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Finally - A positive perspective on small town living. When I read the stories of big city lifestyles I'm amazed so many people opt-in to it. Traffic, noise, c

Finally - A positive perspective on small town living. When I read the stories of big city lifestyles I'm amazed so many people opt-in to it. Traffic, noise, concrete everywhere. Yuck - but to each their own. I'll take my country life as a remote worker going on 8 years. Trees, forest, wildlife, fresh air, backyards. 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. Everyone knows each other. Very tight knit community. Don't even get me started on cost of living differences. I'll never leave. Remote work really levels the playing field and unlocks a lot of potential for rural and small towns. All happening at a time when the staple of resource extraction is declining but global connectivity is increasing. There may be a bright future for small towns yet.

1337biz 8y ago
> Everyone knows each other. Very tight knit community. That's my main problem with it. Grew up in a small city and this was exactly the case. In a big city I can pick the people I want to deal with, in a small town this is inpossible without creating tensions.
- tylerjwilk00 8y ago
  I totally grok the desire for anon when living in a small town especially when I was younger. There is a social pressure that can be suffocating. I can't imagine the pressures of village or tribe life thousands of years ago. As I got older and relaxed this mostly went away. Such is life.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - lotsofpulp 8y ago
    It’s easy to be relaxed when the financial pressures have been lifted. But if you need your community to survive (e.g. LGBT in conservative small towns), that’s not fixable.
3pt14159 8y ago
The hard part, at least here in Ontario, is this: > 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. Almost every small town in Ontario is car-centric. The big ugly parking lots push the shops further from the street. There is no bike lanes to speak of. The coffee shops don't feel lively, they feel depressed, and the coffee is usually Tim Hortons or worse. What I want is a hipster small town, built around bikes and walkability. Close enough to a lake to be fun, but not so close to make it all about "water life". I want a city where artists and computer scientists can both afford to be there. High property taxes, but with a per-person dividend / basic income so the effective property taxes are progressive.
- noelwelsh 8y ago
  Don't we all! I don't think those places exist. Berlin might be the closest. It's big but easy to get around by bike or public transport, and the cost of living isn't that high, though it's climbing. Everywhere else I can think of (mostly considering the US or UK) is already expensive. I visited recently, and if I was single I'd strongly consider moving there.
- metamicah 8y ago
  Your desire for a "hipster small town, built around bikes and walkability" describes the cores of a lot of college towns: Olympia, Missoula, Boise, Eugene, Arcata, Davis, Bozeman, etc. They all have good coffee, too! Not sure if there are similar towns in Canada. However, a common lament in these towns is that housing costs are increasing as people move there from the cities. It can be... socially awkward... to be a carpetbagger in a place where everyone knows everyone else's story. Maybe that's why you've mentioned taxes and basic income in your comment.
  - dragant 8y ago
    100% agree! I would also add Ann Arbor, Michigan to the mix. These "small towns" have wonderfully integrated colleges into the small town such that there are positive benefits for both including good schools and things to do...what many "freelancers" with kids want.
jacobmoe 8y ago
Not trying to start a "town vs city" argument - to each their own, as you said - but I think people who don't live in big cities misunderstand what life is like there. In NYC you hear tourists say "I could never live here". The thing is, as someone who lives in New York, I also could never live here, if _here_ is Times Square or some other tourist hotspot. Cities are just collections of neighborhoods. In your neighborhood you recognize your neighbors and feel the same community spirit you would in any town. The difference is that you can get on a subway or bus and see people or have experiences that would require a trip to the airport somewhere else. But the real thing I love about city life are the opportunities you have every day to come into contact with people who are different than you. Going for a jog in the winter through a Hasidic neighborhood, an elderly man in a wheelchair is stuck in the snow, so I help him get to temple. A woman with a cane who has clearly had a very different life than me needs a seat on the subway, we make eye contact and I get up for her, she says thank you and I say no trouble. These small unavoidable collisions every day really do have an impact on how you see the world.
- b_b 8y ago
  This is especially poignant in NYC, given the density and diversity of life here. Sometimes I think the NYC subway only seems fast because life changes so rapidly from city block to block that it seems like you've arrived in an entirely new place.
  - rch 8y ago
    Unless the uptown C is delayed again, then you're just late.
- rbyrne 8y ago
