Of course there's a difference between city center and city boundary. Of course some places are loud and some are quiet. But the point I'm trying to make is th

Of course there's a difference between city center and city boundary. Of course some places are loud and some are quiet. But the point I'm trying to make is that "noisy, dirty, cramped" isn't a singular fact of urban life - in fact, there are plenty of places relatively high density that are none of those. Even in the USA, there are neighborhoods like Brookline in the Boston area. Brookline is relatively dense (the streets near the light rail system anyways), but also quiet, clean, safe, and residential. The main problem is that it's expensive, very expensive -- which is understandable because there are so few neighborhoods built like it, so it's a very desirable place to live. You mention "worlds apart from the quiet, disperse suburbs 30 minutes away", but this is also a product of urban planning. Here's what a neighborhood 30 minutes away from Osaka city hall by train looks like: https://www.google.com/maps/@34.6176119,135.520036,3a,75y,144.18h,91.22t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sMmIsYvY57W5kibf-p3bYrQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 https://www.google.com/maps/@34.6176119,135.520036,3a,75y,14... Quiet, dense, Residential. A mix between single family homes, tightly packed, and mid-rise apartment complexes. High standard of living, but affordable to the middle class (330~ usd per sqft from my understanding)