I've not spent much time studying this but is it not the case that there's basically some sort of 'ideal suburban-ness' beyond which things start to get horribl

I've not spent much time studying this but is it not the case that there's basically some sort of 'ideal suburban-ness' beyond which things start to get horribly congested? If you want the sort of front and back garden, big detached house lifestyle, then it feels like you want to get in early whilst a city is still small. Once it's beyond a certain size, even if you can afford it, traffic is just awful at any time of day so you're not getting anywhere. Public transport isn't the answer either - taxi services can work, but if you bought in to a place for the sprawl, you just can't get buses and trains to every corner of it. (It's theoretically possible, but people who move to these places don't want it by definition - the whole point of having that big old house is to fill it with big toys, the workshop in the garage, the big chest freezer, etc etc).