I have an interview in Columbia on Thursday. I've never been there. I'm planning on doing a quick recon afterwards. Any suggestions on the part of town to start with? I have 2 school age kids.

Vista for food, State Museum, State Capital grounds are all good options within walking distance.

Good luck on the interview, Marine.

If you have school kids and you are looking to live here, the answer you are seeking is Lexington. Several members live over there and can give you a heads up on what to look for.

Keeping your persec in check, where exactly is the interview at - east, west, or north side of Cola? That may lead us better to where you may want to look dpending on how far you are willing to drive.

My interview is downtown. I'm staying at the Holiday Inn.

ETA. Oh, and thank you.

I agree with this.

Holiday Inn on Assembly St? Enjoy your stay; it's one of the nice areas of downtown. lots of restaurants and sights. Walk down the street to Colonial Arena Thursday night and take in the Lady Gamecocks basketball game - it's a hell of an experience; You can probably get tickets for about $5 each from someone selling them outside. if you are here on Saturday morning, check out the Soda City outdoor market on Main St for some simple entertainment.

Do you love your kids? Do you value their education? Don't put them in school in Richland county. Lexington county schools are starting to decline also; juvenile delinquents expelled from richland are simply getting transported to Lexington schools as an alternative.

More and more families are moving further and further out from the city and heading to Blythewood or Ballentine. Both are nice areas that would have been considered rural 15 years ago. I've never heard bad things about Forest Acres; looking at voting stats, it seems to be the heaviest concentration of conservative voters in all of Richland county.

Everyone thinks they can move to escape the spread of crime, but its a loser's game with the section 8 vouchers.  Hoodrats don't care how far out they live anymore since they don't plan on leaving the house for anything. With decommissioned police cruisers sold for cheap at auction, anyone with 2 dependents and an earned income credit can purchase a car and become mobile, so those that do leave the house usually do so to bring more negativity back home with them. that negativity will affect you directly or indirectly.

My honest suggestion is to not live in Richland County unless it's Forest Acres or Blythewood. the criminals that live here, work here - most are too afraid reputation and tradition to take their nonsense into Lexington. Work in richland (jobs aplenty), but live in Lexington. The taxes are lower, crime stats are lower, it's quieter, and the schools are better.

Roads are shitty everywhere, so don't put that as a factor. Traffic is bad everywhere too; the only escape is to live atop your job.

Op, you will not get better advice for free

Good post Saturn. You brought up things I had not considered as well, but I live in the boonies well away from cola.

I look forward to meeting you at Sigmunds shoot whenever that may be

Mostly accurate, but not entirely.  District 5 (maybe with the exception of Irmo) has great schools.

Forest Acres used to be one of the nicest and safest places in Columbia but then Ft Jackson sold off property, I-77 happened, Wal-mart and all of the trash that goes with it and the decline of Decker Blvd all contributed to growing problems.  Throw in Sec 8 housing and it's nothing like it used to be although still much nicer than most of Columbia.  Crime is under reported by the Forest Acres police though and their city council can be a bit heavy handed like a HOA at times; I would recommend an alarm system definitely.  It's convenient to most stuff though even if traffic has been getting continually worse, especially along Forest Drive.  There are some good private schools around, good grocery stores and stuff like that as well.  Most of the older houses are very well built, with actual 2x4 construction and plaster walls if they haven't been remodeled.  Even the homes built through the 70s tend to be well built.  Newer homes are typical construction (avoid anything in Richland and Lexington built by Mungo).    

Wherever you're thinking about, definitely look at the crime stat maps- after the city closed the downtown apartment complexes the trolls got vouchers and invaded St. Andrews and Dentsville and ruined much of those area.  Also check out traffic at rush hour from wherever you are looking; SC drivers can be crappy and rush hour commutes along I-26, I-277, I-385, Garner's Ferry, etc can be pretty mind numbing and it only takes one knucklehead to make it that much worse.  

Irmo has some nice places up around the lake but I'd avoid living in the town proper.  Lexington doesn't have nearly the gang banger type issues that Richland has but they've got plenty of white trash/meth head types that cause problems of their own.  

Good points are it's pretty easy to get to most other places as you have several highways close to most everything.  Columbia is big enough to have most of what you could want from some decent restaurants (and far too many fast food/chain places  ), specialty places for hardware besides the typical HD and Lowe's, several gun stores including indoor ranges, it's close to some great hunting and fishing, the mountains and the beach are about two and a half to three hours away, the winter's are typically mild but the summers can be brutally hot and humid (Columbia is set between several rivers), the people are generally friendly and there is still some southern manners (although that seems to be going by the wayside as well )