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McKinney, TX
McKinney's historic downtown square, built around its 1927 Collin County courthouse, has preserved a dense cluster of early-20th-century brick commercial buildings that now house restaurants, boutiques, and galleries — a walkable town center that's stood in deliberate contrast to the newer, car-oriented commercial development that's grown up around the city as the broader Dallas metro area has expanded northward. Money magazine named McKinney the number one "Best Place to Live in America" in 2014, a national ranking that brought the city significant attention and that local officials and real estate agents have continued to cite as validation of the city's combination of historic charm, strong schools, and comparatively affordable housing relative to closer-in Dallas suburbs. The city has grown rapidly over the past two decades even while working to preserve its historic square, expanding from roughly 55,000 residents in 2000 to well over 200,000 by the mid-2020s, making it one of the larger cities in the broader Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex despite still being commonly described as a "small town" because of its preserved historic core. McKinney's combination of a genuinely well-preserved historic downtown square, a nationally recognized "best place to live" ranking, and rapid population growth managed alongside historic preservation has made it one of the more frequently cited success stories among Dallas-area suburbs balancing growth against small-town character.
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Highland Park, TX
Highland Park is a fully independent municipality entirely surrounded by the city of Dallas, and it's consistently ranked among the wealthiest small towns in the entire state of Texas — a status the town has maintained since its founding in the early 20th century as a deliberately upscale, deed-restricted development built specifically to stay outside Dallas's own city limits and taxing authority. Highland Park Village, opened in 1931, is widely credited by architectural and retail historians as one of the first planned shopping centers built anywhere in the United States, designed in a unified Spanish Mediterranean style that's been preserved essentially intact for nearly a century and now houses a roster of high-end luxury retailers. The town sits directly adjacent to Southern Methodist University, and together with its twin municipality, University Park, forms what locals refer to collectively as "the Park Cities" — two small, independently governed towns that function almost as a single community despite maintaining entirely separate city governments, police departments, and school districts. Highland Park's combination of complete municipal independence from Dallas, one of the earliest planned shopping centers in American retail history, and consistently top-ranked schools has made it one of the most expensive and prestigious small-town addresses anywhere in Texas.
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