  I second this. I grew up in the NYC suburbs, have went to school and lived in various boroughs of NYC for the past 10+ years, and my wife was born and raised in NYC. I think most people not from here (and perhaps 'here' can be any big city one may just pass through when visiting in this context I guess) seem to forget it's as you say just a collection of small neighborhoods just like anywhere else. I am sure there is an exception (maybe Midtown Manhattan but) - but for the most part I think most people know their neighbors, help each other out, see the same people around when they got to a bar or get coffee, go to the same parks in their neighborhood - all the same things people think you may miss out on vs living in 'small towns.'
kel92ndjd 8y ago
Guess it depends on the city We know 70% of the neighbors on our street and a number of them one block either direction via block parties and having kids the same age in the elem school 6 blocks away. We walk/bike to the grocery store and only drive to get out to a mountain areas (hour away) Not so bad if you pick the right city
addicted 8y ago
People have been talking about remote work “leveling the playing field” for a while, but the statistics show the opposite. More people have been moving into cities since remote work has become possible than the opposite. It’s possible this may be because as our work lives become more lonely due to it being remote, cities offer the availability of people that they lack in their day jobs. Also, the reason cities are expensive is entirely due to the number of people wanting to live there. Setting aside housing demand/supply, cities are more efficient and cheaper than small towns by far. It would be interesting to see how livable small and rural towns would be if it wasn’t for the variety of subsidies the US government offers these areas (subsidized postal services, roads, etc. that are largely paid by people living in cities in the US, where the majority of the economic benefits of the US are generated).
- randomdata 8y ago
  > More people have been moving into cities Not so much in Canada. Small towns (1,000 to 29,999 people) are the fastest growing community type. Large cities (100,000+ people) have lost share of the population. The definition of urban is "a population of at least 1,000 and a density of 400 or more people per square kilometre", so you might hear that urbanization continues (which is true, the rural population shrunk by about the same rate as cities), but that doesn't mean the people are moving into cities.
  - xvedejas 8y ago
    Canada is very different from the US in this regard, so it's important to consider both distinctly. Canada never had the same mass-exodus of the middle class from their cities, so the economic demographics are all very different from those of American cities. Maybe these two sets of cities are growing to become more like each other?
    - herge 8y ago
      Really? There are no suburbs in Canada? There were sure a lot of poor neighborhoods in Montréal near the downtown core in the 60's and a lot of residential development on the South Shore and the West Island.
moorhosj 8y ago
“I'll take my country life as a remote worker going on 8 years. Trees, forest, wildlife, fresh air, backyards. 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks.” My neighborhood in Chicago has all of these things and I can walk to the train for work every day.
- maccard 8y ago
  And my neighbourhood in Edinburgh has all of that too, with a 20 minute walk to my office
  - walshemj 8y ago
    I recall when I worked for a while in Edinburgh a 20 min walk from princess st was considered out in the boon docks.
alxlaz 8y ago
There are ups and downs to any of these, and various people like them (or hate them) for very diverse reasons. My mother is from one of these small towns and she hates almost every single thing you enumerated: - - "Everyone knows each other" is a nightmare when you're a teenager. News that you did something stupid or peculiar can sometimes get home before you do, sometimes amplified. And if you don't want to be that close to everyone, you can end up being treated as a freak. - Trees, forest, wildlife, backyards -- also the occasional possibly rabid fox, bugs everywhere, sweeping the leaves... - Five minutes walk or one minute drive to shop for groceries. If they're out of ketchup, tough luck 'cause the nearest one is thirty minutes away and you have to cross the railroad tracks, too. To those of us who live in the city, these things don't look bad at all. I'd certainly endure my share of bugs and give up the night life (at least for a while...) for some damn fresh air and being able to see more than five trees at a time. But the allure of large cities for people who grew up in small towns isn't worth understating, either. (Edit: to be clear -- I'm definitely not advocating for large cities. I was born and grew up in one so I definitely understand where you're coming from :-D)
- ivm 8y ago
  You are describing a really small town and a Northern American one. Larger ones (≈100k pop.) don't have these problems and tiny ones (≈3-10k pop.) in Europe, Asia or Latin America usually have multiple stores in a walkable range.
  - alxlaz 8y ago
    I'm describing a European town with more than 20k people (albeit only slightly). Edit: certainly a slightly larger city (50k-100k) is better but the parent comment was about country life, hence my comment
    - ivm 8y ago
      It's strange for me because I lived in a 1.5k town on Balkans that had two stores and a tiny open market. The bigger one was a chain store, so it always had everything. In Chile we have lots of stores and services even in quite poor 10-20k towns.
cletus 8y ago
