Moving to Arkansas comes with a consequence for most newcomers: Lippy friends from elsewhere suggest it’s crazy to move to such a place.
Arkansas? Why would you move to Arkansas?
This state gets a bad rap. After moving here 10 years ago from Missouri, The Guru can attest. Arkansas is way better than you might think it will be.
So, welcome to Arkansas, and specifically Northwest Arkansas.
But where exactly are you anyway? What in the world is this Northwest Arkansas place?
Northwest Arkansas has no official definition. Those who tell you exactly what it is geographically don’t know what they’re talking about.
Many people contend Northwest Arkansas is only Benton and Washington counties, but this newspaper’s Northwest Arkansas edition is distributed in a 12-county area that goes farther east than Harrison and farther south than Fort Smith.
The Guru favors the 12-county definition, if only because Fort Smith is more Northwest Arkansas than it is southwest Arkansas.
Now, Northwest Arkansas television anchors will mention a place called the “river valley” as a way to refer to Fort Smith and other towns along the Arkansas River, and they’ll distinguish it from Northwest Arkansas.
Let The Guru be clear: There is no such place as “the river valley.” After all, if a river wasn’t in a valley, wouldn’t it run up a hill?
So, The Guru declares, Fort Smith and the towns near it are part of Northwest Arkansas. Welcome, Clarksville, Paris and Ozark, to the place you’ve always been.
With that spelled out with all the specificity of a fuzzy line, there are a million other things to know about Northwest Arkansas. Newspapers can’t afford to print a million of anything, so The Guru will hit what should be useful tidbits.
- There are only three real highways in Northwest Arkansas: Interstate 40, I-540 and U.S. 412. Wannabe highways such as Arkansas 23, Arkansas 12 and Arkansas 16 are just paved city streets in rural areas with generous speed limits, sharp curves and school bus stops. Be careful.
- There are 20,000 chickens in each of those long silver things next to the rural city streets.
- People here don’t call interstates “the 5” or “the 405” like on the West Coast. It’s called I-540 or just “540.”
- I-540 is crazy busy from 7:08 a.m. to 8:36 a.m. going north in Benton and Washington counties, and from 4:36 to 6:07 p.m. going south on weekdays. And, the rush home arrives a bit earlier on Fridays.
- Rainbow Curve is the point on Walton Boulevard in Bentonville where westbound drivers bend around a sweeping, rainbow-shaped section of the road and go north. Walton Boulevard also is U.S. 71B.
- Most people here drink water from Beaver Lake. Be nice to it.
- Arkansas law allows inattentive motorists to chat for hours on cell phones, but it bans text messaging while driving because that’s dangerous. Go figure.
- Motorcycle riders don’t have to wear helmets here. Fayetteville is the site of one of the nation’s best motorcycle rallies called Bikes, Blues & BBQ, and many attendees wear helmets because it’s smart.
- Arkansas folks refer to notable Arkansans either by their first or last name but never both. In order of importance, they are Frank, Petrino, Mallett, Pelphrey, Beebe.
— Flight attendants announce time and time again that Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport is in Fayetteville when flights land. They lie. It’s 20 miles from Fayetteville in the tiny Benton County town of Highfill.
- Flight attendants don’t lie when they announce the Fort Smith Regional Airport’s location.
- The smell in Springdale comes from the chicken operations. Your shock will soon pass.
- U.S. 71B is the main north-south drag other than I-540, and it has a ton of names when it goes through the cities. It’s known as Main Avenue (Greenland), School Avenue and College Avenue (Fayetteville), Thompson Street (Springdale), Bloomington Street (Lowell), Eighth Street (Rogers) and Walton Boulevard (Bentonville).
m The Fulbright Expressway goes from just north of Fayetteville Executive Airport, Drake Field, to Northwest Arkansas Mall. However, most drivers think of the Fulbright Expressway as just the northern section of the expressway that links I-540 to U.S. 71B (College Avenue) in Fayetteville.
- People still will be talking about a future road known as the Bella Vista bypass after you’ve lived here for 10 years, too. It’s the region’s attempt to find a way to avoid driving U.S. 71 through Bella Vista on the way to Missouri.
- Some people want to make the Bella Vista bypass into the state’s first toll road.
- Herman’s is a dumpy-but-tasty steakhouse in Fayetteville.
- AQ is a chicken joint in Fayetteville and Springdale.
- Fred’s is short for Fred’s Hickory Inn in Bentonville. It’s great, too.
- Fayetteville has a fabulous biking/hiking trail from Lake Fayetteville to Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and beyond. The price is right, too — it’s free.
- Traffic isn’t as bad here as the mega-metropolitan area where you used to live, but you’ll soon complain about it here, too.
- The first time you see someone “call the Hogs,” you’ll think it’s stupid. Within a month, you’ll be raising your hands in the air and saying “Woo, pig sooie” just like all the other people. Loosen up. It’s fun.
m Many people here say, “Thank God for Mississippi” as a way to suggest Arkansas’ educational system is better than at least one state’s. It’s not funny. It’s dumb. Don’t repeat it.
Robert J. Smith, aka The Guru, writes on traffic and travel issues in Northwest Arkansas each Friday and Monday. For a transplant to the area, he knows a lot of other things about the region. He can be reached at [email protected] or nwanews.com/gridlockguru