Why I Love North Carolina, Part 1: Triad 

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City Nerd sounds like he's having fun. Someone should check on him.

I hope he brings up how Duke University torpedoed Triangle-wide light rail because of their financial relationship with the Koch brothers.

NC truly deserves better. Thank you for the highlights, CityNerd.

NORTH CAROLINA MENTIONED!!! BOJANGLES AND COOKOUT !!!

Lived in High Point for three years in high school (2000 to 2003), and seeing how much the Triad has changed for the better -- after I left and couldn't enjoy it, of course! 😂 -- is genuinely uplifting. Downtown Greensboro used to be a dirty dump. Downtown High Point was all about the furniture market and nothing else. Winston's always had some cool stuff going on, but it was always a question of whether it was worth the drive. The smaller towns were just kinda sleepy small towns, not much happening. Growth has brought activity, and it's great to see. By the way, the old Reynolds Building is the miniature precursor to the Empire State Building. The building staffs send each other Christmas cards every year.

The walk score for city vs. downtown areas is such a real NC thing. Lived/have spent lots of time in Wilmington, Raleigh, Durham, Charlotte, and Greensboro and they all have the same "problem". When living in Raleigh we were on the edge of some of the old downtown neighborhoods and we could walk one direction super easily and another direction you found yourself on the side of a busy road in a ditch almost instantly. Love the NC content!

So happy to see NC being talked about here! Unfortunately it seems like a big portion of the population of all our cities actively resist urbanism, holding back our massive potential for enjoyable and walkable urban spaces.

That Greensboro train station is superb. Thank God it still exists!!

Was a transportation planner in Winston-Salem several years ago and it truly does punch above its weight in many regards as featured here. This is due to, among other reasons, the major academic institutions located here: UNCSA, WFU, Salem College, and WSSU all within relative proximity to one another. Although, this is not to discount that W-S does have major challenges, as it was one of the most racially and economically segregated cities I’ve ever experienced.

Honestly, for me, one of the most important parts about a walkable city is the shade provided. Seeing the record heat levels we are experiencing and will see, the amount of shade in so many cities is lacking. We need to make sure we use nature to cool down these areas.

That Reynolds building at 2:45 was the inspiration for the Empire State Building, but so glad Winston is getting the love it deserves, if Charlotte, the Piedmont Triad, and RDU get their acts together and up their collaboration, this could be one of the coolest corridors in the country, namely effective high speed rail connections.

I've watched plenty of mike mileage that a lot of people who love North Carolina are going to love your video.

DUDEEEE I've been a LONG time follower!!! I used to live in MA and moved to downtown Winston-Salem 6 months ago . I love it soooooooooooo much! This made my day!!!!!

Had no clue that Winston-Salem was moving in that direction, the shots look amazing! Love the repurposed industrial space. Also love the CityNerd vlog moments!

I went to school at UNC-Greensboro and two interesting things about the town are 1) on the positive side, a very diverse local music scene with hobby musicians, traditional musicians, and classical musicians just getting together to jam etc in a way I haven't experienced in other places where it was more about big names/gigs. The low cost of living lets people have more hobbies in general. and 2) on the negative side, an overwhelming focus on religion, especially baptist in a kind of oppressive way, many jobs and business owners will still feel empowered to ask you about religious beliefs at an interview, etc.

It was so fantastic meeting you in Durham and the collection of city nerds you brought together from all over NC! There were some advocacy conversations that wouldn’t have happened otherwise.

North Carolina 👌🏾👌🏾👌🏾 honestly, an amazing state to live in. I just hope rail gets pushed more to the forefront. So much opportunity to connect all the cities here.

I love these videos. They show me that there are parts of the country that are at least making some attempt at making their places more fun to visit and live in. It's proper good news.

I really love this new video format with the intermixed selfie videos. Feels a lot more personal.

Love that you’re highlighting my home state and acknowledging the history here. Cant wait for the Durham episode!

It's cool to see walkability in places like NC. As a Texan who is soon leaving the South and not returning, I've had my fill of any location below the mason-dixon line, but it's nice to see where I could go if I ever come back for a visit.

Dang I hate that I missed you. I work in downtown Winston and have lived in Greensboro since middle school. I love that you gave us a little shout!!

