The Car Lover's City

[Eunos_Cosmo]

The feasibility of buying, storing, maintaining, and enjoying varies greatly from city to city. What do you guys think is the best city in which to be a car enthusiast?

There are a number of factors to think about. Cost of living is important because a car lover would be hard pressed to divert funds to a project or even payment while struggling to make rent with a professional degree in downtown San Francisco or Manhattan. Conversely, a well funded and easily stored project would give the owner little joy cruising around the pool-table flat Chicago exterior. A good car-enthusiast city needs a diverse landscape/topography, reasonable cost of living, ideally public transportation options, no or minimal salt, and a strong supply of secondhand cars and parts, for me at least. The Cities that come to mind are:

Portland, Or
Seattle, Wa
Austin, Tx
Fort Worth, Tx
San Diego, Ca
Los Angeles, Ca

All of the above are reasonably affordable (LA and Seattle stretching that definition) and have a good supply of hills and cars.

What do you guys think?

 

[Beeblebrox237]

Maranello? I would probably agree that the best city in the world to be an enthusiast is in America, where petrol is cheap and there are plenty of good, deserted back roads. And if I had to choose one, it would be San Francisco and the bay area. The mountain roads there are the best I've ever seen and the climate is very kind to cars.

Also, I have to nominate Pittsburgh. The car scene is far bigger than you'd expect. It hosts one of the largest car shows in the world each year including races held on city streets and the local racetrack. It also boasts some terrific driving roads if you know where to look, and the topography makes driving almost anywhere in the region reasonably fun. The winters suck and the roads are bumpy, but it still deserves a mention.

 

[Joey D]

Detroit, MI or rather the Metro Detroit area (no one lives in the city by choice except hipsters). The car scene is huge, cruising Woodward Ave on Friday or Saturday night always offers everything from fully blown muscle cars to Ferrari's to sport compacts and everything in between, fuel is mostly cheap, nearly everyone either works for the auto industry or knows someone who does, and the cops are rather chill when it comes to speed.

Sure winters are going to suck, but that leaves you time to work on your project car or hoon around in empty, snow covered parking lots.

And now I miss home

 

[ImaRobot]

Los Angeles, because everyday hasperfect weather for all your car enthusiast needs

 

[Eunos_Cosmo]

Detroit, MI or rather the Metro Detroit area (no one lives in the city by choice except hipsters). The car scene is huge, cruising Woodward Ave on Friday or Saturday night always offers everything from fully blown muscle cars to Ferrari's to sport compacts and everything in between, fuel is mostly cheap, nearly everyone either works for the auto industry or knows someone who does, and the cops are rather chill when it comes to speed.

Sure winters are going to suck, but that leaves you time to work on your project car or hoon around in empty, snow covered parking lots.

And now I miss home

Good for cruising...but Michigan is painfully flat. I definitely know.

If the landscape was interesting....I might actually consider staying here.

 

[The87Dodge]

For expensive luxury cars (Mercedes Benz, Bentley, et cetera), neighborhoods in New York City is the best place to go. When I went to Tribeca, a wealthy neighborhood, all the streets were lined with Porsches and luxury cars.

Overall, Los Angeles is the best place for a car lover. You get a very diverse mix of cars there.

 

[Eunos_Cosmo]

For expensive luxury cars (Mercedes Benz, Bentley, et cetera), neighborhoods in New York City is the best place to go. When I went to Tribeca, a wealthy neighborhood, all the streets were lined with Porsches and luxury cars.

Overall, Los Angeles is the best place for a car lover. You get a very diverse mix of cars there.

The same could be said about Beverly Hills Ca, Bloomfield Hills Mi, Dallas Park Cities, downtown Houston, Chicago Michigan Ave/Rush St, Miami Beach. I saw 2 Bugatti Veyrons (one was a Grand Vitesse), an Aventador, 2 Phantom Dropheads, a 458, and a Huracan on Rush Street two nights ago in Chicago. The last time I was in Chi-town I spotted a Morgan Aeromax blasting down Michigan Ave. I even saw a Morgan 3 wheeler in Detroit not long ago.

But posing with expensive cars and being a car enthusiast are two different things. I don't think owning a car in NYC would be fun at all.

 

[The87Dodge]

The same could be said about Beverly Hills Ca, Bloomfield Hills Mi, Dallas Park Cities, downtown Houston, Chicago Michigan Ave/Rush St, Miami Beach. I saw 2 Bugatti Veyrons (one was a Grand Vitesse), an Aventador, 2 Phantom Dropheads, a 458, and a Huracan on Rush Street two nights ago in Chicago. The last time I was in Chi-town I spotted a Morgan Aeromax blasting down Michigan Ave. I even saw a Morgan 3 wheeler in Detroit not long ago.

But posing with expensive cars and being a car enthusiast are two different things. I don't think owning a car in NYC would be fun at all.

My word! You've seen two Bugatti Veyrons in real life!

Owning a car in Manhattan is torture. Too many people there have bad driving skills, and it is a pain to park your car there. And parking garages are not any better, as they are ridiculously expensive.

I understand that not all luxury car owners are enthusiasts. Still, it is a great sight to see streets lined with Bentleys and souped-up Porsches. But you wouldn't find much of any muscle cars in NYC.

 

[Murcie_LP640]

Dunno about specific cities but I'd love to live in New Zealand as a car enthusiast. So many nice roads and awesome scenery, you can do anything you like to your car as long as you get a mod plate and this brings along a lot of interesting concepts and imports.