I'm glad you've found something that works for you (really!) but you're cherry-picking. The key problem is this: > 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. This might be true for you but that's probably because your income is much higher than the median where you live such that you can afford just off Main St is whatever qualifies as central where you live. By definition not everyone can do that. And I say by definition because: - Average walking speed is about 5 feet per second - 5 minutes to just one of the destinations you mention puts you at at radius of 1500 feet - The average supermarket size is, say, 40,000 square feet [1] - Let's assume an entry on each side and a square footprint of 200x200. That doesn't include parking - It seems ~150 parking spaces per acre is a good estimate [2], putting the space for each at roughly 300 square feet - I can't find any stats or the average number of parking spaces for a supermarket so let's go with 100 for 30,000 square feet bringing out supermarket footprint to 70,000 - Assuming these things are circular (best case) and you can walk in straight lines (best case) the radius of the store is 112 feet. The parking lot eats another 38 feet of that - So the circle for being within 5 minutes is 112 feet + 1500 feet - 70,000 square feet, which we'll call ~8 million square feet. - Average lot sizes are harder to figure out. There's data like this [3] but that includes cities. Even in big cities like Atlanta or Kansas City you can see lot sizes over an acre. - There is also things you need to roads, (more) parking spaces and so on so probably a better way to approach this is houses per acre [4]. Based on medians of 24 acres and 60 housing units, that puts the average house footprint (including ancillary services) at ~18,000 square feet. I actually think that's rather generous too as the figures were for a subdivision. Small towns (with the possible exception of older towns such as what you have in New England) will probably have higher average house footprints. - That means within our circle we have ~440 houses. - According to the 2010 census, the average was 2.58 people per household [5] - So ~1100 people get to walk to the supermarket in 5 minutes. - So with 10,000 people, only 1 in 9 has this lifestyle. - That's just one your points of interest (the market). Add in restaurants, parks and the other things you mentioned and it gets a lot worse very quickly. My point here is that you are in a privileged position and your characterization of "small town life" is unrepresentative. Most people will have to drive everywhere. Now granted traffic probably won't be as bad as say LA or Chicago. My point is that being able to walk everywhere in a small town (in the USA at least) is highly unusual, not remotely representative and highly privileged (locally speaking). [1]: http://time.com/money/136330/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon-be-cut-in-half/ http://time.com/money/136330/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon... [2]: https://ag.tennessee.edu/cpa/Information%20Sheets/CPA%20222.pdf https://ag.tennessee.edu/cpa/Information%20Sheets/CPA%20222.... [3]: http://eyeonhousing.org/2016/07/lots-in-2015-are-smallest-on-record/ http://eyeonhousing.org/2016/07/lots-in-2015-are-smallest-on... [4]: https://www.nahb.org/en/research/housing-economics/special-studies/typical-american-subdivisions-2014.aspx https://www.nahb.org/en/research/housing-economics/special-s... [5]: https://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-14.pdf https://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-14.pdf
badrabbit 8y ago
Some of us don't feel comfortable if everyone knows each other. I don't know my neighbors and I like it that way. I have more options for stores,etc... More services are available in big cities too. More banking options,more car repair places,more grocery shops and placss of entertainment. There are nice parks if I want trees,or I could just drive out of the city on the weekend. I'm just saying, everyone has their own priorities.
bytematic 8y ago
5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop? Must not be the US.
ahoy 8y ago
5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. I've never lived in, or even seen, a small town in america where this was possible.
- yellowcherry 8y ago
  I'm living in a small town right this moment where is is all possible. Toss in a library, a bar, a couple barbers, and a fresh bakery too.
  - anothergoogler 8y ago
    Interesting that you bring up the library -- when it comes to small towns, the library is the deal breaker for me. They usually have thin, dated collections.
    - phil21 8y ago
      Most (in my state - MN - which I do believe is known as one of the better ones) state library systems are networked, for this reason. Simply reserve a book you want and it will show up on the weekly van delivery. I spent a few years growing up in a ridiculously small town where we'd have to drive to the next town over to check out books - and I never missed anything I wanted to read, just had to plan ahead a little.
      - anothergoogler 8y ago
        That might work if you know what you want already, you're still out of luck for browsing though. And even if you know what you want, they might deliver you the busted copy that's all highlighted and underlined ;)
- krisroadruck 8y ago
  Keene, NH. About 20-30K people total. Walkable and all amenities available.
tjr225 8y ago
