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For years in my 20s I considered myself mildly depressed. Not a go-see-a-therapist or take medication depressed, but I felt a general malaise that something was

• throwawa14223 3y ago
  I'm in the same boat as you. I felt miserable living in a city and I find rural-suburban life to be an improvement that was large enough I wouldn't consider going back.
  • hackerlight 3y ago
    One reason to push for city density is so suburb life is more accessible to the people who want it. As it stands everyone is competing for a limited amount of suburban land and it's not sustainable.
    • nradov 3y ago
      There is essentially unlimited land available to build new suburbs. The problems come in when those people need transportation to somewhere outside the suburb.
      • hackerlight 3y ago
        Not really though because most people in suburbs need to be within 1 hour of the city to commute for work or services.
• tekla 3y ago
  You know you can do all of that in a city right? I lived in Manhattan for years and I had a backyard with a smoker and had good relationships with my local bodega and cafes.
  • jprete 3y ago
    What neighborhood, what decade? That sounds to me either very expensive, very far uptown, or very crime-ridden, but I don't know what your situation was.
    • tekla 3y ago
      UWS, Below 80th St. 2016. Lived with a roommate for 1700 bucks/m that I never saw since they lived on another floor (could have afforded it myself, but liked saving money). Had a backyard, close to Central Park (1.5 blocks), had a garden w/ backyard where we held BBQs and parties. So crime ridden, so uptown. My starving artist friend lives in a rent controlled apt, UES, roughly 86th st. Went to a backyard party to their place with BBQ last fall. Right next to transit. People have no idea how awesome cities can be.
• Xcelerate 3y ago
  It is quite funny how different everyone is on this. My wife and I lived in the Bay Area for a while and my wife hated it with a passion, particularly whenever we went into San Francisco. Whereas I would have permanently moved to SF no problem. 800 sq ft works just fine for me. I also wouldn’t mind moving to Europe, as I lived there a while as a kid and really enjoyed it. But we’re back in the suburbs now with our kids and I detest it so much. The driving, the lack of good food, the uninteresting suburban landscape, and the constant home maintenance that living in an apartment never required. My wife loves this though. We’ll never understand each other haha
  • DHPersonal 3y ago
    I'm married to a suburb-loving wife and kids who've only ever experienced the suburb existence. I glare in disdain at the memory of the younger me who never dared to move to a bigger city for a couple years to experience the city life in a tiny apartment, because I think I would've liked it quite a lot!
• tayo42 3y ago
  Which cities? I think most American cities are kind of like busy suburbs with big business downtowns. There are some exceptions. Also the European cities I've been to feel very different from US cities
• throw0101b 3y ago
  > Everyone is different, but man... I'm the guy that likes to fire up the bbq and chat with neighbors in the backyard while the kids are who knows where (but safe) in the sprawl. I do this in "the city" right now (I BBQed some lamb on Sunday; my neighbour got a new motorcycle (Scrambler 1200XE) and I chatted with him about it). The Oh the Urbanity channel has a video on the (mistaken) idea that "urban living" = Manhattan / Hong Kong apartment blocks, which is certainly not the case: * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCmz-fgp24E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCmz-fgp24E Here are some examples houses in an urban area with front yards, back yards, and garages (attached to lanes): * https://www.google.com/maps/place/150+Geoffrey+St,+Toronto,+ON https://www.google.com/maps/place/150+Geoffrey+St,+Toronto,+... * https://www.google.com/maps/place/70+Jackman+Ave+Toronto,+ON https://www.google.com/maps/place/70+Jackman+Ave+Toronto,+ON A little less square footage: * https://www.google.com/maps/place/125+Hampton+Ave,+Toronto,+ON https://www.google.com/maps/place/125+Hampton+Ave,+Toronto,+... * https://www.google.com/maps/place/50+Geoffrey+St,+Toronto,+ON https://www.google.com/maps/place/50+Geoffrey+St,+Toronto,+O... Plenty of that was build pre-WW2 in ways that didn't depend on cars: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetcar_suburb https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetcar_suburb * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0&t=1m8s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0&t=1m8s Suburban design is the worst of both worlds: lacking the density of the urban so infrastructure is inefficient and so is transportation, and basically bulldozing what makes more rural living nice (closeness to nature).
• angarg12 3y ago
  Where exactly did you live? My experience is the polar opposite. I'm visiting my native city in souther Europe after 2+ years living in the US suburbs (Seattle). When I go outside, there is a plaza full of children playing (I can hear them from my window in a 5th floor), people sitting in a bench chatting, and terraces full of patrons. In my suburbs in Seattle I never see children "going to school", I just see a School bus that stops and has some kids jumping inside. I also never see anyone around when I walk the dog, except that faithful old man going for his morning jog. Also how is having the ability to drive everywhere more humanizing? here I just don't have to. Yesterday I had 15 minutes until a meeting, so I just went downstairs, crossed the street to pop by the supermarket, bought something and had time to spare to join the meeting. In the US it would take me that much just to drive to the closest strip mall.
