I'm not sure where you got this model. It's not that small towns are strung out along roads. Rather, the town itself becomes a nexus for walk/bike-ability. In

I'm not sure where you got this model. It's not that small towns are strung out along roads. Rather, the town itself becomes a nexus for walk/bike-ability. Instead of every trip to the grocery store, movie theater, and gym being taken by car, the vast majority of trips are taken by walking or biking. This isn't to say there aren't cars in town: on the contrary, roads exist, ideally going around heavily trafficked areas. This lets the roads focus on being roads (getting people from place to place) and the streets focus on being streets (allowing people to walk, bike, and "experience the world", in the parlance of "Not Just Bikes". Of course, the next town over (let's say it's 20 miles away) will be "down the road", with a both a road and a train connecting them.