America's Best Places to Live 2008

No. 4: Irvine, Calif.

Courtesy: City of Irvine

Population: 194,000

Miles from Los Angeles: 36

Green space: One-third of the city

Sunny days per year: 280

Pros: Topnotch schools, great weather, lots of green space

Con: High home prices

Long before developers embraced the idea of mixed-use communities where residents could live, work and play, there was Irvine. Born in the 1960s, when the University of California commissioned architect William Pereira to design a new campus and town, “it was one of the first of the large planned communities that offered residents more than just a house and a yard,” says Jerold Kayden, a professor of urban planning and design at Harvard University.

Today, Irvine’s population hovers around 200,000, yet it feels much smaller thanks to its tight-knit neighborhoods and more than 16,000 acres of green space. From their house here, Megan and Brent Gess and their daughters, Emily, 10, Natalie, 7, and Lily, 4, can walk to six different parks. “Most neighborhoods have their own pools, swim teams and recreation programs,” says Megan, 34, a mergers-and-acquisitions attorney. “It makes for very close communities.”

Families say Irvine is pretty close to perfect. The school district has won national recognition, and not just because of stellar test scores. Innovative curriculums, year-round schedules and open-style classrooms all win kudos. “Education is a high priority here,” says Brent, 37, an intellectual-property attorney. “We’re surrounded by a lot of very smart people”—in part because the university is the city’s largest employer. Some two dozen international companies, from Gateway to St. John’s Knits, also call Irvine home.

One drawback—and it’s a big one—is the cost of housing. While median prices have fallen nearly 19% since the 2006 market peak, a typical three-bedroom, two-bath house still runs about $700,000, says Cesi Pagano, a realtor with Keller Williams Realty. But prices in Irvine have held up better than those elsewhere in Orange County, and foreclosures aren’t nearly as widespread.

No. 5: Franklin Township, N.J.

Courtesy: Township of Franklin

Population: 59,200

Miles from New York City: 33

Green space: 11,930 acres

Typical single-family home: $385,000

Pros: Natural beauty, diversity, affordability

Con: High taxes

When you hear the phrase “primeval old-growth forest,” chances are New Jersey doesn’t spring immediately to mind. But the state known for jokes about its mammoth turnpike does in fact boast such a pristine wilderness: a 65-acre one. In Franklin Township. This surprising 46-square-mile municipality, home to several different villages, also contains a towpath along a 19th-century canal beloved by bikers and runners, and bucolic back roads dotted with colonial houses and working farms. “The other day I saw a fox in my backyard,” says Angela Wen-Bianchi, 37, a full-time mother who moved here in 1998. Is this place really just an hour from Manhattan?

Residents can catch a train to New York City in neighboring New Brunswick, which also has good restaurants and theaters, but they need not head to the big city to find jobs. There are plenty of high-tech, pharmaceutical and research and development firms in the area, not to mention Princeton just to the south and Rutgers and Robert Wood Johnson Medical School to the north. What’s more, housing is a deal—for this part of the country, anyway. Starter homes go for less than $250,000 in Somerset (the neighborhood closest to Manhattan); a lovely Cape Cod on nearly an acre in the verdant historical village of Griggstown recently listed for $369,500. And the solid school system has a 95% graduation rate.

On the downside, New Jersey’s tax burden is notoriously high. The township’s property taxes run about $7,000 for the typical $385,000 three-bedrooom, two-bath house. Still, for overall affordability, convenience and natural beauty, as well as remarkable economic, religious and ethnic diversity, nowhere else in Jersey—and few places anywhere—can match it.

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