Having it both ways is best serviced by cities that reduce sprawl. If you want to be where things are happening, it's right there. If you want nature, it's just

Having it both ways is best serviced by cities that reduce sprawl. If you want to be where things are happening, it's right there. If you want nature, it's just outside of the city. Sprawl creates miles and miles of area that isn't nature and isn't the center of activity. It's a huge amount of infrastructure for a design pattern that has a lot of environmental downsides and doesn't help most people.