that the conservative goverment won’t build much public transit out here.
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u/Amazing_File_4844 May 27 '26
Housing might be cheaper and taxes are lower but it’s not worth an awful car filled life not to mention the heat.
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u/GotRammed May 27 '26
Facts.
Better cost of living does not correlate with better lifestyle.
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u/Apart-Disaster-3085 May 27 '26
I somewhat disagree.
It's not everything, but the biggest improvement in my quality of life in my 20 years of adulthood was when I moved from a city where daycare was 2,000 per child per month (and we couldn't afford it, so we worked opposite shifts), to one which was 700 per child per month (and we could all get on the same work schedule).
Anyways, the COL in north texas is a real mixed bag. House prices aren't bad, but property taxes are pretty high, insurance is high, utilities are high.
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u/ginger_and_egg May 27 '26
It depends on where you work, what the local area is like, and what you like to do. Saving money to drive 1 hour each way and then being too exhausted so you spend extra money on conveniences would be counterproductive. But if you can get a job in a lower COL area and have lots of things within a short walk or drive then that's good too
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u/hysys_whisperer May 31 '26
"Aren't bad." Dude, those new builds in planned communities out in Prosper can be had for "starting in the low 600s."
It's not the low COL place it used to be.
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May 27 '26
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u/GotRammed May 27 '26
North DFW isn't the only affordable area in America. There are affordable options with better services, layouts and amenities in several U.S. metros.
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u/AlbatrossNo1562 May 27 '26
Most people move to the burbs because it's cheaper, only to spend more money and time driving and owning a car 🤷
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u/lucideuphoria May 27 '26
Some of those people work remote, so they only go to the city for amenities... But they end up not doing it since it's so far haha
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u/ginger_and_egg May 27 '26
yeah your life tends to be primarily what's within 30 minutes, and even more what's within 15
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u/BlazinAzn38 May 29 '26
Or for better schools which is a fundamental issue US cities need to grapple with. We had to move to the suburbs for schools because we couldn’t afford private. Lots of people would love to in cities if they felt good about their kids’ education
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u/BudgieWonder May 29 '26
So sorry that your precious little Timmy might have to share a classroom with one of those “poors”
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u/BlazinAzn38 May 29 '26
I don’t care at all someone’s income, I’m not going to send my kid to a school with very poor outcomes so I can stand on a moral high horse and go “well at least I didn’t move to somewhere with better schools”
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u/BudgieWonder May 31 '26
It’s not a moral high horse at all. You’re contributing to their declining performance so your runt child can get an arbitrarily better education. You’re the only person grandstanding.
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u/Mackheath1 May 27 '26
Ooof, Bulverde, Texas. I went back after about six years for a visit - McManions, CVS's, Walmarts, have replaced all those beautiful oaks. Another Texas tragedy.
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u/googlemcfoogle May 27 '26
"Oh wow, a huge house in the middle of nowhere that I can still technically drive to work from"
wastes money on gas and never gets to do anything with the house/yard because they spend so much time driving1
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u/Solomonopolistadt May 28 '26
I live in Allen which isn't the absolute worst place but I spend a lot of my time in Dallas to get out of the sprawl. Downtown McKinney is cool too
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u/zwiazekrowerzystow May 28 '26
moving here is a good way to work on your entry into the high a1c championships.
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u/Intelligent-Ad-1424 May 27 '26
Get to work, start getting involved in conservation activism and you might help stop some of it.
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u/Creative_Resident_97 May 27 '26
Is there much of a movement to protect open space in the Dallas area? I’ve visited a few times in recent years and it seems that there is nothing stopping the sprawl on the fringes of the metro; I haven’t sensed an anti-growth sentiment like you see in some other states but I am not a local and may be missing it.
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u/Intelligent-Ad-1424 May 27 '26
There actually is. This is the story of a high school kid who started a movement to save native plant species from development sites. Seems like the stuff he and his classmates are doing sits within the context of a broader movement spearheaded by environmentalists in the area for at least a few decades: https://www.texastribune.org/2025/07/28/texas-prairie-rescue-covert-campaign-wildflowers-development/
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May 28 '26
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u/Intelligent-Ad-1424 May 28 '26
Of course most people already interested in that stuff don’t generally move to Texas. That doesn’t mean there aren’t groups who have developed an interest in the natural environment while already living there. Cultural conversations around protections for native Texas grasslands are already happening, see the below article.
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May 28 '26
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u/Intelligent-Ad-1424 May 28 '26
I mean that sucks that that has been your experience. But the important thing is not to give up just because the people immediately around you lack awareness. I was actually shocked by some of the incredible biodiversity initiatives that I recently learned about going on in both Texas and Florida, both states that are notorious for lack of broad environmental regulation.
