This is a question I ask myself a lot. This is some data and code to try and figure out which places I would like to live. Here are some criteria.

• Moderate Population

  • I've always lived in smallish cities and towns, I don't think I would like to live somewhere with less than 800k people, but also not somewhere so big as to make the cost of living super high. A happy medium. Maybe between 1-3 million people in a combined area would be good.

• Close To A Body Of Water

  • Like most people I love bodies of water, a lake, river, or the ocean is a very desireable quality. Preferable near enough to visit with a bike ride or public transit. If the city is weaved around the body of water that is even better!

• Close To Mountains / Valleys

  • I also really like mountains, hills, and valleys and cliffs. It gives this sense of protection or security. Mountains can be further away from the city than a body of water, but even if there are no mountains a place with sharp or dramatic changes in elevation can be great if the city is very close to them.

• Lots Of Greenery

  • The desert is beautiful and striking, and I love to visit, but for my home I prefer woods, vines, and lots of plants and flowers and grass. I love places where it's a constant battle to keep vines from covering my windows.

• Cool / Cold Weather

  • Places where the temperature rarely goes above 80 are ideal. An average temperature around 65 in the summer and nice and cold with plenty of snow in the winter would be perfect.

• US CSA Population Estimates

  • I've found Combined Statistical Area population figures to be a very good indicator of how big a city will "feel". Since many metropolitan areas have multiple cities, towns, and suburbs that all feed together into usually one economic focal point that will be where most of the large buildings, infrastructure, shopping, and business takes place. Practically what this means is that if you like how "big" a city is, looking at other cities with similar CSA populations will usually give you the same "feel".
  • In conjuction with this data use CBSA Delineation Files to break down location data further.

• USGS TNM

  • A dense resource for many kinds of GIS data that can be searched filtered and sometimes previewed on a the map. Great for finding elevation, land coverage, transportation, and tons of other geographic data.
  • Alongside this resource I've found the Producer Field Guide to be a great resource for learning more about GIS data, how it's commonly structured, and how to use it.
  • One more useful link is the Library of Congress GIS Formats page. They have nice high level descriptions of many of the common GIS data file formats and even some information on how to use them.