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> if you make tech money It is a great tragedy that the US with all its money and diversity of geography and people has only really managed to produce a single

> if you make tech money It is a great tragedy that the US with all its money and diversity of geography and people has only really managed to produce a single walkable city and a scattered handful of “I don’t always use my car” neighborhoods, which are always the most expensive places to live. So many cities outside the US manage to do this on a fraction of the budget.

throwaway48540 2y ago
So many cities outside the US manage to have this as the only redeeming quality. It's nice to not have to walk - it's not so great to have to walk because you can't afford a car and public transit does not cut it for everyone even in the best rated cities of the world. And it's not really interesting to have a dense train network if you can't afford the train ticket; then you're just angry your tax money is spent on it instead of you. I'm from Europe but I would be very careful with claiming it's just a few cities or neighborhoods in the US. I made a list of places I could move to eventually, and it's at least two dozen, and that's just because I was focused on cities with significant tech/business scene.
ricardobayes 2y ago
Everyone wants what they can't have. Europeans want to drive in cities/suburbs and Americans want to walk. People in Paris/Madrid don't really value walkability all that much. It's an increasing trend to buy bigger and bigger SUVs.
- dkdbejwi383 2y ago
  > Europeans want to drive in cities/suburbs No, I don't. Thank you.
  - ricardobayes 2y ago
    Soccer moms disagree with you. In my area they actually removed bike lanes to make way for more traffic.
    - dkdbejwi383 2y ago
      Where I live in London there are football (soccer) pitches in most local parks, school grounds, etc, which kids tend to use. Most people have such a park in a 5-10 minute walk from their home. No need to drive for such short distances. It's better for kids to walk around and experience their neighbourhood, use the time walking to chat with their friends, etc.
      - vel0city 2y ago
        Where I live in Texas there are football (soccer) pitches in most local parks, school grounds, etc, which kids tend to use. Also often baseball fields and sometimes tennis courts as well. Most people here have such a park in a 10-minute walk from their home.
    - sensanaty 2y ago
      The majority (dare I say all?) of European kids just take public transport/their bikes to wherever they're going, from a young age. I took the bus 1.5 hours 1 direction every day to go to my swim practice starting from age 10, sometimes at night too. I don't really think soccer moms are a thing outside of the US
      - refurb 2y ago
        The percentage of commutes by car in Northern and Southern European cities ranges from 50% to 75% I’m not sure where Americans get the idea Europeans don’t commute by car.
        sensanaty 2y ago
        We're talking about kids here though, not all commuters. And at least in the Netherlands, sample size of my office (around 300 people) maybe a dozen people max commute by car because they live ~2 hours away or in tiny villages where the trains are only hourly rather than every 10 minutes. I'd assume that metric varies a lot depending on the country you're looking at, and if we're talking about how kids go to school/practice/wherever, I'm willing to bet even in car-heavy European countries that the vast majority of kids take public transport or their bikes. I have friends with kids in the (rural) North of the Netherlands, and their kid's school is ~15km away from their house. The kids bike that every day, to quote my friend, "they've got legs and wheels, why would I chauffeur them around?"
- gilbetron 2y ago
  > Americans want to walk They actually don't. I mean I do. My wife does, and one or two of our friends do. But almost everyone else we know aren't at all interested in having a walkable city. They love their cars and garages. US cities are the way they are because a great majority of Americans want them that way. It 100% bums me out, but that's where we are at. Americans that want to walk are a small minority.
  - beaglesss 2y ago
    Children don't have the patience of parents. They melt down waiting for a bus/transit in snow or summer broiling heat and it becomes a nightmare. I didn't have a car most the time until I had a kid and found quality of life went way up with a car.
    - badpun 2y ago
      I was born in a walkable in Europe. School was 5 minutes (by walk) from home. High school was 10-15 minutes by bus, plus 10 minutes walking to the bus stops. The bus service was very frequent, there was no endless waiting on bus stops in snow or heat. If Communist Poland could pull it of, so could the richest country in the world.
      - beaglesss 2y ago
        Getting to school works but that's because everyone on the bus is going the same place. A child can walk to say a cornerstore in the US many places no problem but the parents will be placed under arrest for negligence. Most any other place they'd like to go is most practical with public transit involving a long wait or driving by what appears to the child as a private car chartered at his convenience.
        badpun 2y ago
        There are no school buses in Polish cities. I was using regular city transit buses, just like grownups do when going to their jobs.
itsoktocry 2y ago
>It is a great tragedy that the US with all its money and diversity of geography and people has only really managed to produce a single walkable city Have you considered, then, that many people do not actually want this? >So many cities outside the US manage to do this on a fraction of the budget. Young yuppies with their Silicon Valley salaries get to spend time in European city AirBnbs and wonder "why can't America be like this?"
- klabb3 2y ago
  > Have you considered, then, that many people do not actually want this? If so, the European city planning wouldn’t be popular within the US, but it’s the opposite. The few European style cities are incredibly attractive to live in. > Young yuppies with their Silicon Valley salaries get to spend time in European city AirBnbs and wonder "why can't America be like this?" Right.. and? They’re not representative? Or it’s unrealistic? That’s a perfectly reasonable question to ask for those that do get the opportunity to see functional dense urban areas in other places, especially as they don’t require anywhere near SV salaries yet are still lively and safe. I don’t think the US will drop car centrism, partly because of the perpetual lower class social issues that make it dangerous to share public space with strangers, but you can get pretty far if you mix in high volume public transit like in NYC (or even SF BART for a smaller example), which greatly reduces the dead spaces that prevent walkability.
  - rangestransform 2y ago
    > because of the perpetual lower class social issues that make it dangerous to share public space with strangers I never quite figured out why the US is so allergic to enforcing the public order laws already on the books with any degree of vigour
- alright2565 2y ago
  > that many people do not actually want this? The concept of supply & demand shows people obviously do want this, given that the cost of living in that walkable city and in walkable places is so high. The real reason? Americans become infatuated with the latest technological marvel too easily. For a while, this was the car. And unfortunately, rolling back all these car subsidies takes a while and is heavily fought against because people hate the feeling of having something taken from them.

