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It's interesting because in Atlanta the inner city is growing and the suburbs are becoming more like the city and creating walkable downtown areas. The new mill

It's interesting because in Atlanta the inner city is growing and the suburbs are becoming more like the city and creating walkable downtown areas. The new millennial ideal seems to be a revival of the main street and a rejection of both the strip malls and super urbanized downtowns. If millennials really didn't like the urban lifestyle then wouldn't prices be dropping instead of staying high? I was recently in a coffee shop in Ypsilanti, Michigan that was indistinguishable from one in Brooklyn. I think more and more people are realizing they can keep the things they want from trendy metros and move to places like Raleigh, Salt Lake City,Austin,Atlanta,Boise ,Dallas,Ann Arbor in exchange for lower costs and less traffic.

helen___keller 7y ago
> If millennials really didn't like the urban lifestyle then wouldn't prices be dropping instead of staying high? A million times this. I don't want to (and can't afford to) pay for the ultra luxury downtown destination living experience. But urban living is more than luxurious downtown destinations. I want my day-to-day trips (bringing kids to school, going to the grocery store, going to work) to be safe and accessible without a car. Just starting there implies a lot about the built environment, and your stereotypical suburb just can't offer that.
- throwaway1777 7y ago
  Why do you want to go without a car so badly? I get not wanting one IN the city (did it for several years myself), but outside of the city driving is not bad at all.
  - helen___keller 7y ago
    It's not really the end-all-be-all, but it's a matter of personal preference that I would like to go without one if possible. Having grown up in the deep suburbs of a car-dependent city (including having a car to myself for a few years in high school), it basically comes down to this: (a) I don't like driving and I'm bad at it. (b) I don't want my kids to grow up like I grew up: with no friends in walking distance, nowhere to hang out in walking distance, ultimately bored and only spending time on the internet as a result. By the age I had a car to spend time with friends on my own terms, I basically had no social skills to speak of. (c) Driving cars just feels bad to me. Like, from an environmental point of view. I know it's not sustainable for the earth in the long-term, so it sucks feeling like I am reliant on that technology. Again, it's all personal. But having lived both without a car and completely car dependent, my optimum for quality of life is living a car-optional lifestyle, where the car is only used for the occasional luxury (e.g. a weekend trip out), not for day to day necessities.
    - dawg- 7y ago
      I want to chime in here too, because I am from a similar place - deep suburbs where having a car is a necessity. Only difference is I still refuse to pay to live in an inner city. I am counting on the current renaissance of suburban cities to continue, where these smaller towns are embracing walkability/bikeability. My dream is to live in a little suburban town where I can actually walk and bike to important places, and only go into the big city when necessary. It seems like we are getting there, slowly!
  - pedantsamaritan 7y ago
    in addition to GP/sibling's reasons: (d) I enjoy the activity of walking or biking or the relaxation of reading or sleeping over driving a car most of the time (e) cars are expensive (average TCO is $8k per year). That's multiple vacations per year, for me. (f) riding in cars isolate me from others around me in a weird way. Society has partially adapted to this by talking about cars as if they were animate objects (g) parking lots are bundles of frustration for me with multiple people and vehicles constantly in conflict very much echo GP/sibling in wanting day-to-day trips to be car free. Maybe <10 trips per month via car.
    - CalRobert 7y ago
      Also, every drive is a missed opportunity for a bike ride, one of life's great pleasures (for me at least)
  - r00fus 7y ago
    > Why do you want to go without a car so badly? Car ownership (if you mostly just commute/shuttle kids) is not all flowers and roses. There's insurance, accidents, maintenance, parking, fueling, cleaning - not to mention the whole purchase + resell process that can take months. That's assuming you like driving. I'd rather do better stuff on my commute or simply not commute at all (WFH).