I'm liking where I live at the moment though, close to the Adelaide Hills, breathtaking landscapes and it's got fairly cheap housing though the public transport system is a bit meh.

 

[McLaren]

The best place in North Texas would have to be Dallas because it has a much larger base of support for enthusiasts due to being the major link between the east & west coasts. There's a major dealership for every brand, exotic & non, as well as well-established shops such as Jotech, Dallas Performance, etc. Car meets are also dominantly held in Dallas as well as since most Fort Worth folks are the ones who have to drive to Dallas to gatherings than vice versa. Fort Worth does have the ease of being able to go north or west to find solid driving roads within' an hour, but hardly a significant advantage when you can do the same in Dallas by going an hour away in any direction into the country. I'd say Houston/Austin are probably right behind it but again, only due to Dallas' impact as central hub in the US which makes it easy to maintain a car; everything comes through here.

Cost of living, public transport, etc. is essentially the same throughout Texas. Every city has its own major transport & varying degrees of wealthy neighborhoods. Frisco & North Plano are probably the ideal areas in Dallas due to reasonable cost of living, good weather 10 out of 12 months (& just north enough to enjoy Oklahoma's cold fronts without all the snow), extremely open areas, well maintained roads, with the ease of Dallas itself only 30-45 minutes away.

 

[ScottPuss20]

What is the car capital of Australia? I feel as though Melbourne may be because there's a few oddballs lying around and several high-end supercars, especially in Toorak, Hawthorn, South Melbourne, Albert Park, Richmond and Carlton. In one day I spotted at least 20 such vehicles. Beach Road on a Sunday afternoon is littered with supercars, muscle cars, classic European cars, oddball cars, badly modified cars-the lot. At least when I went around that area once before.

 

[SVX]

Dunno about specific cities but I'd love to live in New Zealand as a car enthusiast. So many nice roads and awesome scenery, you can do anything you like to your car as long as you get a mod plate and this brings along a lot of interesting concepts and imports.

Quoted for truth. I didn't think much of our car culture until I actually went to a few meets and saw a few videos - and it certainly blew my mind how much of a diverse range of cars we have here, even in Wellington.

The two I'd say would be NZ for the reasons stated above, and really anywhere in Japan, because, well, Japan.

 

[Eunos_Cosmo]

The best place in North Texas would have to be Dallas because it has a much larger base of support for enthusiasts due to being the major link between the east & west coasts. There's a major dealership for every brand, exotic & non, as well as well-established shops such as Jotech, Dallas Performance, etc. Car meets are also dominantly held in Dallas as well as since most Fort Worth folks are the ones who have to drive to Dallas to gatherings than vice versa. Fort Worth does have the ease of being able to go north or west to find solid driving roads within' an hour, but hardly a significant advantage when you can do the same in Dallas by going an hour away in any direction into the country. I'd say Houston/Austin are probably right behind it but again, only due to Dallas' impact as central hub in the US which makes it easy to maintain a car; everything comes through here.

Cost of living, public transport, etc. is essentially the same throughout Texas. Every city has its own major transport & varying degrees of wealthy neighborhoods. Frisco & North Plano are probably the ideal areas in Dallas due to reasonable cost of living, good weather 10 out of 12 months (& just north enough to enjoy Oklahoma's cold fronts without all the snow), extremely open areas, well maintained roads, with the ease of Dallas itself only 30-45 minutes away.

I suppose I'm biased. Having lived in Fort Worth while working in Dallas, I greatly prefer the city to the west. Fort Worth landscape > Dallas landscape. Dallas feels more cosmopolitan, though.The best part about each city is that the other is only 30 mins away, in my opinion.

In the end, both are too far from the Ocean for me, so I don't think I'll return.

 

[Hayden]

I'll have to agree with @Murcie_LP640 on both fronts. New Zealand is simply amazing and Adelaiade certainly has its upsides. Plenty of great hills roads, diverse and reasonably large car culture, affordable housing, somewhat decent weather (), a circuit relatively nearby and an awesome Motorsport complex under construction not to far away.

SA also doesn't have yearly checks of cars, so unless you get caught by a roadside breath testing or defect station, you can get away with basically any mod you like. Petrol is expensive but compared to many places, insurance is very reasonably priced. There's plenty of speed cameras but I guess you'd be fine once you knew where they all are.

The more I think about it, the more I want to move there.

 

[McLaren]

I suppose I'm biased. Having lived in Fort Worth while working in Dallas, I greatly prefer the city to the west. Fort Worth landscape > Dallas landscape. Dallas feels more cosmopolitan, though.The best part about each city is that the other is only 30 mins away, in my opinion.

In the end, both are too far from the Ocean for me, so I don't think I'll return.

Well, the benefit of our opinions is that folks like us generally just refer to it a DFW anyway.

 

[Gotbeefboy564]

The same could be said about Beverly Hills Ca, Bloomfield Hills Mi, Dallas Park Cities, downtown Houston, Chicago Michigan Ave/Rush St, Miami Beach. I saw 2 Bugatti Veyrons (one was a Grand Vitesse), an Aventador, 2 Phantom Dropheads, a 458, and a Huracan on Rush Street two nights ago in Chicago. The last time I was in Chi-town I spotted a Morgan Aeromax blasting down Michigan Ave. I even saw a Morgan 3 wheeler in Detroit not long ago.

But posing with expensive cars and being a car enthusiast are two different things. I don't think owning a car in NYC would be fun at all.

Saw the veyrons

 

[Eunos_Cosmo]

They are far smaller in person than one would expect. Very compact design. I quite like it, much better than it shows in photographs.