Somehow my hometown suburbs, and where the rest of my family still lives, still found plenty of motivation for NIMBYism and desiring property value appreciation

Somehow my hometown suburbs, and where the rest of my family still lives, still found plenty of motivation for NIMBYism and desiring property value appreciation. You're confusing "you can grow outward with single-family-homes near indefinitely" with "we want more apartment buildings near our precious houses!" You still get a lot of the same problems, you've just changed the complexion of the traffic problems...