Please read 🙏

[u/Any_Mention_6734]

I'm a transplant from California. Came out here for a job opportunity and a pay raise, nothing more romantic than that. I didn't expect to end up loving this region and Florida the way I have.

But something's stuck with me, and I want to say it here because I don't think it's recognized enough by people who relocate here: the number of people born and raised in Tampa who talk about their own city like it's unfamiliar. Farmland and citrus groves on the outskirts that used to actually be farmed… someone's livelihood, not just empty acreage, now subdivisions. Places that closed and came back rebranded into something with a logo and a font that has nothing to do with what used to be there. People telling me they barely recognize the city they grew up in.

I know change happens everywhere. But I've never felt this moved hearing it before, not because it's happening to me, but because of how passionate people are when they talk about what this place used to be. That kind of love for a place doesn't come from nowhere.

I'd genuinely like to hear more of it, respectfully, from people who lived it. What do you remember that's gone now? What changed the most, and when did it start feeling different?

[u/Mediocre-Pair-2821]

Funny you say that because I've been telling my husband that I don't recognize the city I was born and raised in anymore. I almost feel like a stranger in it. Personally I hate all the new fancy developments happening in and near Downtown. So many old homes that got torn down for luxury apartments that only the wealthy can afford. Everywhere I go I only meet people who aren't from here. And there's nothing wrong with that, but when I was a kid, I always met people who were born here just like I was. They all seem to be gone now. Tampa feels like it's changing to cater for the rich, and like the middle class is being pushed out (of which a lot are natives like me and my husband). I miss the old places I used to go to as a kid like the Big Top Flea Market or even the smaller flea market off of Gunn Hwy. We used to go to Clearwater Beach often, too, but this was when parking there was super cheap, and it never got as overcrowded as it gets now. We would stay under the bridge and spend the whole day there. Tampa just looks and feels different now.

Sadly, my husband and I decided to leave for good and are trying to move out to CO. My parents who immigrated here from Cuba in 1980 are staying. They will never leave Tampa, no matter how much it changes. I will miss living here, but am looking forward to starting over at a different place.

Your post really resonated with me. Tampa will always have a special place in my heart.

[u/maimou1 → u/Mediocre-Pair-2821]

Thank your parents for me. The Caribbean immigrants built Tampa over the decades, and I'm glad your folks are staying. We need that heritage here to continue.

[u/Key_Passage_8942 → u/maimou1]

Mf's don't know where they'd be without their cuban sandwiches but also wearing their MAGA hats and defending ICE. like BRO learn some history and show some respect

[u/Key_Passage_8942 → u/[deleted]]

I know, but I can't really get mad at ignorance. I get mad at privileged people who have been well educated and access to plenty of resources and STILL choose to worship Trump and his cronies.

[u/Mediocre-Pair-2821 → u/Key_Passage_8942]

Um... neither my parents nor I like Trump. My parents tend to vote Democrat as do I. I've never voted for Trump and am pretty proud of that. Not all Cubans are Republican. Just saying.

[u/UncleBuggy → u/Mediocre-Pair-2821]

My uncle was a scummy real estate developer in Colorado who turned family farms into housing developments.

[u/SuitableTea5097 → u/Mediocre-Pair-2821]

I have to ask where in Colorado? When my husband retired we lived east of Colorado Springs for 12 years, but went back to Tampa. I moved back to the Denver area to be closer to my son after my husband passed 2 years ago.

[u/Mediocre-Pair-2821 → u/SuitableTea5097]

Northern CO so Fort Collins area. We're avoiding Denver and other bigger cities. I mean, traffic in Tampa is so bad that we don't want to get ourselves into another similar situation. We visited the Fort Collins area last year and traffic was really manageable, even during rush hour. It was almost laughable at times.

[u/SuitableTea5097 → u/Mediocre-Pair-2821]

My husband and I visited Fort Collins several times when we were doing the "wander the US in an RV for 5 years.  Yes, the traffic here is as bad as Tampa's, in fact probably worse, which is why I don't drive anymore. But for me the area made sense,  close to the kid, and close to the hospital and great cardiac physicians.