Living in Madison Wisconsin

"Nobody doesn't like Madison"
— A January 2020 Washington Post article

[Last updated in 2020]

Is Madison a good place to live? Interestingly this question goes back to at least 1948, when Life Magazine put Madison on its cover, under the title "The Good Life in Madison, Wisconsin" (see the two pictures nearby). The first time it came up to me, though, was in 1996, when I was doing a Ph.D. in Seattle. That was when Money Magazine voted Madison the "Best Place to Live in America", which generated quite a bit of buzz.

After the Ph.D. I moved around, then finally came to Madison for good in 2006, as a professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Wisconsin. Since then, with the exception of spending one year in Silicon Valley with a startup, I have been living in Madison. During this time I have grown to appreciate living here. There are multiple reasons for this.

The city is beautiful. Madison's location is picturesque: a city nestled among five lakes, rivers, forests, dairy farms, and rolling hills. It is very thoughtfully laid out, from way back in the early 1900s until now. The city is dotted throughout with numerous postcard-perfect views. Examples include sunset from the Memorial Union terrace, Picnic Point (any time), lake view from the Monona Terrace, the 360-degree view from the observation deck of the State Capitol, the view from Observatory Drive (UW), and many more. This set of pictures is indeed illustrative of Madison's beauty, but is far from doing justice to it.

The region is beautiful. The region surrounding Madison (within 1.5 hours of driving) is also very pretty, especially the northwest and the west. Those parts are full of rolling hills, forests, meandering streams, and little savannas. Here and there, you see red barns, silos, little farms, grazing cows. It is the quintessential pastoral scenery. All so pretty and relaxing. There are beautiful state parks within one hour driving, such as Devil's Lake State Park and Governor Dodge State Park, pretty sceneries (such as the dells at Wisconsin Dells), unusual places (such as the House on the Rock), kitschy but fun recreational places (such as Wisconsin Dells), and historical places (such as Taliesin and Lake Geneva). You can easily find many lists of such places online.

The seasons are stunning. The change of seasons here is dramatic and a feast for the eyes. You will see it in the trees, smell it, and feel it on your skin. The best season is perhaps the fall (mid September to late October). It's a riot of color, in all hues and forms. You can see fantastic fall colors in Madison (the UW arboretum and Wally Bauman Woods are the best) and at Devil's Lake, and it gets even better if you can drive a few hours up north. The winter scenery (early to mid-December, when snow typically falls, until mid March) is beautiful in the UW arboretum and the many wooded parks (especially if you do cross-country hiking). The spring (late March to early May) is again a riot of color, this time from the flowers. Summer is all green forests dotted with lakes and rivers. Check out this page for more detail (and for things to do in each season).

It is more than just skin-deep beauty. Another thing that I really appreciate is that Madison and the surrounding region were the birthplace for several influential figures in the environmental movement, and their influence is still heavily felt today. John Muir, "the father of the US national parks", came from Wisconsin. Aldo Leopold, a former UW professor, was famous for his land ethics, in which he advocated living in harmony with the land, and take care to keep "things natural, wild, and free" (his most famous book, "A Sand County Almanac", is highly influential and a joy to read). Living here, I can feel the influence of Muir and Leopold, and can tell that there is a lot of thoughts coming into building Madison and the region in a way that stays in harmony with the land, the wilderness, and nature. My understanding of the land and its place in our world, as well as an appreciation for nature and the wilderness, grows during my time so far in Madison.

Interesting architectures. Madison is full of neighborhoods with interesting architectures (such as prairie style and mid-century modern houses). There are historic architecture walking tours. Frank Lloyd Wright, a famous American architect, spent considerable time in Madison (and grew up nearby), and you can see multiple houses that he designed in Madison. New apartment complexes being built have generally been designed well (and not too boring). The Epic campus in Verona adds another interesting angle to the architecture landscape in Madison. And of course, Chicago, which is full of architectural history and treasures, is only 3 hours away.

Fantastic outdoor opportunities. This is simply amazing. It is pretty much a given that no matter where you live in Madison, you are only minutes away from numerous outdoor opportunities. For example, within 10 minutes drive from my house (in the Near West), I can kayak on a lake or a river, hike through a forest or a prairie, fish in streams judged to be among the best for trout fishing in the US, or urban hike through an interesting neighborhood. On biking alone, there are miles and miles in many directions. I can hop on a bike trail (2 miles from my house) and bike for hundreds of miles through rolling hills, prairies, and other beautiful sceneries all the way to the Illinois border. There are so many bike trails here (you can also hike or run on them, many of which are open in the winter for snowmobiling). Recently the city put $8M into connecting two bike trails via a bridge across a lake. It's no wonder that Madison is consistently ranked as one of the best cities for biking in the US.

And there are outdoor events being organized here year round. People here are also very active outdoor, year round. You will constantly see people bike, run, hike, cross country skiing, and more. Yet places are not crowded. You can easily find solitude, and the necessary peace and quiet to enjoy nature.