You uploaded this video on the same day that I'm moving back to North Carolina. INCREDIBLE.

Thanks for visiting Winston Salem! Glad you enjoyed your time in downtown. The local sentiment is very similar to your impression of downtown. A lot of up and coming promise downtown. Great and relatively affordable downtown lifestyle can certainly be had here. The biggest problem as you mentioned is as soon as you step outside of the immediate downtown area it becomes near impossible to walk/ bike anywhere. I love 4mins by car from work. It would be a quick 15min bike ride if I didn't think I would die on the no-shoulder 45+mph roads on the way there. Keep up the good work!

I think you got the difference between Winston and Greensboro exactly right, Winston’s downtown is so much more lively and pedestrian friendly. Glad you liked your stay in my little adopted city, it was fun to see so much of our city through a visitor’s eyes

You should try visiting Raleigh and checking out the greenway, it runs circular around downtown and connects multiple locations of interest like parks, two different lakes, a large indoor mall and the north carolina museum of art (which has its own beautiful trail as well). What makes all of this special is its in the city and accessible from downtown. I think it'd make a cool video, I currently use the greenway to commute to work.

I like the cutaways to candid, in the moment CityNerd

I love living in Greensboro. They added a free bus that runs up and down elm street and the neighborhoods north and east of downtown are walkable and have some fun bars and restaurants as well. There are plans to add protected bike lanes along Market street (running East from downtown) and they’re finishing up a greenway that runs in a circle around downtown, creating bike and walking access from all sides. Overall it feels like a mix between a small big city and a big college town.

Lived in Uptown/4th ward and my wife lived in Industry Hill in Winston Salem before she moved to Charlotte. When we were living in NC, we visited Winston Salem a couple of times and love the walkability of neighborhoods and reminded us of Uptown. Currently in CO, but if we happen to ever move back that way Winston Salem is top of the list!

Can't believe you found all this good in the city, despite not even going to reynolda village! W-S is an extremely underrated city.

I know this video didn't do great numbers wise, but it has been in the back of my head to watch this for so long

Glad to see you made it down here and enjoyed it! I've been enjoying your videos for months now and glad to see you took a chance on Winston-Salem. I think you highlighted some really great features. It was announced recently that Winston-Salem will be added to the Amtrak line thanks to a large grant. Please come back some time and check out the Quarry at Grant Park, Hanes Park, and the Ardmore and West Salem neighborhoods.

Born and raised in the Triad and love it!! This is my home and cant imagine living anywhere else! 💙

My home region! What started it all for me with The Black Urbanist! And yes, we do have urbanism! And I haven’t been to Winston-Salem since I moved away 8 years ago, so nice to see it’s newer and reused areas I lived in Downtown Greensboro for two years right behind the train station (you saw my old apartment from the train!) and know it’s new urbanism and scrappy urbanism and park system well! And yeah, being Black and from here, yeah. That’s what I’m sitting with and what made me go to DC. I was home this weekend for my 20th reunion, hate that I missed you, but glad you had a good time and you captured us well!

What a sweet surprise! I’ve lived in Winston Salem since 1966. It’s been through a lot of changes over the years. Downtown pretty much died for so many years after being pretty much the epicenter for many years. I think the malls killed downtown but it’s back better than ever. Thank you for taking the time to come visit us! We especially love the local bands, the theater & arts, restaurants, and the Kaleideum. Subscribed. I like the variety and quality of your videos. Quite refreshing.

btw - Old Salem is essentially a tourism destination by itself, I went there in school at least once, even as someone from Raleigh. (I think we also went to the International Civil Rights Center on the same trip)

As a Durham resident - I'm so stoked for the next video!

So grateful you came to our state and can’t wait for your video on Durham!

NC is home. It's nice to see your take on WinstonSalem and Greensboro. Thr triad is a great compliment to Charlotte and the triangle which get so much attention but also have many transplants.

Biased since I'm a Charlotte native, but W-S is my favorite mid-size city in the US. So glad you gave it some attention.

Winston-Salem once had its own airport (Smith Reynolds) but it's no longer used for passenger service. Same goes for passenger train service which ended in 1970. The station has been restored and there's an initiative to restore service underway. The city is also home to one the finest arts conservatories in the nation - the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.

