You’re leaving Missouri because you feel unsafe and your best option is …Baltimore? Where the public schools can’t afford air conditioning? Not Portland or SF or Boston or Austin? I mean don’t get me wrong we are rounding a decade here and there’s plenty of good, but Baltimore has no infrastructure for protecting anyone because there’s such willfully inappropriate spending, and we are literally a case study of redlining with national attention for police corruption. I don’t think the specific issues you’re citing are better here. I mean I grew up riding the bus with the daughter of the local grand wizard. Maryland has some liberals, but we are palpably the northern most historically southern (as in south of the mason dixon line) state. Edit: “southern”

Traffic sucks

You'll find that St Louis and Baltimore have an awful lot in common - both are largely-poor, largely-black cities with declining populations that are politically separate from the suburban jurisdictions that surround them. I've never been to St Louis, but I've heard that it kinda feels like Baltimore - lots of brick houses from the 19th century, fairly low outside of the central business district, whole sections of town that are full of dilapidated buildings slowly reverting to empty lots, the highest rates of lead paint contamination in the country, a fair number of really nice neighborhoods that surprise out-of-town visitors expecting Fallujah-on-the-Mississippi/Patapsco, etc.

At the state level, the good news is that Maryland is overwhelmingly Democratic, meaning that abortion bans, book bans, etc generally don't fly here. That doesn't mean the rest of the state cares all that much more about Baltimore than Missouri does about St Louis, though. There is a fair amount of animosity towards Baltimore City from the surrounding counties - it's a popular whipping boy on subjects from policing to schools to crime to government corruption. Maryland is very, very blue, but it's not particularly progressive. Moderate Democrats are the order of the day around here, and liberal policy goals tend to lag here despite how overwhelmingly Democratic the vote is. (We only just legalized weed last year, for instance.) If you're looking for liberal paradise, this is not your state; if you're looking for a fairly well-governed state that leans left but not overwhelmingly so, Maryland will be a good fit.

edit: department of redundancy department calling

This is a really good answer. I’ve never been to Missouri so the relativism is something I can’t reflect on.

> Not Portland or SF or Boston or Austin?

Generally those cities are at another price point. SF especially. Those cities also have their share of problems.

Yeah I definitely felt like "ah this is familiar" looking at the city. And for what it's worth, Missouri only legalized weed last year and we had to duke it out between three ballot provisions, one of which was literally "give this guy Brad control over all the weed"

Thanks! I know it ain't a liberal paradise, but we don't wanna move to Fire Country California or to some uppity rich northeastern enclave

Edit: someone reached out to me to say that "uppity" is a racially coded term? I just meant uptight NIMBY folks lol

Baltimore has a very similar vibe to St. Louis. An independent city, just like St. Louis, only much bigger, but sporting an equally disfunctional city government, but largely progressive/competent State level governance.

Ah that’s very true.. I guess I got stuck on the LGBTQ friendly bit.

>ern most historically confederate state.

Historically confederate when the state didn't seceed...?

Ha I actually had to Google this because I didn’t know that. Neat. Well the mason dixon line is our northern border. That’s what I was getting at.

My family just fled here from tallahassee, florida for a better place to raise our kids in terms of lgbt treatment, more liberal politics generally, and better attitude towards diversity.

Baltimore certainly has its issues but it also has lots of beauty, tons to do, it relatively cheap for the northeast, has lots of friendly people and is light years ahead of florida on the issues we care about.

for us its an enormous improvement from the southeast. Honestly we lived in Chicago for over a decade and it feels more liberal here to me (which may be because I’m originally from the northeast and always felt some cultural mismatch in the Midwest and a huge cultural alienation from the Deep South)

Ps feel free to message me if you want.

Edit: we have found it to be a more family friendly city than Chicago was. Lots of kids in the area we live.

I’m a realtor who works the counties around Baltimore and can help if you are interested, currently helping a Reddit couple I actually met a few years ago on here. I’ll send you a Dm if you have questions!

Maryland still doesn’t have legal recreational marijuana FWIW. Legislation legalizing it goes into effect July 1.

