Single in the City
Totally peculiar reasons why Dallas and other Texas cities are hotbeds for singles
While happy couples plot their fancy dinners and buy overpriced undergarments for Valentine’s Day, one national pub is celebrating the best places in America for the un-coupled.
Travel+Leisure recently unleashed a listicle about the best American cities for singles, with info gleaned from America’s Favorite Places survey. T+L asked readers to rank 38 cities on dozens of indicators, including attractive locals, cool shopping destinations and hipster coffee bars. Because hipster coffee bars are total meet markets.
According to T+L, the winning cities “excel in the off-hours, ranking highly for nightclubs, dive bars and even great diners, where you might lock eyes with someone over a late-night order of fries.” Singles-friendly cities also put creative spins on conventional meet-up spots, with monthly happy hours at art museums, trivia nights and bars with video games. (Clearly those T+L editors missed this and this.)
The trick in Dallas — No. 14 out of 20 — it seems, is to not just act above it all but be above it all. (Note to T+L, it’s Greenville Avenue, not Boulevard. But we’re splitting hairs.)
These Texans attracted readers with their well-heeled fashion sense. They also made a big impression for brunch, which was rated highly — to understand why, sample fried egg, bacon, and Gruyère sandwiches, paired with Bellinis, at The Libertine Bar, on happening Lower Greenville Boulevard. While Dallas natives did strike some readers as snobby, you too can feel above it all, literally, at the GeO-Deck on top of the city’s iconic Reunion Tower; 50 stories up, you can share the views with other singles from the revolving bar at Wolfgang Puck’s Asian-flavored Five Sixty.
T+L makes an equally strange argument for No. 2 Houston, which “landed near the top for both its decadent barbecue and world-class art.” A more plausible explanation might be H-Town’s excelling in the wine bar category, thanks to places like La Carafe and Public Services Wine and Whisky.
A list is not a list unless Austin is on it, and the No. 4 city for singles can credit its hipster population — aka “bearded Peter Pan types” — for its ranking. Apparently dive bars and food trucks are hot singles scenes, which is news to those who actually live there.
Miami is the country’s top city for singles, BTW. Rounding out the top five are New Orleans (No. 3) and Atlanta (No. 5).