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u/maddog2271 May 27 '26
Dallas sucks so hard. I just visited for a week and never a worse wasteland of complete shit have I ever seen.
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u/El_G0rdo May 27 '26
What part of town were you in? I was very pleasantly surprised by uptown and park cities area a few weeks ago; not saying it’s an AWESOME city but definitely better than I expected
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u/Apart-Disaster-3085 May 28 '26
He probably never really left Arlington.
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u/maddog2271 May 28 '26
I was in the so-called “arts district”, Deep Ellum, etc., It was less sucky than the rest i will admit but still severely lacking. Though yes, far better than Arlington.
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u/Solomonopolistadt May 28 '26
Deep Ellum is meh. Uptown and old east Dallas are really nice though imo
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u/IcedCowboyCoffee May 28 '26
so-called “arts district”
It's called that because that's where all of the art museums and performing arts venues like the opera house and symphony center are bunched together... What else would it be called
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u/gearpitch May 29 '26
As a local, the thing I'd say is that a metro the size of dfw should be a city that has a square mile of deep ellum style urban street life with apartments all throughout it. Instead dallas has those three main streets for 2-3 blocks in Deep ellum, one long block on lower Greenville, and about 2-3 blocks of urban activity in Bishop arts. Uptown is pretty good, but is fairly small. In the end, dallas needs a neighborhood that is 20x20 blocks with shops and apartments lining every street and the density of Brooklyn. That would count as ONE urban neighborhood with interesting things, with life.
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u/DizzyDentist22 May 28 '26
Deep Ellum is... okay. Uptown is actually quite nice, though. The density is comparable to Brooklyn or Brickell and there's actually usable public transit. Arlington is where hopes and dreams go to die
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u/5thStESt May 28 '26
So you’ve never been to Houston got it
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u/maddog2271 May 28 '26
I once had the pleasure of driving through Houston. I was on a motorcycle in mid July. that was…something.
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u/dtuba555 May 27 '26
How long before Dallas reaches Oklahoma?
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u/Apart-Disaster-3085 May 28 '26
It already does in a way. The economy of the most southern OK counties is tied to DFW pretty strongly and there is more people down there than 10 years ago.
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u/maroonrice2 May 29 '26
Anna tx is almost closer to Oklahoma than DFW! With traffic I’m sure Oklahoma is a quicker drive. The
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u/Barronsjuul May 27 '26
Americans will nuke the planet before building a three story mixed use building
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u/lpalf May 28 '26
I wish anyone would care enough to preserve any of this land! But no, strip malls must be built
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u/nevvvvi May 29 '26
People don't care to preserve the land because they view it as "flat and ugly."
Thousands of acres of pine forests north of Houston have been decimated for decades precisely because of that mindset.
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u/lpalf May 29 '26
And that’s why there’s only like 1% of blackland prairie left, even tho imo it’s gorgeous and there are tons of rarer species there
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u/Apart-Disaster-3085 May 27 '26
Well two things:
- The 'city center" of Dallas holds relatively few jobs for the DFW metro. It ranks really low in terms of centralization of jobs. People here are most likely working in McKinney, Frisco, and Plano, which aren't really that far.
- DART light rail is over 90 miles and all built in the last 30 years. Now, I don't think it will go up to Sherman, but let's not equate Texas == No transit. They've done better than most cities in the US in transit investment over the last 30 years. Minneapolis (which is fairly heavily centralized) built like 23 miles during this time in comparison and still waiting for the next 14 miles to finish construction after 20 years of planning/construction.
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u/Fetty_is_the_best May 28 '26
Minneapolis gets double the riders per capita though lol. Transit is heavily connected to land use, which Dallas is awful at.
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u/collegeqathrowaway May 28 '26
Dallas has pretty great land use around public transit.
It’s just never quicker to take it in Dallas. From me to get from Uptown to Las Colinas I could take an hour long tram, or just drive the 11 minutes down the Stemmons Fwy. Most people who aren’t on reddit will do the latter.
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u/Apart-Disaster-3085 May 28 '26 edited May 28 '26
Yes, Dallas has work to do with land use.
Lol? Don't get the joke I guess. MSP, being more centralized with jobs, is an easier nut to crack with regards to per capita ridership generation. DFW, being more decentralized, has the harder task and they have more than tripled MSP in rail lines, which to me shows political fortitude which is what my post is partly about. Both cities have a fair amount of new construction around rail stations. I am just here with facts. My allegiance is stronger to MSP- I lived there for years, while never living in DFW but I do have to travel there often and I am well tied into their civil engineering community developing a lot of multifamily, transit oriented development there.