Yes, good point, we only voted to legalize it last year. Here's hoping the state pulls together a good legalization plan before July 1...

You should take a look at Howard County .

Just moved to Baltimore city a few weeks ago from Louisville. I’ve visited St. Louis before and the vibes are similar. Did you live in the city or the suburbs? Are you trying to move your family into Baltimore city or county? I’m not sure exactly how you determined Baltimore would be any safer a place to raise your children, but it certainly is a diverse and generally friendly city with general city safety concerns.

In my short time here, I’ve really enjoyed the walkability and the abundance of things to do. There seems to me to be an equal or greater amount of cultural attractions. I don’t think there are any parks as awesome as the one with the history museum and art museum in St. Louis here though but there are several parks in the city.

We moved to baltimore from the sf Bay area and love it. Some reasons we love it here:

• you get all 4 seasons, but none are very harsh or long. It snows once or twice. It is hot for maybe 4 weeks.
• near so many great places to visit like DC, NY, Philadelphia. Trains to a bunch of cities.
• mountains and oceans in the same state. Great camping and outdoor activities in Maryland and lots of hiking near Baltimore
• we don't have to worry about increasing drought and fire risk like the West Coast, and we don't have the increasing hurricane risks of the south.
• all states have red rural areas, but maryland as a whole tends to be blue. I didn't actually consider that much when we moved here in 2019, but now that roe has been overturned, I would.

-plenty to do with kids. Paddle boats on the harbor, aquarium, science center and discovery kids center, family concerts at the baltimore symphony orchestra...etc etc.

• baltimore is just charming. It has its own thing. It has its own vibe. It doesn't feel like just another city. It has a sense of place and history, and you feel it walking around.

As for the bad parts, I mean the crime. I haven't experienced any crime myself in my 3 years here, but there are parts of the city I don't go. There are parts of the city that you drive through and the level of decay is hard to believe. You have dinner in fells point and you convince yourself the city has a bright future and then you drive down a street with boarded up rowhomes and the devastation feels insurmountable and all consuming.

> someone reached out to me to say that "uppity" is a racially coded term?

I’m super interested in hearing the logic on that one from whoever contacted you

> I’m not sure exactly how you determined Baltimore would be any safer a place to raise your children

I believe they mean raise them in a place that doesn’t have book bans and a litany of other personal autonomy issues. The grander Balt-Wash area also has far more opportunities in it than St Louis has.

Also re: that park in St Louis, Patterson Park from end-to-end is just over half a mile; Forest Park in STL is around 2 miles wide. To be fair though, not a lot of cities have parks that massive, and places like Philly, Baltimore, and DC do have decent river-valley parks on their falls lines which are nice.

I think something that folks from other parts of the country might be surprised by is free museums here. Walters, BMA, and the Smithsonian museums in DC are all free, and as someone who grew up here I didn’t realize that was rare.

I mean, you’re using a line surveyed 260 years ago because of competing colonial claims as your basis of culture today. The Maryland claim would’ve included Philadelphia, the Pennsylvania claim would’ve included Baltimore and nearly Georgetown.

Things have changed a lot since the 1760s and the 1860s. Baltimore and Washington are pretty squarely Northeast cities.

Same situation here. We are moving to Baltimore from Texas this summer. Hoping to find a safer place for us (lesbian couple with a daughter). We are really excited!!!

Thanks for that tip and the info. Definitely open to any more information you might have on the museums and uncommon knowledge you have gathered.

Forest Park area - Wyman Park/Hopkins/Roland Park

South Grand Blvd - Hampden or Fells Point

Delmar - Harbor East

No City Museum or Magic House but there is a Science Center. The Baltimore Aquarium beats the one in Union Station.

Traffic is similar. Housing prices are similar. Baltimore and St. Louis are VERY close to twin cities in many regards except pizza. Miss me with that provel.

Biggest plus to me besides the beach is what is in the four hour drive bubble. In St. Louis you have Kansas City, Memphis and not much else. In Baltimore you have DC, Philly, New York. You will never run out of things to do,

Source: Lived in Baltimore for 40 years. Presently in KCMO but I go to STL a lot for work and play.

