All of the items you listed as a positive, every single one, are not only possible but mundane for a lot of people that live in proper urban spaces. None of th

All of the items you listed as a positive, every single one, are not only possible but mundane for a lot of people that live in proper urban spaces. None of the negative things you mentioned about city life are "transcendental". They might be common in USA cities, but these qualities are far from universal. IOW, if your baseline is a shitty city, of course the suburbs are going to seem like a good deal. But have you ever considered what life in a good urban space might be like? > claim your preferences are objectively better than anyone else. No. What I am saying is that your basis of comparison is very limited and that you were robbed of the opportunity to experience something better. To make an analogy, you want to engage in a "Budweiser vs Miller Lite" argument, while anyone that had the chance to try "proper" beer will tell you that such an argument is pointless. To repeat: the argument in the beginning was about "taking the beauty away and selling it back as a luxury" in relation to suburbs vs big cities and "having to pay for nice things". My comment was not against "suburbs" as a matter of preference, but merely to point out the historical, FACTUALLY BAD post-WW2 urban development in North America which destroyed its cities and gave people no other choice but suburban sprawl.