This is one of the things I love most about Madison. When I have just a few hours with my family (say at the end of the workday or over the weekend), it takes us no time to be out in the nature and enjoy it.

Numerous interesting events. There are many interesting events year around. Here's a sampling of what we do. In May we go to the UW arboretum to enjoy a brilliant show put on by the blossoming crab apples and the lilacs. The arboretum has a big collection of crab apples and has perhaps the largest collection of lilacs in the world. In June and July it is the prairies' turn to blossom. In mid August we make sure not to miss the sunflower days at Pope Farm Conservancy, where up to 500,000 sun flowers bloom over a vast area of rolling hills. This view must be seen in person. In September the prairies again put on an amazing show of fall flowers, with seas of brilliantly yellow golden rods and dark red tall grasses. In mid October then of course it is hours of hiking in forests and lake banks in the splendor of the fall color. In December and January we enjoy the solitude and beauty of a fresh snowfall while hiking (or cross-country skiing) in the UW arboretum or the many wooded forest parks in and near Madison.

Sometimes we hop on a plane to visit Las Vegas (a suburb of Madison) to escape the cold for a week or so. There we visit the various state and national parks. There are direct flights from Madison to Vegas (under four hours). We also often go to farmers' markets (the one on the Capitol Square is one of the best markets in the nation and a major tourist attraction).

Strong community sense. There is a strong sense of community in Madison, where people actively participate in community affairs and collectively get things done. The various neighborhoods often organize neighborhood events (such as parties, drives to build up the neighborhood parks). Overall, people here seem very active in community and neighborhood issues.

High quality services. Madison has good public schools. I have been generally happy with the quality of instructions that my son has received, and with the range of activities being offered. The schools are full of very smart kids (the way schools in a college town usually are). Services such as plumbing, house repair, health care, etc. are generally on time and quite good.

Low-stress living. Life with kids (especially small ones) can be pretty stressful and unpredictable. As such, I really appreciate the fact that Madison is quite low stress in this aspect. Within 2 miles of my house, I have pretty much everything I want: coffee shops, hospitals, schools, Target, grocery stores, haircut places, good restaurants, bars, movie theaters, playgrounds, forests, lakes, hiking trails, etc. From work, I can drive to parent-teacher conferences in 15 minutes, and then be back at work soon after that.

Growing population. "Great for raising a family" is often an euphemism for "too small and not having enough interesting things to do". Madison is not like that. While the city proper has a population of only about 250K, this does not count the contiguous suburbs, such as Middleton, Fitchburg, Verona, etc. Counting them and a few other outlying places, the entire Dane county has a population of 530K. To me this is about the right size: not too small so that I feel that there is nothing to do, but not too large so that the roads are choked with traffic and no matter where I go, it would be crowded. Madison is still growing rapidly though.

Vibrant and growing high-tech scene. As of 2020, I have a startup located in Madison, with significant investment from Informatica, a Silicon Valley company. Many national high-tech players want to establish offices in Madison, to recruit talent. In addition to Informatica, we have offices from Google (more than 150 people), Microsoft, Zendesk, Amazon, and more. The local VC presence is also growing rapidly, with a lot of funding for startups.

Recently, UW has also created a new School of Computer, Data, and Information Sciences, with a lot more funding and a large number of hiring slots, bringing even more high-tech talents to the area. A recent NYTimes article shows that Madison is the only Midwest city in the top ten of metro areas that have gained the most innovation jobs.

Some other stuff. Madison as a whole is quite progressive and supportive of diversity. It has a rich cultural life, as seen by the many plays, musicals, symphonies, and other regular artistic performances at the Overture Center for the Arts.

Madison has a vibrant food scene, with many farm-to-table restaurants that many people seem to like. I'm more into the Asian restaurant scene. There, the situation is good in that there are a few good restaurants for each type of food (such as Thai, Chinese, Vietnamese, etc.), but of course nothing approaching the variety, quality, and quantity of a big city, such as Chicago or New York. Beer is good here. Madison has a great number of microbreweries. Enough said.

Winter is a bit longer than at other places (usually lasting from Thanksgiving to mid March). See my comment on cold weather. For me, winter has been largely a non-issue because I have a heated garage at home and an underground parking spot at work. Winter is definitely the biggest con that I can think of about living in Madison. But between that and commuting 40 minutes each way (which ends up wasting five hours per week sitting in the car, compared to my 10-minute commute here), I would gladly take the former.

Flying from Madison is pretty good. It takes about 20 minutes to get to the airport from my house or the university in light traffic, and 30 minutes in regular to heavy traffic. I usually leave for a domestic flight 1 hour to 75 minutes before the scheduled departure time. The airport is pretty, and going through security is a breeze. Madison has direct flights to a whole range of cities (24 as of January 2020), including NYC, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Orlando, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, and more (see the complete list).