u/larrybronze

Hi!

Family has grown to 4 and we desperately need to upgrade. I test drove the Grand Highlander and liked it, but one thing wasnt clear: in trims with Captain chairs, if we have child seats installed in the second row (specifically, the clek liing and foonf), is it possible to get into the third row? I saw that the captains chairs trims still have a center console in between them, and I couldn't tell if it would be possible to angle the second row seats forward enough to allow third row access when car seats are installed.

My wife and I are considering settling in Seattle with our 3.5-year-old daughter and infant son. My wife’s extended family is in the area, which is a major draw, and we’ve loved Seattle when we’ve visited. We currently live in Porter Square, Cambridge and love the cohesiveness of the neighborhood, the walkability, the cultural resources, and the progressive environment, but we struggle with how expensive it is and—relatedly—how much it feels like an affluent enclave for people in tech and academia.

We strongly prefer living in a "place for everyone" with meaningful socioeconomic breadth, strong but not viciously competitive public and private school options, walkability, and housing costs that give us some breathing room to save aggressively.

We've read lots of neighborhood guides and want to drill down on three questions:

1. How rampant is tech culture, really?
Cambridge is dominated by a few highly educated industries. We increasingly feel like everyone we encounter works in tech, medicine, or academia and that this has thinned the social fabric of the city. We don't want our kids to grow up in a sort of cocoon.

I don't mean that we dislike people who work in tech per se. But we're concerned about living in a place where a single affluent professional class has come to define the culture. I don't want to be talking about APIs or AI at every cookout.

2. To what extent is Seattle becoming an affluent enclave?

Seattle is obviously an expensive city, but not every expensive city feels the same. Do teachers, artists, nonprofit workers, service workers, civil servants and families without very high incomes still feel like part of the same neighborhoods and institutions? And are there certain neighborhoods where this is particularly the case?

3. How competitive is the culture for children who expect to attend college?
Our children are very young, so this is less a question about any particular school and more about the culture surrounding childhood and education.

Among families in Seattle’s stronger public-school neighborhoods—and in the independent-school world—how early does academic and college competition begin?s there a pervasive culture of tutoring, enrichment, résumé-building and jockeying for selective programs, or can academically motivated children receive a strong education without entering a pressure cooker?

We obviously want our kids to do well, but we don't want their childhoods organized around getting into the most selective possible university, especially if that means that nonstop extra tutoring, bullshit nonprofits that they found, etc. rob them of their childhoods.

My wife and I are considering settling in Philadelphia with our 3.5-year-old daughter and infant son. My close friend from home lives in West Philadelphia and I've loved your fair city every time I've visited. We currently live in Porter Square, Cambridge and love the cohesiveness of the neighborhood, the walkability, the cultural resources, and the progressive environment, but we struggle with how expensive it is and (relatedly) how it feels like an affluent enclave for people in tech and academia. We strongly prefer living in a "place for everyone" with meaningful socioeconomic breadth, accessible parks, strong public or private school options, walkability, and housing costs that give us the breathing room to save aggressively.

We've read lots of neighborhood guides and posts on reddit and I was wondering if we could drill down on two questions:

1. How miserable are the summers, really?
I dislike heat and humidity way more than I dislike winter. With young kids, how usable is ordinary outdoor life from June to September? Does the weather seriously constrict daily life? I realize it's not New Orleans ... but things are trending bad seemingly everywhere in this respect

2. How much does city-government dysfunction actually intrude on daily life?
I hear people describe Philadelphia government and public services as dysfunctional. How much of that is local gallows humor, and how much materially affects residents? Does this extend to schools, trash collection, street conditions, parks, SEPTA, and getting basic issues addressed? And does it uniformly affect the city or only certain neighborhoods? I've spent a lot of time in poorly governed cities and in cities that feel well governed and have found that this makes a big difference.

I'm renting a 2026 Platinum*. Every time I turn on the car and put it into gear I see this:

https://preview.redd.it/3qhll94p5g8h1.png?width=1143&format=png&auto=webp&s=9ac9ad8f0682d6421e5ca7c6ff7f721d62811836

I can disable it temporarily by hitting 'ok', but I'm a bit confused. In the situation pictured, no one is in the front passenger seat, my daughter is in a car seat installed using the vehicle belt in the passenger side captains chair, there is no one seated in the third row, and in the seat directly behind the driver I have the base of an infant car seat, which is installed using only the rigid LATCH system.

My questions are:

1. Why do I get this alert for the third row when no one is seated there? If humans are sitting there unbuckled, I would like this alert to sound, and when no one is there, I would *NOT* like it to sound.

2. how do I disable the alert for the captain's chair behind the driver's seat, since that car seat base does not use the belt? I'm assuming that is why it's sounding

_____

*incidentally, I'm renting from the dealer directly, which did not realize was a thing. Highly recommended! Saved a LOT relative to Turo options in the area both in terms of $ and having to drive out to bumbleF to fetch the vehicle.

My wife and I are trying to decide where to settle with our 3.5 yo daughter and infant son. We currently live near Porter Square in Cambridge, MA, and love much of our daily life here:

• cohesive, family-oriented neighborhood
• walkability and easy errands
• libraries, universities, cultural resources, parks and cafes
• progressive local culture

But we struggle with Cambridge’s cost, the amount and quality of space available for the money, and the increasing sense that it is becoming (or has bcome) an affluent enclave for people in tech and academia. We'd strongly prefer to live in an area or city that feels like a "place for everyone".

We are looking for a safe, progressive, diverse, family-oriented urban neighborhood or walkable inner-ring suburb. We do not want an isolated, car-dependent suburb.

Other priorities:

• my wife is an academic, so a strong university, humanities, library, museum or cultural ecosystem
• meaningful socioeconomic breadth; not necessarily a cheap neighborhood, but not a luxury enclave
• good environment for children: parks, neighborhood friends, independence, extracurriculars and strong education without an extreme pressure-cooker environment
• excellent public schools OR access to independent private schools with strong college placement that are not impossible to get into
• housing costs that leave room for us to save aggressively
• on climate -- my wife hates long, bitter winters, which I don't mind; I hate high heat and humidity, which she doesn't mind. 😒

Our current, very editable shortlist:

• Seattle. Wife's extended family.
• Philadelphia. My best friend + many of our friends are on the eastern seabord
• Chicago. Just seems like a place that rules.
• Cambridge/Boston. Maybe we should just stay?
• Cleveland. We're both from here. Cheap as F.

Would love to hear if folks have found some version of this combination ... I realize it's kind of a unicorn. Firsthand experiences on these specific places would be great too. Thanks!

Between that, the possibility of Watson starting, and the team fleecing the city, I'm struggling