woohoo chaska!!!
CNN money just released their list of the 100 best places to live in the nation for 2007, and, holy crap, my hometown made the top 10!!!!!
8. Chaska, Minn.
Population: 22,500
Typical single-family home: $275,000
Estimated property taxes: $3,100
Pros: Quality jobs, a beautiful setting
Cons: Winter; highway expansion will spur growth
Chaska has beauty. It's one of the more rural towns on our list, and its small 19th-century downtown quickly yields to open fields, farmland and the Minnesota river. And it has brains too. More than a dozen technology and biotech firms are based in 600 acres of corporate office parks near Chaska's northern border, and the city, 25 miles southwest of Minneapolis, was the first in the country to offer low-cost wi-fi access to residents.
It's no wonder the town is a magnet for families, who can find reasonably priced homes, low taxes and quality schools. Chaska's population has nearly doubled to almost 23,000 since 1990. So far that growth hasn't detracted from its small-town charm. Summer band concerts still take place every Friday night in the city Square Park gazebo, as they have for more than 100 years. Shops, restaurants and businesses line the main street, where almost all of the buildings are constructed with yellowish bricks made from Chaska clay. Downtown stops at the river, where a trail system extends in both directions and connects to the more than 40 miles of pathways that wind through the community. "We love all the open space," says Sid Kudige, 29, a software developer who moved to Chaska with his wife Navya, 27, three years ago to buy their first home.
With no highway direct to Minneapolis/St. Paul, Chaska is a bit isolated from Twin City sprawl. That's about to change. A highway expansion next summer will turn the town's main artery to the Twin Cities from a two-lane road to a four-lane divided highway. Travel time to Minneapolis will be cut in half, to 30 minutes. The downside: Chaska officials expect the town's population to increase 50% in 15 years. "It's a growing community, but it still has the same feel from when I grew up," says John Born, 36, a middle school teacher who has stayed to raise his family here. "The challenge will be keeping it that way."
check out the rest of the article here:
http://finance.yahoo.com/real-estate/article/103225/Best-Places-to-Live