JudgeBear1845 said:
Good topic. It is actually kind of hard these days to find decent sized cities that aren't just suburbs and part of the larger metro area. Abilene is forever changing with the data centers going in. Problem with San Angelo is that part of Texas has a face only a mother could love. Tyler I think would be high on most people's list.
Some others that come to mind that I have not seen listed.
- Huntsville/Conroe area (although Conroe is close to becoming north Houston)
- New Braunfels/San Marcos area (although this area is becoming north San Antonio or south Austin)
- Victoria
- Although smaller than "medium", anything in the Granbury, Glen Rose, Stephenville area
What intersting about the smaller cities is that you can typically tell how good the local ecomony is by the quality of the shopping mall.
Almost all of the medium sized cities have one story malls, but some of them (Tyler, Midland, San Marcos outlet) are bustling and full of people and some of them (Wichita Falls, Texarkana, Shreveport) are barely hanging on and are mostly filled with barber shops and low end jewelry kiosk.