There are plans to connect W-S to the rest of the NC rail corridor. It will also be extended out east to Wilmington.

NC is awesome! Can’t wait for your Durham Raleigh vid!

That’s awesome. I found your channel last week when I was visiting Raleigh/Durham. Now perfect timing that you’re making this video

I enjoyed watching this, particularly the highlights of the greenways. Looking forward to Durham. Richmond, VA (we call it "RVA") would make for an interesting city review as well, with several walkable neighborhoods that were developed along the country's first street car system, along with a couple of neighborhoods that have experienced explosive growth within the last 10 years. We have a BRT that was developed a few years ago that connects some of the densest neighborhoods.

Back in the late 1990s I interviewed at UNC Greensboro and enjoyed seeing the area. Looks like public transport there has improved a good deal.

Sister went to North Carolina A&T in Greensboro. One of the great things about the city is that it lies at the perfect sleeper train distance from Atlanta on the Amtrak Crescent in both directions.

I'm the land surveyor who surveyed over 100 separate parcels of land where the ballpark sites prior to its development. Based on my knowledge of the long-term plans for the site, I can say that most of the surface parking at the W-S ballpark will be going away in the next few years.

Love the inclusion of the POV cutaways! It kills me to say it (because I adore your channel), but I feel that some of your longer videos tend to drag a bit (especially when it comes to fully fleshing out the methodology and going in-depth with each city in the Top 10 lists). That being said, I think boots-on-the-ground, in-person stuff like what you've included here ends up being really effective in breaking up the content / varying the pacing of the video!

Haven’t been to these cities but another great NC city is Asheville. Only spent an afternoon there but it’s such a neat, artsy place! This makes me want to go back and see more of the state.

Holy shit, he’s in my state. Please come to Chapel Hill and Carrboro.

Never in a million years did I think a video dedicated to my hometown (GSO) would pop up on your channel.

I visited Greensboro a couple of years ago, and went to the museum in the Woolworth building. Fascinating!

You mentioned it in this video but I love how you appreciate the small differences between cities. Many people (especially in the urbanism community) will say things like “all cities in the US are the same” etc, but I appreciate how you actually immerse yourself into these cities and discover the truth - which is that every city (even seemingly “bad” ones) have something to offer!

The crux of urbanism is fostering walkability and bikability in a city as well as a decent public transit system. Sadly, a lot of US cities have grown outrageously car-centric.

Yeah we need more of those elevated pedestrian freeway crossings.

Come to Richmond, VA next!! I'm the statewide bicycle and pedestrian planning coordinator at VDOT and live in the Fan District and would be happy to show you around and tell you about what Virginia is doing to improve walking and biking for all Virginians. Also, I attended undergrad and grad school at UNC Charlotte, so thanks for doing some NC content!

One of my favorite videos in a while. I have always kinda looked down on this area since its walk score doesn’t do it justice, but honestly the whole area looks mostly enjoyable!

There are some truly cool urban areas in the South. I just finished a long tour and was surprised by the many walkable neighborhoods. Thanks again..

Southern history is important, though I can understand why you might not like it so much. Understanding southern history helps us understand attitudes and opinions. I looked a little into southern architecture for a while. Plantation houses (not a city nerd thing) and South Caroline city homes (IS a City Nerd thing). Those homes still exist today. Thanks again for an interesting look at a city I'll probably never visit again. (I don't like the south, but for climate. The architecture is fascinating.)

yoooo nc represent! all the cities down here are in a massive growth phase, and while thats terrible for housing, its great as you can literally watch the city grow into something greater(although you also get to watch as city council puts their foot in their mouth over and over with terrible decisions, looking at you charlotte

Very refreshing content. Finally City Nerd is not dissing Sunbelt cities, and actually enjoying the South. NC is great for some affordable warm-climate urbanism. No need to pay California prices.

Very nice to see you visit my home state. I hope we can get better rail service in the coming decades.

Looking forward to the Durham video! There are a LOT of transit/density improvements that could be made in NC cities, and affordability issues remain for new housing, but Winston, Greensboro, Durham, and Raleigh remain pretty incredible cities and I'm glad you got the chance to check them out. Hope you enjoyed the beer at Fullsteam; Sean has been at the forefront of a lot of good trends in Durham and NC in general and I'm not surprised you had a good turnout. With love from an NC expat now in NoVa!

