I lived in Hillsboro from 1995 til 2005 and I loved it. It's a beautiful suburb and easy to get to NW Portland and all... It's not that long to get there...20 minutes or so ...then you have the mountains and the sea ...and alot of other things like walking/hiking and other things. I used to live in Orenco at Arbor Gardens when Orenco was just built and I miss it. Sunday drives up the west hills was beautiful.That was my Sunday getaway driving under the canopies of ancient oaks and that all the way to Sauvie/Burlington area...
It's great to see you both posting about Hillsboro. I visited for a month (the entirety of June) and think it's perfect for me. Now I'm simply looking for a job so I can pivot over there (I live in Japan and just recently returned to Tokyo). Keep up the good vibes!
Listen dudes...I live in middle of nowhere southern MA. Just the aerial and street views of Hillsboro looks like the nicest town I've ever seen LOL. Cities and towns out here were all built waaayyyy before, and we don't have a normal grid-pattern city planning structure. A lot of the houses are old as shit, and there are far less neighborhoods where the houses all look similar. Idk, this looks pretty nice for me. I live a quiet life, I work in IT. So, Intel might be getting a resume submission from me soon.
Hillsboro is really nice if you like that suburb+urban mix. Thing about Hillsboro/Tigard even Beaverton to some extent is that you get a lot of the same crime you would get in a nicer part of Portland (Laurelhurst, the hills, etc.). I've thought about a move out of the city to get somewhere safer, but it really seems you kind of need to get out of the metro area to really get that safe/suburb vibe.
Highway 26 tunnel is not in Hillsboro silly. Nike and Intel are big companies. Don't drive by them during rush hour silly. Also, there are other routes to Portland. I too do not like going through the tunnel on 26 (although, Portland / Beaverton own that). A lot of your complaints are about how hard it is to get to Portland from Hillsboro. Try living in Portland silly.