These kinda of comments seem to be growing in frequency on HN. Why? Who cares what decisions people make? I've lived on acreage in the woods, small towns, suburbs, mid sized cities and urban environments and guess what? The only thing I've learned is that each has pros and cons and that every time I've said I would "never" live in one of those situations again I was surprised when I chose to do that very thing. Why limit your lifestyle options with arbitrary mental boxes? Maybe I'm just getting tired of reading strangers opinions on the internet, it seems like a waste of mental energy...but as you say- "To each their own"
rbanffy 8y ago
I grew up in São Paulo. Then I moved to Dublin, Ireland (which is, compared to São Paulo, tiny, but, with over a million people living here, shouldn't be called a small town). I now live in a quiet and walkable city. Have a huge shared backyard where kids in the neighborhood play. We all know each other, we have Whatsapp groups for the neighborhood (wives created one, husbands, half-jokingly, created another to keep a balance of power). I almost never have to use a car. We have only one. I never considered moving to a smaller city, but, really, I can see the appeal of not living between tall buildings, with sirens, beeps, engines and the constant hum of large city. I'm now in San Francisco (for the week) and the constant noise is already getting on my nerves again (happens every time I come here - I'll be cranky for 3 days or so - and, mind you, I've been living in Dublin for only two years and grew up in São Paulo).
k__ 8y ago
I got both. Living in one of the big cities in Germany, but on the outta rim of it. 10min walk and I'm in the forrest, 10min subway and I'm in the city center.
paganel 8y ago
I’m writing this comment from a small village close to the Carpathians, where my brother lives and where my family on my father’s side has lived for generations (half of the land on which the village’s church was built was “donated” by my family), I for my self live in a city with a population of 2 million people. As such, I just wanted to comment on the “everybody knows everybody else in a small town/village” and the implicit assumption that that would only cause “positive” feelings. It doesn’t. Back to my brother: he has been through a nasty divorce (divorces also happen in small towns/villages) and as such half of the village (the one who “listened” to his ex-parents-in-law) now think that he (my brother) is the scum of the earth. That isn’t good at all for my brother’s psyche. Also, my brother happens to be better at what he does (driving a lorry all over Europe for a living and in his free time raising a couple of cows and making some pretty good palinka-like drink) compared to some other villagers, and because of that those villagers sort of envy him, so much so that some of them have directly approached my brother’s new life companion and have told her about how in fact my brother is a not that big of a deal because he hasn’t accomplished this and that and that other thing. And I could go on and on with examples like these, all of which haven’t directly affected me while living in the big city: “My neighbor thinks bad of me? F.ck him, I don’t care what he thinks!”. The quiet and calmness is pretty nice in the village though, of that there’s no doubt.
phil21 8y ago
> 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. Yes, this sounds amazing. In fact you've just described exactly what (most) in the big city enjoy about it. You also described a vanishingly small amount of American small towns. Most are much more akin to suburbs, which to me is the absolutely worst form of living yet invented. I completely understand those who want to live in small towns/rural area around nature. I completely understand those who want to live in a big city with big city conveniences. I simply do not understand those who want to live in between.
sneak 8y ago
Driving is wasteful, dangerous, expensive, and toxic.
programmarchy 8y ago
I live in a small town, work remotely for the most part, and love it. In my town, the number of people who work remotely is steadily increasing. The remote workers tend to have higher incomes which brings in more resources to the town, but also creates some divisions. For example, there’s a “yuppie” coffee shop and a “hippie” coffee shop. They’re both great, but there’s a noticeable cultural divide and some animosity on both ends. People who have been here their whole lives are starting to get priced out of the area, and they’re understandably leery of non locals. We’ve already had long time businesses shut down because they couldn’t afford rising rents. There’s a vocal group who are very much against new developments that would taint the old charm and probably raise prices. Our town is actually pretty progressive though, and is already investing in low cost housing, but I doubt that’ll be enough. I see a bright future ahead for our small town, but managing the growth without losing our sense of history and community is going to be difficult.
the_gastropod 8y ago
> I'll take my country life as a remote worker going on 8 years. Trees, forest, wildlife, fresh air, backyards. 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. If you don't mind a bit of privacy invasion, what city/town do you live in? One of the biggest reasons I live in a big city is that I like being able to take a 5 minute walk to get to anything I need. Stereotypical suburbs/rural areas are primarily built for cars, not pedestrians/cyclists.
mixmastamyk 8y ago
I like your take in general, but these two phrases don't quite go together: > Trees, forest, wildlife, fresh air, backyards. 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to… Guessing that the number of places in the middle of a forest with a five minute walk to spectacular shopping are quite rare.