You need to visit Richmond, VA! It's almost never talked about on your channel but it's a great up and coming city with lots of distinct neighborhoods. Imo it's more aesthetically appealing than some NC cities but similar none the less.

This is great. Visit Raleigh soon!

You know what? I was just going to comment on your last video, on how Winston-Salem seemed like a nice city. And here you are, with the first mention on the city. Wait did I comment? I forget. Either way I'm glad you mentioned it. Yeah all in all not a bad downtown. Of course, not the biggest downtown, but it has potential.

I was grinning ear to ear watching you in the 336! Can’t wait for trains to not be 3 hours late on a biweekly to a city 1 hour away.

Great video and really does highlight a lot of the things that are hidden gems about the tri-cities area. I have in laws that live in that area and I have spent a lot of time there during holidays and as a biker I have also had the good fortune of actually riding my bike to all 3 cities in the area. Like you, I was wonderfully surprised by the trails when I ran into them on my adventures and how long they were and how well developed the store fronts around them were. Downtown Winston-Salem recently surprised me again with that innovation district found around the abandon coal power station. Compared to riding in much warmer places in the South getting around there on bike wasn't so bad. The main issue was that once the trails ended it required a substantial amount of bravery to keep going because then it was the defacto suburban sprawl roads that you would find yourself riding on and sharing with cars.

I grew up in eastern NC but went to university in Charlotte and had many friends in Greensboro and Winston. Winston was always the smaller city and somewhat less important but honestly, it always felt more cohesive and interesting especially in its downtown core. Greensboro felt more college town and the development seemed to be pushed out of the central city into the areas adjacent to the universities in a much more car-centric overly modern type of way while Winston was just more charming and quirky. I remember stumbling upon breweries and interesting eateries in Winston before the whole breweries and quirkiness of places became such a fad. I think the fact that you have to somewhat make an effort to get to Winston as opposed to always passing through Greensboro (think I-40/I-85 and rail travel, etc.) makes Winston a more interesting place because people really choose to be there.

As someone who grew up in Winston, this feels so surreal that you were in my hometown. So much has changed and so much is the same!

I like the addition of selfie walk and talk clips!

Oh hey, I live in Winston Salem, but I recently moved from New Jersey. This is a good reason to be up to date to your Patreon, I should've known you were nearby somewhere. Just for the mental check. Thanks for the videos. If it's one thing I miss from the Northeast, it's the transit. There's actually a pretty good bus service here that runs regularly. Can't wait to see the next video in the series. I have family in the Durham area and was thinking of maybe moving there.

I’m so happy you came to North Carolina!! I missed your Durham event but would love for you to come back!,

Came over from Nebula for this and I'd love to see you do a video on northeast cities under 1 million people that sit at the northern end of the northeast corridor and are under-represented on RU-vid. This isn't just to get you to talk about my beloved Portland I swear...

You should check out Greenville SC! Very similar vibes but a bit smaller. Old industrial city, very walkable downtown (the ball field is a highlight), albeit with sprawl all around it :/. There's also an amazing Greenway (swamp rabbit trail) that runs along an old railway, right through downtown with a ton of development along it. I think the planning dept is doing a great job for the explosive growth the city is experiencing. Anyway great video 😊

So it looks like Camel City indeed does come from camel cigarettes, but that Winston and Salem cigarettes were introduced (by RJ Reynolds, same company as Camel, headquartered in Winston-Salem) and named after the town.

I have lived in all three of the triad cities and let me tell you what, you really know how to capture the beauty of a place. I love my state.

Solid video Ray! There’s a Downtown greenway system in Greensboro but had no clue Winston-Salem came along this far. Lived in GSO for a three years after high school. More heavy rail would do the state well. Something like the Bustang(CO) in NC would do wonder as well.

Dude. The cigarette brands were named after the city.

I think it would be really interesting if you looked at Charleston SC the city has changed a TON in the last twenty years and the traffic patterns are tragic and unique because the metro area is surrounded by water and totally exploded in the recent past.

