What about social, cultural, and civic life and public services? These depend on density, scale, and networks. > "a densely packed apartment complex in the mid

What about social, cultural, and civic life and public services? These depend on density, scale, and networks. > "a densely packed apartment complex in the middle of a noisy city" I dispute the notion that dense urbanism is not necessarily unpleasant. What you describe is a consequence of thoughtless architectural and urban design. I live in a four-storey apartment building with a garden in a quiet, bucolic neighbourhood in a core urban district in the Randstad — a dense megalopolis of over 8 mil people in The Netherlands. Density makes cycling, public transit, and walking feasible. This greatly reduces car traffic. Reduced car traffic requires less urban space to be spent on road and parking surfaces — urban space that can instead be spent on green and public spaces. Reduced car traffic in turn means less urban noise. It is a virtuous cycle. To preempt the expected protests that this kind of urbanism is only achievable by centuries-old cities: it is true that it is much easier for old cities to achieve this, but it is possible for car-centric cities as well. Rotterdam — its centre razed in WW2 and rebuilt to be car-centric — managed the transition. Old cities have many modern districts: see IJBurg of Amsterdam.