re: Just booked my trip to Fayetteville....

quote:

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but NWA people always get it wrong.

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The converse can be said about central AR people I've known.

I've lived in Hot Springs very briefly, LR and NWA. I've also lived in OKC so I have a little knowledge of the areas.

NWA is the better of the two IMHO, but I certainly understand it is not for everyone. I guess it just depends on your needs.

Let's look at a common denominator, Household Income. This is usually a good measure of an area.

Per LR's website and Wiki LR's median HH income is approximately $37K to $38K. The MSA is about the same (this covers 6 counties as opposed to 2).

Wiki
American Towns

MSA

NWA's median HH income is listed a bit higher at approximatly $44K, at least according to one news source. I do not think this report is accurate b/c when I broke the towns down separately there was a totally different story.

In addition, it is comparing apples to oranges with the population difference. While LR proper is under 200K, the LR area is well over that of NWA (650K vs 450K).

NWA Homepage

Rogers alone is around $40K.
Wiki

Bentonville is also listed at around $40K.
Wiki

Fayetteville actually drops down to $31K.
Wiki

Springdale is listed as $36K. Before looking at this I would have bet that Springdale was the lowest of the 4.

Wiki