Bailey Park is awesome! They have a criterium (bike, high speed bike race) around there every year and it’s a blast

I lived in Charlotte for a year and thought it was pretty underrated

Me and my wife were considering places to move from our hometown in Eastern NC and this Winston Salem video opened our eyes to the potential there. We visited and LOVED IT. We are planning on moving to WS in the near future

NORTH CAROLINA VIDEOS LFGGGG!! I'm our local urbanist RU-vidr in Asheville, NC. It's a bizarre town.

Kannapolis, NC is also a town I think is worth visiting! It is smaller but it has made some significant changes to it's urban fabric in the past few years and I think it has a downtown area that punches above its weight. Also has a passenger rail line which is always nice.

Sunday in the south I'm not surprised the downtown was empty.

Holy shit CityNerd + NC

Railroader here for Yadkin valley railroad. We run out of Winston Salem so we are familiar with neighboring rail in the area and I will say there is word going around we are getting passenger service back at the old southern railway terminal as far as we know

Video idea: Now that it's thoroughly summer and people tend to travel to the coasts, how about a video on the most urban beach towns/ cities. Perhaps cities that touch the coast and that have a high ratio of visitors/ tourists compared to walk, bike, and transit score

Thanks for giving my home state some love. You're right, most NC cities are not built well enough for public transit and it really needs to work on that. They're trying to work on those issues but they're getting a lot of pushback by Nimbys. The transit projects that they actually are working on are being built at a ridiculously slow pace. North Carolina is a great state but it's experiencing a lot of growing pains. I'm just hoping that with all the people moving here, the transplants will pressure the DOT/State and Local governments to start investing in more transit options. The booming population in NC cities is quickly becoming unsustainable with it's current transit infrastructure and this will hopefully force city and state leaders to act.

There is an interesting 90-mile freight railroad in North Carolina, called the Winston-Salem Southbound Railway (WSS). It is currently jointly owned by Norfolk Southern and CSX.

The "just for show" houses in Old Salem are mostly private residences still in use.

Come over to the Burlington/Graham area and I would be happy to show you around. Just last month, Burlington was just ranked as the 3rd best city to move to in NC by USA Today.

Welcome to North Carolina. You will find this trend continues across the state, almost without exception, from Hickory to Forrest City to Wilmington and beyond.

I moved to the Winston-Salem area two years ago from the Denver area, and you did a pretty good video of Winston-Salem itself. The downtown area is quiet compared to what I'm used to, and is pleasant to visit. The Salem Creek Greenway is unique to the area, in that connects to additional trails and you can go relatively long distances without worrying about automobile traffic. Outside of Winston-Salem pathways of such length are rare to non-existent, they usually don't connect to another trail, or even a sidewalk, and people would see why the area has such a low walkability score. In fact, sidewalks are pretty much non-existent in most parts of the city and region. People here walk on the road in their neighborhood, or they go to a park and walk laps. Having said that, Winston-Salem does have an interesting history and most parts are aesthetically more pleasing than other Triad cities in my opinion. Despite my complaints, this is a nice city to live in and near. It is within reasonable driving distance to Charlotte, Raleigh-Durham, the mountains and the coast. Most of the city and surrounding areas are safe, but there are some parts of Winston-Salem with high levels of criminal activity, so you have to pay attention to that. It has good restaurants, and I've heard it has good breweries, but I don't drink alcohol, so I can't verify that. There are a bunch of vineyards nearby as well, and I have heard that they are decent too. The economy appears to be going well. And people are generally nice like most places. It varies by part of town, but there are a fair number of transplants like me here too. Most appear to be from Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, or Florida with a few sprinkled in from other parts of the country.

Thank you so much for posting this. I was in WS for my first time in April and loved it. Both Winston and Salem are beautiful in their own ways. I stayed in Kernersville, but thought the traffic was much worse out there. 🙁

Omggg, I live in Winston-Salem and I'm so flattered to see this! I love my city😊

Portlander who recently moved to NC here. If you rode the train from Greensboro to Durham, then you probably flew through the other Rose City USA, Gibsonville NC. Its nickname was earned by the rosebushes that line the train tracks (a much better origin story than the Pittock's Rose Garden IMHO).