1337biz 8y ago

> Everyone knows each other. Very tight knit community. That's my main problem with it. Grew up in a small city and this was exactly the case. In a big city I can pick the people I want to deal with, in a small town this is inpossible without creating tensions.

tylerjwilk00 8y ago
I totally grok the desire for anon when living in a small town especially when I was younger. There is a social pressure that can be suffocating. I can't imagine the pressures of village or tribe life thousands of years ago. As I got older and relaxed this mostly went away. Such is life.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- lotsofpulp 8y ago
  It’s easy to be relaxed when the financial pressures have been lifted. But if you need your community to survive (e.g. LGBT in conservative small towns), that’s not fixable.

3pt14159 8y ago

The hard part, at least here in Ontario, is this: > 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. Almost every small town in Ontario is car-centric. The big ugly parking lots push the shops further from the street. There is no bike lanes to speak of. The coffee shops don't feel lively, they feel depressed, and the coffee is usually Tim Hortons or worse. What I want is a hipster small town, built around bikes and walkability. Close enough to a lake to be fun, but not so close to make it all about "water life". I want a city where artists and computer scientists can both afford to be there. High property taxes, but with a per-person dividend / basic income so the effective property taxes are progressive.

noelwelsh 8y ago
Don't we all! I don't think those places exist. Berlin might be the closest. It's big but easy to get around by bike or public transport, and the cost of living isn't that high, though it's climbing. Everywhere else I can think of (mostly considering the US or UK) is already expensive. I visited recently, and if I was single I'd strongly consider moving there.
metamicah 8y ago
Your desire for a "hipster small town, built around bikes and walkability" describes the cores of a lot of college towns: Olympia, Missoula, Boise, Eugene, Arcata, Davis, Bozeman, etc. They all have good coffee, too! Not sure if there are similar towns in Canada. However, a common lament in these towns is that housing costs are increasing as people move there from the cities. It can be... socially awkward... to be a carpetbagger in a place where everyone knows everyone else's story. Maybe that's why you've mentioned taxes and basic income in your comment.
- dragant 8y ago
  100% agree! I would also add Ann Arbor, Michigan to the mix. These "small towns" have wonderfully integrated colleges into the small town such that there are positive benefits for both including good schools and things to do...what many "freelancers" with kids want.

jacobmoe 8y ago

Not trying to start a "town vs city" argument - to each their own, as you said - but I think people who don't live in big cities misunderstand what life is like there. In NYC you hear tourists say "I could never live here". The thing is, as someone who lives in New York, I also could never live here, if _here_ is Times Square or some other tourist hotspot. Cities are just collections of neighborhoods. In your neighborhood you recognize your neighbors and feel the same community spirit you would in any town. The difference is that you can get on a subway or bus and see people or have experiences that would require a trip to the airport somewhere else. But the real thing I love about city life are the opportunities you have every day to come into contact with people who are different than you. Going for a jog in the winter through a Hasidic neighborhood, an elderly man in a wheelchair is stuck in the snow, so I help him get to temple. A woman with a cane who has clearly had a very different life than me needs a seat on the subway, we make eye contact and I get up for her, she says thank you and I say no trouble. These small unavoidable collisions every day really do have an impact on how you see the world.

b_b 8y ago
This is especially poignant in NYC, given the density and diversity of life here. Sometimes I think the NYC subway only seems fast because life changes so rapidly from city block to block that it seems like you've arrived in an entirely new place.
- rch 8y ago
  Unless the uptown C is delayed again, then you're just late.
rbyrne 8y ago
I second this. I grew up in the NYC suburbs, have went to school and lived in various boroughs of NYC for the past 10+ years, and my wife was born and raised in NYC. I think most people not from here (and perhaps 'here' can be any big city one may just pass through when visiting in this context I guess) seem to forget it's as you say just a collection of small neighborhoods just like anywhere else. I am sure there is an exception (maybe Midtown Manhattan but) - but for the most part I think most people know their neighbors, help each other out, see the same people around when they got to a bar or get coffee, go to the same parks in their neighborhood - all the same things people think you may miss out on vs living in 'small towns.'

