> As a person sitting in the city pondering a life outside of it I can't see the point in the suburbs if I'm going to be driving and stuck in traffic anyway. I'

> As a person sitting in the city pondering a life outside of it I can't see the point in the suburbs if I'm going to be driving and stuck in traffic anyway. I'd rather go whole hog and live rurally. I've though this way too for a long time, both now and when I lived in a city. Having thought about it often, I think the two things driving suburbs are those with daily commutes (that 15 extra minutes twice every day adds up), and many people are not well off enough to live in the denser city to begin with (as things stand). Cities are economic attractors, and suburbs are basically less concentrated instances (or addons) of that. Also note that the question specifically says "amenities". Likely most people aren't thinking about commuting while answering the question.