When I graduated high school in 2002, I was ready to go as far away from Chattanooga as possible. It was a common sentiment among my peers – though they seem to have changed their opinions in the same way I did.
When I moved back from Boulder, Colorado, in 2007, seeing the city with fresh eyes allowed me to see its potential. The far lower cost of living was a perk, as were the job opportunities that come with knowing what feels like everyone in town. That small-town feel also makes this mid-sized urban area feel welcoming, whether you grew up here or not.
From 2010 to 2018, Chattanooga’s population growth outpaced that of Tennessee’s next-largest city, Knoxville – where many Chattanoogans move for college – according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Many former Chattanoogans, including those we interviewed for this story, returned around the same time that EPB started offering fiber optic network service in 2009, providing internet access to homes at speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second, at the time the fastest internet speed in the country. This earned Chattanooga its “Gig City” nickname and has helped to lure technology-based startups looking to benefit from the gig economy.
Former residents, particularly millennials like myself, are drawn back to Chattanooga to take advantage of those opportunities and rediscover the city’s charm, which is more abundantly evident thanks to hip new areas such as the Southside that most people could not have imagined back in the ’90s or early 2000s.
So, all you parents who are soon to become empty-nesters, you may want to hold off on converting your high school grad’s bedroom into your new gym or home office space. They may be back sooner than you think.