19 ms·

Why? Isn’t most of the West one of the the least densely populated areas in the United States? Seems there would be lots of land to build single family homes.

• quietbritishjim 5y ago
  Wow that is an incredibly US-centric view even by HN standards. They meant the western world, not the West in the USA. Try Googling "the west" and look at the top results.
  • cudgy 5y ago
    I don’t base my definitions on the most popular search results. Referring to the west as you reference makes little sense in the context of what I was addressing. HN is not only largely US focused, but I would say it is hyper-focused from the Silicon Valley FAANG perspective. Basically, a few companies in a single metro area.
• Gibbon1 5y ago
  I meant the US and Europe. And by extension places of that nature. Slower growing aging populations and the realization that low density single family both burdens local government with costly infrastructure that generates low revenue. Like a sewer main with 100 customers per mile. Only sustainable when growing fast. There is a lot of multifamily being built despite fairly intense NIMBYism. And despite that you're seeing cities getting rid of R1 zoning.
  • yholio 5y ago
    There is no fundamental reason for urban sprawl to stop. Western living standards and wealth are increasing, and the actual material costs of laying a sewer pipe or road become negligible. With the advent of electric self driving cars, transportation becomes cheap and hassle free. A network of highways converging to an urban center served by Boring co Loop tunnels can gather trafic from a 30 mile area. As long as travel times are less than say, around 45 minutes, those people will be living "in the city". A 30 mile radius means about 7 million plots of 10000 sq feet, so you could accommodate more than 20 million inhabitants in this suburbopolis of single detached family homes. The factors preventing it are land prices, regulatory pressure and homebuyer tastes.