kel92ndjd 8y ago

Guess it depends on the city We know 70% of the neighbors on our street and a number of them one block either direction via block parties and having kids the same age in the elem school 6 blocks away. We walk/bike to the grocery store and only drive to get out to a mountain areas (hour away) Not so bad if you pick the right city

addicted 8y ago

People have been talking about remote work “leveling the playing field” for a while, but the statistics show the opposite. More people have been moving into cities since remote work has become possible than the opposite. It’s possible this may be because as our work lives become more lonely due to it being remote, cities offer the availability of people that they lack in their day jobs. Also, the reason cities are expensive is entirely due to the number of people wanting to live there. Setting aside housing demand/supply, cities are more efficient and cheaper than small towns by far. It would be interesting to see how livable small and rural towns would be if it wasn’t for the variety of subsidies the US government offers these areas (subsidized postal services, roads, etc. that are largely paid by people living in cities in the US, where the majority of the economic benefits of the US are generated).

randomdata 8y ago
> More people have been moving into cities Not so much in Canada. Small towns (1,000 to 29,999 people) are the fastest growing community type. Large cities (100,000+ people) have lost share of the population. The definition of urban is "a population of at least 1,000 and a density of 400 or more people per square kilometre", so you might hear that urbanization continues (which is true, the rural population shrunk by about the same rate as cities), but that doesn't mean the people are moving into cities.
- xvedejas 8y ago
  Canada is very different from the US in this regard, so it's important to consider both distinctly. Canada never had the same mass-exodus of the middle class from their cities, so the economic demographics are all very different from those of American cities. Maybe these two sets of cities are growing to become more like each other?
  - herge 8y ago
    Really? There are no suburbs in Canada? There were sure a lot of poor neighborhoods in Montréal near the downtown core in the 60's and a lot of residential development on the South Shore and the West Island.

moorhosj 8y ago

“I'll take my country life as a remote worker going on 8 years. Trees, forest, wildlife, fresh air, backyards. 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks.” My neighborhood in Chicago has all of these things and I can walk to the train for work every day.

maccard 8y ago
And my neighbourhood in Edinburgh has all of that too, with a 20 minute walk to my office
- walshemj 8y ago
  I recall when I worked for a while in Edinburgh a 20 min walk from princess st was considered out in the boon docks.

alxlaz 8y ago

There are ups and downs to any of these, and various people like them (or hate them) for very diverse reasons. My mother is from one of these small towns and she hates almost every single thing you enumerated: - - "Everyone knows each other" is a nightmare when you're a teenager. News that you did something stupid or peculiar can sometimes get home before you do, sometimes amplified. And if you don't want to be that close to everyone, you can end up being treated as a freak. - Trees, forest, wildlife, backyards -- also the occasional possibly rabid fox, bugs everywhere, sweeping the leaves... - Five minutes walk or one minute drive to shop for groceries. If they're out of ketchup, tough luck 'cause the nearest one is thirty minutes away and you have to cross the railroad tracks, too. To those of us who live in the city, these things don't look bad at all. I'd certainly endure my share of bugs and give up the night life (at least for a while...) for some damn fresh air and being able to see more than five trees at a time. But the allure of large cities for people who grew up in small towns isn't worth understating, either. (Edit: to be clear -- I'm definitely not advocating for large cities. I was born and grew up in one so I definitely understand where you're coming from :-D)

ivm 8y ago
You are describing a really small town and a Northern American one. Larger ones (≈100k pop.) don't have these problems and tiny ones (≈3-10k pop.) in Europe, Asia or Latin America usually have multiple stores in a walkable range.
- alxlaz 8y ago
  I'm describing a European town with more than 20k people (albeit only slightly). Edit: certainly a slightly larger city (50k-100k) is better but the parent comment was about country life, hence my comment
  - ivm 8y ago
    It's strange for me because I lived in a 1.5k town on Balkans that had two stores and a tiny open market. The bigger one was a chain store, so it always had everything. In Chile we have lots of stores and services even in quite poor 10-20k towns.