  - hylaride 7y ago
    Because they’re money pits.
  - mywittyname 7y ago
    > outside of the city driving is not bad at all. Driving is getting awful anywhere near major metro areas, even the midsized ones. Every year seems to add another minute or two onto my commute due to the increase in traffic. I'm even commuting in the against traffic, meaning from near the city core to the suburbs, and it's borderline miserable. I can tell that things are much worse in the other lanes. I don't blame people at all for wanting to forego driving. Population growth is clearly outpacing infrastructure capacity.
  - notJim 7y ago
    I thought I'd weigh in here too. I assume we're talking about driving in the suburbs (i.e., not road trips or the country.) - Car commuting is awful. Terrible use of time, bad for the environment, stressful, etc. Any other method is preferable for me. I WFH now, and actually slightly miss my old bike commute. - Overall driving is a hassle. Getting in the car, backing out, parking it, walking from the parking spot to the place. Much nicer to just walk straight from door to door (unless it's really hot or actively raining.) It's a minor thing, but once I got used to not driving most of the time, I started noticing it. - Driving is stressful for me at least. Just the idea that if I make a minor mistake or miss something, I could kill or maim someone, or even that I could cause serious damage to someone else's property. And traffic is constantly crazy now in places I've driven, so you really have to be on high alert. I prefer to avoid it. - Can't drink or get stoned. Each party has to have at least one DD, which puts a damper on things if you're going to a bar or whatever.
    - helen___keller 7y ago
      > Just the idea that if I make a minor mistake or miss something, I could kill or maim someone, or even that I could cause serious damage to someone else's property. I always felt this stress, but living a pedestrian lifestyle really opened my eyes to it. When you're a car, every car is a risk sure but ultimately a collision is just an "accident" and most accidents aren't that bad. When you're a pedestrian, every distracted driver could be the end of your life. A collision means certain death if the car is going fast enough. A lot of my preferences on urbanism have come from realizing that the more convenient you make things for people in cars, the more dangerous and inconvenient you make things for the people outside cars.
  - CalRobert 7y ago
    There are many reasons. Mostly, cars make walking and cycling far worse or impossible. In the US, cars are the leading cause of dead children.
jamesgeck0 7y ago
> If millennials really didn't like the urban lifestyle then wouldn't prices be dropping instead of staying high? Some absurd percentage of the real estate in Atlanta is owned by investors. I don't think prices are an accurate indicator of millennial preference right now. > I think more and more people are realizing they can keep the things they want from trendy metros and move to places like ... Atlanta ... in exchange for ... less traffic. Atlanta has some of the worst traffic in the nation; in the top five last I checked.
- hdlothia 7y ago
  The trend holds up in other metros too. People get priced out of the nice parts of the inner city, move to the suburbs and turn it into a miny version of the city. Atlanta has terrible traffic but some of the other metros I listed do not. I should have written and/or.
DailyHN 7y ago
> If millennials really didn't like the urban lifestyle then wouldn't prices be dropping instead of staying high? Articially inflated / bubble pricing. Recently we were moving and received significant "incentives" including multiple months of free rent. My thoughts are that this way they can keep the sticker price above a certain threshold. And that keeps out people that make below the 3X rent minimum that's calculated using the inflated sticker price.
burmer 7y ago
Exactly! For me, realizing that I can have what I want from the city in a small suburban town was a huge shift for me. I moved way outside of a large city to a much smaller town, but I'm right downtown now. When I lived "in the city" I could walk to anything. Now I can walk to bars, grocery stores, a movie theater. There's not much there, and I really hope the little downtown revives more, but it's all close, and it's got cool old brick facades, etc.

