There’s no denying it: there are plenty of places in South Dakota that are downright beautiful and full of excitement.
Unfortunately, not all towns and cities in SD are so lucky.
Just like in all U.S. States, there are definitely some boring places within South Dakota’s borders. You know the places: the ones where everyone has an AARP card and the most exciting thing they do all day is post a picture of their grandchild on Facebook.
Like Custer, for instance. In our latest analysis, we found that this city was the most boring city in all of South Dakota. But don’t feel bad if you’re a resident of Custer. There are plenty of other boring, lackluster places in South Dakota as well.
Here they are. Try not to jump out of your seat with excitement:
- Custer
- Milbank
- Redfield
- Winner
- Hot Springs
- Lead
- Elk Point
- Chamberlain
- Canton
- Flandreau
Before you get all upset if your city’s name is on the list, rest assured that we didn’t use personal opinion when it comes to what classifies a city or town as “boring” or “exciting”. We crunched actual numbers to figure out which towns are statistically more boring.
By the way, where are the most exciting cities in South Dakota? Those would be Vermillion, Brookings, Sioux Falls, Madison and Aberdeen. That sounds about right.
How we determined the boring cities in the Mount Rushmore State
To figure out how boring a place is, we rely on a complex algorithm that factors in things we generally think make people exciting, and then we figure out which cities have the least number of those exciting people. We used the U.S. Census data to gather the information. Here are some of the things people tend to think of as making a city’s population boring:
- % of Population Over 35 (higher is more boring)
- % of Married Household (higher is more boring)
- Average Age (higher is more boring)
- % of Households With Kids (higher is more boring)
- % of Households with People Over 65 (higher is more boring)
- Population density (lower is more boring)
Then, our algorithm generates several lists of the cities that have plenty of residents with high rankings in all of these categories. After a crunching of the numbers, a list of all of the cities magically appears listing them from most boring to most exciting.
For this list, we used every South Dakota city that qualified for our rankings based on having a population of at least 2,000 residents. This keeps us from prejudicing our rankings by including very small pockets of retired people.
Grab your rocker and hold on.
1. Custer
Population: 2,188
Average Age: 43.5
Married Households: 49.1%
Households With Kids: 27.7%
2. Milbank
Population: 3,326
Average Age: 44.0
Married Households: 55.0%
Households With Kids: 23.7%
3. Redfield
Population: 2,480
Average Age: 47.0
Married Households: 50.7%
Households With Kids: 27.7%
4. Winner
Population: 2,882
Average Age: 40.8
Married Households: 46.9%
Households With Kids: 33.8%
5. Hot Springs
Population: 3,618
Average Age: 49.8
Married Households: 36.4%
Households With Kids: 22.2%
6. Lead
Population: 3,113
Average Age: 43.8
Married Households: 51.4%
Households With Kids: 28.3%
7. Elk Point
Population: 2,156
Average Age: 39.0
Married Households: 54.4%
Households With Kids: 35.1%
8. Chamberlain
Population: 2,875
Average Age: 36.7
Married Households: 47.3%
Households With Kids: 33.1%
9. Canton
Population: 3,159
Average Age: 43.2
Married Households: 50.1%
Households With Kids: 28.1%
10. Flandreau
Population: 2,180
Average Age: 39.8
Married Households: 47.6%
Households With Kids: 32.1%
Now That You’re Asleep
On a list like this, there are usually no winners, but since South Dakota isn’t necessarily the most boring state in the United States (barely), the cities on this list can at least take solace that there are, in fact, more boring cities in the country.
Just not these places.
Detailed List Of Boring to Exciting Cities In South Dakota
City | Rank |
---|---|
Custer | 1 |
Milbank | 2 |
Redfield | 3 |
Winner | 4 |
Hot Springs | 5 |
Lead | 6 |
Elk Point | 7 |
Chamberlain | 8 |
Canton | 9 |
Flandreau | 10 |
Pierre | 11 |
Fort Pierre | 12 |
Belle Fourche | 13 |
Mobridge | 14 |
Beresford | 15 |
Sturgis | 16 |
Hartford | 17 |
Lennox | 18 |
Mitchell | 19 |
Summerset | 20 |
Huron | 21 |
Dell Rapids | 22 |
Yankton | 23 |
Box Elder | 24 |
North Sioux City | 25 |
Sisseton | 26 |
Watertown | 27 |
Brandon | 28 |
Rapid City | 29 |
Spearfish | 30 |
Harrisburg | 31 |
Volga | 32 |
Tea | 33 |
Aberdeen | 34 |
Madison | 35 |
Sioux Falls | 36 |
Brookings | 37 |
Vermillion | 38 |