cletus 8y ago

I'm glad you've found something that works for you (really!) but you're cherry-picking. The key problem is this: > 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. This might be true for you but that's probably because your income is much higher than the median where you live such that you can afford just off Main St is whatever qualifies as central where you live. By definition not everyone can do that. And I say by definition because: - Average walking speed is about 5 feet per second - 5 minutes to just one of the destinations you mention puts you at at radius of 1500 feet - The average supermarket size is, say, 40,000 square feet [1] - Let's assume an entry on each side and a square footprint of 200x200. That doesn't include parking - It seems ~150 parking spaces per acre is a good estimate [2], putting the space for each at roughly 300 square feet - I can't find any stats or the average number of parking spaces for a supermarket so let's go with 100 for 30,000 square feet bringing out supermarket footprint to 70,000 - Assuming these things are circular (best case) and you can walk in straight lines (best case) the radius of the store is 112 feet. The parking lot eats another 38 feet of that - So the circle for being within 5 minutes is 112 feet + 1500 feet - 70,000 square feet, which we'll call ~8 million square feet. - Average lot sizes are harder to figure out. There's data like this [3] but that includes cities. Even in big cities like Atlanta or Kansas City you can see lot sizes over an acre. - There is also things you need to roads, (more) parking spaces and so on so probably a better way to approach this is houses per acre [4]. Based on medians of 24 acres and 60 housing units, that puts the average house footprint (including ancillary services) at ~18,000 square feet. I actually think that's rather generous too as the figures were for a subdivision. Small towns (with the possible exception of older towns such as what you have in New England) will probably have higher average house footprints. - That means within our circle we have ~440 houses. - According to the 2010 census, the average was 2.58 people per household [5] - So ~1100 people get to walk to the supermarket in 5 minutes. - So with 10,000 people, only 1 in 9 has this lifestyle. - That's just one your points of interest (the market). Add in restaurants, parks and the other things you mentioned and it gets a lot worse very quickly. My point here is that you are in a privileged position and your characterization of "small town life" is unrepresentative. Most people will have to drive everywhere. Now granted traffic probably won't be as bad as say LA or Chicago. My point is that being able to walk everywhere in a small town (in the USA at least) is highly unusual, not remotely representative and highly privileged (locally speaking). [1]: http://time.com/money/136330/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon-be-cut-in-half/ http://time.com/money/136330/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon... [2]: https://ag.tennessee.edu/cpa/Information%20Sheets/CPA%20222.pdf https://ag.tennessee.edu/cpa/Information%20Sheets/CPA%20222.... [3]: http://eyeonhousing.org/2016/07/lots-in-2015-are-smallest-on-record/ http://eyeonhousing.org/2016/07/lots-in-2015-are-smallest-on... [4]: https://www.nahb.org/en/research/housing-economics/special-studies/typical-american-subdivisions-2014.aspx https://www.nahb.org/en/research/housing-economics/special-s... [5]: https://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-14.pdf https://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-14.pdf

badrabbit 8y ago

Some of us don't feel comfortable if everyone knows each other. I don't know my neighbors and I like it that way. I have more options for stores,etc... More services are available in big cities too. More banking options,more car repair places,more grocery shops and placss of entertainment. There are nice parks if I want trees,or I could just drive out of the city on the weekend. I'm just saying, everyone has their own priorities.

bytematic 8y ago

5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop? Must not be the US.

ahoy 8y ago

5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. I've never lived in, or even seen, a small town in america where this was possible.

yellowcherry 8y ago
I'm living in a small town right this moment where is is all possible. Toss in a library, a bar, a couple barbers, and a fresh bakery too.
- anothergoogler 8y ago
  Interesting that you bring up the library -- when it comes to small towns, the library is the deal breaker for me. They usually have thin, dated collections.
  - phil21 8y ago
    Most (in my state - MN - which I do believe is known as one of the better ones) state library systems are networked, for this reason. Simply reserve a book you want and it will show up on the weekly van delivery. I spent a few years growing up in a ridiculously small town where we'd have to drive to the next town over to check out books - and I never missed anything I wanted to read, just had to plan ahead a little.
    - anothergoogler 8y ago
      That might work if you know what you want already, you're still out of luck for browsing though. And even if you know what you want, they might deliver you the busted copy that's all highlighted and underlined ;)
krisroadruck 8y ago
Keene, NH. About 20-30K people total. Walkable and all amenities available.