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I could see that perspective, and I honestly don’t know the regional history to the extent you’re describing. But considering the active klan here, the enormous number of confederate flags in the schools in western maryland/Frederick co and on the shore at least, my lived experience in the state when not in private schools/with people not “from here” has always shared more in common with my father’s in NC than my mother and husband from NY (who both a generation apart thought the klan was “over” before moving here). Our public high school vehemently referred to the civil war as a war of northern economic aggression, all the way through AP US history. That, to me, is a meaningful and modern reflection of values and ideals in the state that wouldn’t be common in most of the north east.

The good thing in your comparison is we just had a Republican Governor for 8 years and we’re still lightyears better than Missouri!

The Baltimore-Washington area as a whole is pretty good for what you’re looking for. There’s decent variety in communities throughout the area that you will probably be able to find the type of place you like (I mean vibewise - dense downtowns, rowhouses on rowhouses, detached homes in cities, suburbs, rural areas, waterfront towns, small towns from the Bay to the foothills) and all of those are decently close to the cores of both cities. In fact, Baltimore and DC‘s central train stations are less than 40 miles from each other and have a bunch of different trains that can get you between the cities in 35-50 minutes. (Also I might as well mention here something that’s rare elsewhere but plentiful here: free museums. Baltimore’s big two art museums are free as are all the Smithsonian museums in DC.)

There are plenty of things to complain about Baltimore (crime worries, very humid summers, dreams of a better transit system), but if you’re looking at it as a region and not just a city then I think you’ll find a lot in common and a lot you’ll like. If you want to live in the city proper and are worried about crime then do research on neighborhoods - just like any city, there are better and worse areas.

Pretty informed on the subject, obviously. Keep that wisdom coming!

Hi I’m from NE Kansas & I think one big difference between all of Missouri & Baltimore is that Baltimore is much denser! So when you are in Missouri & it’s only 5 miles away, that same 5 miles is waaaaay longer of a trip in Bmore.

Ah yes, admitting where the limits of my background are paints a bullseye on anything left I would say, as opposed to limiting my contributions to smug commentary on others. Cute.

The American visionary arts museum here, while not free, I think was just named one of the top museums in the nation. It's a treasure - art by untrained artists.

I think this is something we can all agree on lol

Congrats on the move. But this question has been asked many times. There are lots of rant threads.

I’m not an expert here, so I didn’t post! Do you see how that works?

This is an excellent, well written answer.

I’m just saying that regardless of where the region was grouped 150-250+ years ago, that today is not the same.

> the enormous number of confederate flags in the schools in western maryland/Frederick co and on the shore

I grew up on the Shore and have zero clue what you’re talking about.

Also, you can find Confederate flags in NY. You can even find them in Canada - people who fly them aren’t always thinking about Southern pride…… And although biggest in the South, the Klan wasn’t just a Southern thing - like they had a big presence in the Midwest and failed in spreading more around Boston because they’re anti-Catholic (like, funding the Calles government in Mexico in a civil war because of laws against the Catholic Church, or their campaigns against Al Smith, JFK, and Biden).

> Our public high school vehemently referred to the civil war as a war of northern economic aggression, all the way through AP US history. That, to me, is a meaningful and modern reflection of values and ideals in the state that wouldn’t be common in most of the north east.

Yeah that wouldn’t be a thing in Maryland. You might hear some people say “the War of Northern Aggression” in certain places but, growing up on the Eastern Shore, it always sounded slightly unserious and we were never taught the Lost Cause narrative in school.

Congratulations! I hope your move goes well and I hope you love being here as much as we do!

Summers won’t phase you —they are surprisingly humid, but short! And the winters aren’t brutal! It’s so easy to travel all around the northeast!

Also I’ll say the city has a surprising amount of nature and parks that feel like actual woods is amazing and rare of a city if this size. Additionally Baltimore isn’t very sprawled (compared to something like Chicago) so you can get into the actual country in 20 min drive.

I haven’t found traffic to be terrible—especially for the northeast (as long as you aren’t commuting between dc.