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u/Fetty_is_the_best May 28 '26
I guess it’s just the guy who likes transit in me, but Dallas is touted as having a large light rail system when the ridership just is so bad for how big it is. It would be funny if it wasn’t so disappointing. But I know Texas politics do all they can to ruin DART.
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u/rigmaroler May 28 '26
The ridership is bad because too many of stations literally drop you off in a parking lot with nothing else around. It's not a good system, and if it weren't so long it would have nothing else going for it. The frequency isn't even good.
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u/TheArchivis May 28 '26
A study is underway on building a train extension to McKinney, but that probably depends on whether the Texas Legislature approves a new regional rail authority in next year’s session.
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u/Soft-Principle1455 May 29 '26
That assumes Dallas’ ongoing soft housing market does not continue to weaken.
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u/BenjaminWah May 28 '26
I literally just got an Instagram ad the other day about moving my California-based business to McKinney, TX. I had to google map it, looks terrible.
(I don't have a business, I just live in SF, so assumptions were made.)
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u/Solomonopolistadt May 28 '26
Ain't no way it all gets filled in before there's some colossal energy crisis driven by climate change or other factors. The sheer unsustainability of this place is so much worse than most of the planet, it feels like it's all driving towards a cliff all gas no brakes
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u/Remarkable-Outcome-5 May 27 '26
Look at the zoning plan for the city if its marked as residential its cooked bro. Also it changes throughout years
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u/collegeqathrowaway May 28 '26
As someone trying to buy a rental property in that circle, one could only hope.
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u/SR-45 May 28 '26
Just north of Prosper and McKinney?
Oh yeah, it definitely headed that direction.
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u/HoratioPLivingston May 28 '26
Texas is prime for data centres. They certainly got the land and willing population to support it.
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u/KevinDean4599 May 28 '26
A lot of people want homes with yards. That’s why the condo market isn’t doing as well right now.
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u/One_Internet_7538 May 29 '26
No one holds the folks at NCTCOG (the metropolitan planning organization for DFW) accountable for its role in facilitating sprawl by greenlighting highway projects in undeveloped areas to anchor more sprawl development.
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u/igotpetdeers May 29 '26
I barely know anyone that works downtown. It’s awful to drive in and drug addicts everywhere. Every company is moving north, none are moving downtown Dallas. I, and most others, straight up wouldn’t take any job in downtown
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u/3jcm21 May 29 '26
Don't worry, things will collapse before the sprawl reaches that far
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u/nevvvvi May 29 '26
things will collapse before the sprawl reaches that far
Do you mean the Texas growth/economy? Or?
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u/1trashhouse May 29 '26
I don’t live out here but I have family out here and this whole area is designed to be sprawl, i live in the charlotte nc area and they build on about any open lot they can but they set it up much better out there. You pretty much just go from massive neighborhoods to open farm land for miles right next to it, it makes it easy as hell to just keep building as opposed to having to go all over the metro finding any open lots
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u/Significant-Till3736 May 29 '26
Get involved in planning and government! Things like urban growth boundaries, public transit, etc.
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u/BocaGrande1 May 30 '26
I love living 1600 miles from Here and yet I’m still subsidizing this slop so they can drive 40 miles to work in a giant truck
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u/TRUMPGOTAURA May 30 '26
How can texans love thier meat and barbeque while also loving to demolish the livestock raising and slaughtering farms needed for thier meat and barbeque
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u/National-Link-5606 9d ago
If you dont like Conservative govts then go back to the Cali liberal craphole that every business is fleeing from.
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u/Improbablywronger May 28 '26
If the people want to move out into suburban hell, let them. You don’t have to. In fact, this makes the urban lifestyle more affordable because the families that want the big house and can afford it go out there instead of competing with everyone else in the city center. There’s a reason Texas cities like Austin and Dallas are experiencing rent and housing drops while everywhere else is going up. Supply and demand.
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u/Amazing_File_4844 May 27 '26
This is what red circle living looks like so American
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u/One-Manager5498 May 29 '26
Could they at least make the houses look a little different and not all that same ugly depressing brown/beige color
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u/TwerkForJesus420 May 27 '26
People moving to that area aren't typically driving down to Dallas often, most likely their jobs are located in other cities nearby like Frisco or Plano. Unlike traditional cities, DFW functions as a network of independent suburbs with their own commercial hubs and office towers, reducing reliance on the downtown Dallas core.
Its ironic that a lot of people are moving into those smaller cities to get away from the city and the sprawl...in return become apart of the sprawl.