tjr225 8y ago

These kinda of comments seem to be growing in frequency on HN. Why? Who cares what decisions people make? I've lived on acreage in the woods, small towns, suburbs, mid sized cities and urban environments and guess what? The only thing I've learned is that each has pros and cons and that every time I've said I would "never" live in one of those situations again I was surprised when I chose to do that very thing. Why limit your lifestyle options with arbitrary mental boxes? Maybe I'm just getting tired of reading strangers opinions on the internet, it seems like a waste of mental energy...but as you say- "To each their own"

rbanffy 8y ago

I grew up in São Paulo. Then I moved to Dublin, Ireland (which is, compared to São Paulo, tiny, but, with over a million people living here, shouldn't be called a small town). I now live in a quiet and walkable city. Have a huge shared backyard where kids in the neighborhood play. We all know each other, we have Whatsapp groups for the neighborhood (wives created one, husbands, half-jokingly, created another to keep a balance of power). I almost never have to use a car. We have only one. I never considered moving to a smaller city, but, really, I can see the appeal of not living between tall buildings, with sirens, beeps, engines and the constant hum of large city. I'm now in San Francisco (for the week) and the constant noise is already getting on my nerves again (happens every time I come here - I'll be cranky for 3 days or so - and, mind you, I've been living in Dublin for only two years and grew up in São Paulo).

k__ 8y ago

I got both. Living in one of the big cities in Germany, but on the outta rim of it. 10min walk and I'm in the forrest, 10min subway and I'm in the city center.

paganel 8y ago

I’m writing this comment from a small village close to the Carpathians, where my brother lives and where my family on my father’s side has lived for generations (half of the land on which the village’s church was built was “donated” by my family), I for my self live in a city with a population of 2 million people. As such, I just wanted to comment on the “everybody knows everybody else in a small town/village” and the implicit assumption that that would only cause “positive” feelings. It doesn’t. Back to my brother: he has been through a nasty divorce (divorces also happen in small towns/villages) and as such half of the village (the one who “listened” to his ex-parents-in-law) now think that he (my brother) is the scum of the earth. That isn’t good at all for my brother’s psyche. Also, my brother happens to be better at what he does (driving a lorry all over Europe for a living and in his free time raising a couple of cows and making some pretty good palinka-like drink) compared to some other villagers, and because of that those villagers sort of envy him, so much so that some of them have directly approached my brother’s new life companion and have told her about how in fact my brother is a not that big of a deal because he hasn’t accomplished this and that and that other thing. And I could go on and on with examples like these, all of which haven’t directly affected me while living in the big city: “My neighbor thinks bad of me? F.ck him, I don’t care what he thinks!”. The quiet and calmness is pretty nice in the village though, of that there’s no doubt.

phil21 8y ago

> 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. Yes, this sounds amazing. In fact you've just described exactly what (most) in the big city enjoy about it. You also described a vanishingly small amount of American small towns. Most are much more akin to suburbs, which to me is the absolutely worst form of living yet invented. I completely understand those who want to live in small towns/rural area around nature. I completely understand those who want to live in a big city with big city conveniences. I simply do not understand those who want to live in between.

sneak 8y ago

Driving is wasteful, dangerous, expensive, and toxic.

programmarchy 8y ago

I live in a small town, work remotely for the most part, and love it. In my town, the number of people who work remotely is steadily increasing. The remote workers tend to have higher incomes which brings in more resources to the town, but also creates some divisions. For example, there’s a “yuppie” coffee shop and a “hippie” coffee shop. They’re both great, but there’s a noticeable cultural divide and some animosity on both ends. People who have been here their whole lives are starting to get priced out of the area, and they’re understandably leery of non locals. We’ve already had long time businesses shut down because they couldn’t afford rising rents. There’s a vocal group who are very much against new developments that would taint the old charm and probably raise prices. Our town is actually pretty progressive though, and is already investing in low cost housing, but I doubt that’ll be enough. I see a bright future ahead for our small town, but managing the growth without losing our sense of history and community is going to be difficult.

the_gastropod 8y ago

> I'll take my country life as a remote worker going on 8 years. Trees, forest, wildlife, fresh air, backyards. 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to a shop for groceries, hardware, lumber, restaurants, kid parks. If you don't mind a bit of privacy invasion, what city/town do you live in? One of the biggest reasons I live in a big city is that I like being able to take a 5 minute walk to get to anything I need. Stereotypical suburbs/rural areas are primarily built for cars, not pedestrians/cyclists.

mixmastamyk 8y ago

I like your take in general, but these two phrases don't quite go together: > Trees, forest, wildlife, fresh air, backyards. 5 minutes walk or 1 minute drive to… Guessing that the number of places in the middle of a forest with a five minute walk to spectacular shopping are quite rare.