A huge upside for small town living is livability for people with disabilities. It's a major reason, for example, that people like to retire to smaller towns. I

A huge upside for small town living is livability for people with disabilities. It's a major reason, for example, that people like to retire to smaller towns. It's also why it is expensive to rear more than a couple small kids in a major urban area, assuming you can consider babies and toddlers (temporarily) less-than-able human beings. It varies from big city to big city, but older areas of cities are usually grandfathered out of ADA regulations that require wider doors, accessibility ramps, elevators, etc. Parking at all in most cities is atrocious, let alone handicap parking with extra room to unload a wheelchair. Wide aisles are a waste of space in dense urban areas but needed if you need to get a wheelchair to the only open table in the back of the room. Shoving your way on to a crowded train car is distasteful when young and healthy but a deal breaker for many. See also availability of handicap bathroom stalls. The list goes on. I was recently at a museum in a small city and was struck with how many visitors had significant disabilities of various kinds. For all the diversity we come to expect from large cities, this kind of diversity is probably lacking.