helen___keller 7y ago

> If millennials really didn't like the urban lifestyle then wouldn't prices be dropping instead of staying high? A million times this. I don't want to (and can't afford to) pay for the ultra luxury downtown destination living experience. But urban living is more than luxurious downtown destinations. I want my day-to-day trips (bringing kids to school, going to the grocery store, going to work) to be safe and accessible without a car. Just starting there implies a lot about the built environment, and your stereotypical suburb just can't offer that.

throwaway1777 7y ago
Why do you want to go without a car so badly? I get not wanting one IN the city (did it for several years myself), but outside of the city driving is not bad at all.
- helen___keller 7y ago
  It's not really the end-all-be-all, but it's a matter of personal preference that I would like to go without one if possible. Having grown up in the deep suburbs of a car-dependent city (including having a car to myself for a few years in high school), it basically comes down to this: (a) I don't like driving and I'm bad at it. (b) I don't want my kids to grow up like I grew up: with no friends in walking distance, nowhere to hang out in walking distance, ultimately bored and only spending time on the internet as a result. By the age I had a car to spend time with friends on my own terms, I basically had no social skills to speak of. (c) Driving cars just feels bad to me. Like, from an environmental point of view. I know it's not sustainable for the earth in the long-term, so it sucks feeling like I am reliant on that technology. Again, it's all personal. But having lived both without a car and completely car dependent, my optimum for quality of life is living a car-optional lifestyle, where the car is only used for the occasional luxury (e.g. a weekend trip out), not for day to day necessities.
  - dawg- 7y ago
    I want to chime in here too, because I am from a similar place - deep suburbs where having a car is a necessity. Only difference is I still refuse to pay to live in an inner city. I am counting on the current renaissance of suburban cities to continue, where these smaller towns are embracing walkability/bikeability. My dream is to live in a little suburban town where I can actually walk and bike to important places, and only go into the big city when necessary. It seems like we are getting there, slowly!
- pedantsamaritan 7y ago
  in addition to GP/sibling's reasons: (d) I enjoy the activity of walking or biking or the relaxation of reading or sleeping over driving a car most of the time (e) cars are expensive (average TCO is $8k per year). That's multiple vacations per year, for me. (f) riding in cars isolate me from others around me in a weird way. Society has partially adapted to this by talking about cars as if they were animate objects (g) parking lots are bundles of frustration for me with multiple people and vehicles constantly in conflict very much echo GP/sibling in wanting day-to-day trips to be car free. Maybe <10 trips per month via car.
  - CalRobert 7y ago
    Also, every drive is a missed opportunity for a bike ride, one of life's great pleasures (for me at least)
- r00fus 7y ago
  > Why do you want to go without a car so badly? Car ownership (if you mostly just commute/shuttle kids) is not all flowers and roses. There's insurance, accidents, maintenance, parking, fueling, cleaning - not to mention the whole purchase + resell process that can take months. That's assuming you like driving. I'd rather do better stuff on my commute or simply not commute at all (WFH).
- hylaride 7y ago
  Because they’re money pits.
- mywittyname 7y ago
  > outside of the city driving is not bad at all. Driving is getting awful anywhere near major metro areas, even the midsized ones. Every year seems to add another minute or two onto my commute due to the increase in traffic. I'm even commuting in the against traffic, meaning from near the city core to the suburbs, and it's borderline miserable. I can tell that things are much worse in the other lanes. I don't blame people at all for wanting to forego driving. Population growth is clearly outpacing infrastructure capacity.
- notJim 7y ago
  I thought I'd weigh in here too. I assume we're talking about driving in the suburbs (i.e., not road trips or the country.) - Car commuting is awful. Terrible use of time, bad for the environment, stressful, etc. Any other method is preferable for me. I WFH now, and actually slightly miss my old bike commute. - Overall driving is a hassle. Getting in the car, backing out, parking it, walking from the parking spot to the place. Much nicer to just walk straight from door to door (unless it's really hot or actively raining.) It's a minor thing, but once I got used to not driving most of the time, I started noticing it. - Driving is stressful for me at least. Just the idea that if I make a minor mistake or miss something, I could kill or maim someone, or even that I could cause serious damage to someone else's property. And traffic is constantly crazy now in places I've driven, so you really have to be on high alert. I prefer to avoid it. - Can't drink or get stoned. Each party has to have at least one DD, which puts a damper on things if you're going to a bar or whatever.
  - helen___keller 7y ago
    > Just the idea that if I make a minor mistake or miss something, I could kill or maim someone, or even that I could cause serious damage to someone else's property. I always felt this stress, but living a pedestrian lifestyle really opened my eyes to it. When you're a car, every car is a risk sure but ultimately a collision is just an "accident" and most accidents aren't that bad. When you're a pedestrian, every distracted driver could be the end of your life. A collision means certain death if the car is going fast enough. A lot of my preferences on urbanism have come from realizing that the more convenient you make things for people in cars, the more dangerous and inconvenient you make things for the people outside cars.
- CalRobert 7y ago
  There are many reasons. Mostly, cars make walking and cycling far worse or impossible. In the US, cars are the leading cause of dead children.

jamesgeck0 7y ago

> If millennials really didn't like the urban lifestyle then wouldn't prices be dropping instead of staying high? Some absurd percentage of the real estate in Atlanta is owned by investors. I don't think prices are an accurate indicator of millennial preference right now. > I think more and more people are realizing they can keep the things they want from trendy metros and move to places like ... Atlanta ... in exchange for ... less traffic. Atlanta has some of the worst traffic in the nation; in the top five last I checked.

hdlothia 7y ago
The trend holds up in other metros too. People get priced out of the nice parts of the inner city, move to the suburbs and turn it into a miny version of the city. Atlanta has terrible traffic but some of the other metros I listed do not. I should have written and/or.

DailyHN 7y ago

> If millennials really didn't like the urban lifestyle then wouldn't prices be dropping instead of staying high? Articially inflated / bubble pricing. Recently we were moving and received significant "incentives" including multiple months of free rent. My thoughts are that this way they can keep the sticker price above a certain threshold. And that keeps out people that make below the 3X rent minimum that's calculated using the inflated sticker price.

burmer 7y ago

Exactly! For me, realizing that I can have what I want from the city in a small suburban town was a huge shift for me. I moved way outside of a large city to a much smaller town, but I'm right downtown now. When I lived "in the city" I could walk to anything. Now I can walk to bars, grocery stores, a movie theater. There's not much there, and I really hope the little downtown revives more, but it's all close, and it's got cool old brick facades, etc.