  • wink 3y ago
    German here and I think I have experienced both what you are referring to (to a lesser degree though) in a bigger city, but also what the person you replied to said. In my city you can have both, completely depending on the neighborhood. Where I mostly grew up (<10km from here) we knew our neighbors, children could play in the 30 speed limit zone, etc.pp) and where I've been living for 15 years I hardly know or talk to my neighbors. But this is not always the case in apartment buildings, but relatively common. So I guess what I'm saying is that we can have some of this suburban feeling (as much as I can assume it to be) inside the city (maybe not the city centre) in many cities here. We do have the real suburbs as well, but I think they're still more "communities" than just.. single homes with zero shops and bars and stuff. And yeah, I'd totally take the small house with my own garden and being able to BBQ and invite the neighbors, if those weren't going for 1m EUR :P
  • snide 3y ago
    As I mentioned, my opinion is very American skewed. I grew up in Maryland, outside the DC area. I now live in Annapolis, Maryland, in a suburb. In between I lived in California cities, and later in California suburb an hour and a half outside SF. There are about a dozen kids at the bus stop nearby, including my two kids. When I lived in a California suburb it was similar. In the city I never saw kids. When I did it wasn't a good experience and they didn't look happy. I never saw them without parents, and when I did I wondered where they were. In the suburbs I see kids without their parents all the time. They are climbing in trees or riding on bikes. I drive my pickup truck within 30 minutes all the time, for everything from general shopping to also picking up various house related things (lumber, mulch, whatever). I've lived in places where everything was walkable, and lived in SF for 5 years without a car. I didn't care for it, for the reasons I mentioned. I love going into cities for day trips, but I prefer living around families and yards.
• Edmond 3y ago
  >Everyone is different, but man... I'm the guy that likes to fire up the bbq and chat with neighbors in the backyard while the kids are who knows where (but safe) in the sprawl. Seeing a teenager in their first job at an ice cream shop sort of reinvigorates my sense of community. These are things I recognize and grew up with, and everyone has different upbringings, but the suburbs are where I'm happiest. I am not sure any of this is specifically Suburban, there is no reason this same scenarios couldn't play out in a city neighborhood. It just so happens that in America, the suburbs have been sold as the idyllic place to aspire towards, so that's where you find kids and teens, couples move there. Also the picture you're painting is not what passes for suburbs today. Most people can't afford to live in the kind of places where you can BBQ with your neighbor and walk to an ice-cream shop with a teenager at the counter. You might maybe find them at some soulless strip mall working at a similarly soulless ice-cream chain, but I am guessing that's not what you mean? There are true suburbs but they are for rich people. Think places like Bethesda Maryland, Old-Town Alexandria VA, Morristown NJ...these are actual suburbs that have excellent mix of what an idyllic suburb should look like, but they are also mostly for the affluent. What passes for suburbs in today's America, are patches of land with houses on them, basically just real estate development and not much else. Usually there would be some strip mall that is called "Town Center" that is shared between these developments. If your town center has a sign that reads "Town Center", it means you don't live in a town.
  • anthony_d 3y ago
    > Also the picture you're painting is not what passes for suburbs today. Of course it is, that’s just what suburbs are. Some are crazy expensive and some are not. > There are true suburbs but they are for rich people. You can’t define suburbs as being expensive and then complain they’re expensive. If you’re happy living in an expensive concrete jungle good for you, but you don’t need to make excuses for hating suburbs.
  • nunez 3y ago
    The latter half of my childhood was in a suburb much like OP described and it was (and still is) solidly middle class. (That said, I don't like suburbs.)
• prophesi 3y ago
  I worked hard at the start of my 20's enduring long commutes, terrible cars, and entry level paychecks until I could afford to live in an American city. And that still required having a roommate to make rent. Even if I could have afforded it at the time, I wouldn't recommend living alone in the city for your first few years until you're well-adjusted. And geez, imagine going through quarantine alone in a city you don't know.
• pllbnk 3y ago
  I share the same feelings and I live in Europe. It seems to me that people that are against suburbs either have lived in the city since childhood and given our current culture these people are very much a majority, on the web at least. What they also don't understand that you don't need a car to go to the store. I live in the suburbs after many years having lived in the city and our family shares a single car, but we also use bicycles extensively.
• nunez 3y ago
  Counterpoint: I grew up in Brooklyn. We had block parties every so often and people would definitely interact with each other. We didn't need to drive very often. We took the subway and bus to school! Definitely wasn't safe though LOL Living in Houston suburbs as an adult, I discovered that if you were a man, didn't have kids and weren't into sports, fishing, or hunting, you were gonna have a bad time. Also, good luck walking anywhere interesting!