throwaway48540 2y ago

So many cities outside the US manage to have this as the only redeeming quality. It's nice to not have to walk - it's not so great to have to walk because you can't afford a car and public transit does not cut it for everyone even in the best rated cities of the world. And it's not really interesting to have a dense train network if you can't afford the train ticket; then you're just angry your tax money is spent on it instead of you. I'm from Europe but I would be very careful with claiming it's just a few cities or neighborhoods in the US. I made a list of places I could move to eventually, and it's at least two dozen, and that's just because I was focused on cities with significant tech/business scene.

ricardobayes 2y ago

Everyone wants what they can't have. Europeans want to drive in cities/suburbs and Americans want to walk. People in Paris/Madrid don't really value walkability all that much. It's an increasing trend to buy bigger and bigger SUVs.

dkdbejwi383 2y ago
> Europeans want to drive in cities/suburbs No, I don't. Thank you.
- ricardobayes 2y ago
  Soccer moms disagree with you. In my area they actually removed bike lanes to make way for more traffic.
  - dkdbejwi383 2y ago
    Where I live in London there are football (soccer) pitches in most local parks, school grounds, etc, which kids tend to use. Most people have such a park in a 5-10 minute walk from their home. No need to drive for such short distances. It's better for kids to walk around and experience their neighbourhood, use the time walking to chat with their friends, etc.
    - vel0city 2y ago
      Where I live in Texas there are football (soccer) pitches in most local parks, school grounds, etc, which kids tend to use. Also often baseball fields and sometimes tennis courts as well. Most people here have such a park in a 10-minute walk from their home.
  - sensanaty 2y ago
    The majority (dare I say all?) of European kids just take public transport/their bikes to wherever they're going, from a young age. I took the bus 1.5 hours 1 direction every day to go to my swim practice starting from age 10, sometimes at night too. I don't really think soccer moms are a thing outside of the US
    - refurb 2y ago
      The percentage of commutes by car in Northern and Southern European cities ranges from 50% to 75% I’m not sure where Americans get the idea Europeans don’t commute by car.
      - sensanaty 2y ago
        We're talking about kids here though, not all commuters. And at least in the Netherlands, sample size of my office (around 300 people) maybe a dozen people max commute by car because they live ~2 hours away or in tiny villages where the trains are only hourly rather than every 10 minutes. I'd assume that metric varies a lot depending on the country you're looking at, and if we're talking about how kids go to school/practice/wherever, I'm willing to bet even in car-heavy European countries that the vast majority of kids take public transport or their bikes. I have friends with kids in the (rural) North of the Netherlands, and their kid's school is ~15km away from their house. The kids bike that every day, to quote my friend, "they've got legs and wheels, why would I chauffeur them around?"
gilbetron 2y ago
> Americans want to walk They actually don't. I mean I do. My wife does, and one or two of our friends do. But almost everyone else we know aren't at all interested in having a walkable city. They love their cars and garages. US cities are the way they are because a great majority of Americans want them that way. It 100% bums me out, but that's where we are at. Americans that want to walk are a small minority.
- beaglesss 2y ago
  Children don't have the patience of parents. They melt down waiting for a bus/transit in snow or summer broiling heat and it becomes a nightmare. I didn't have a car most the time until I had a kid and found quality of life went way up with a car.
  - badpun 2y ago
    I was born in a walkable in Europe. School was 5 minutes (by walk) from home. High school was 10-15 minutes by bus, plus 10 minutes walking to the bus stops. The bus service was very frequent, there was no endless waiting on bus stops in snow or heat. If Communist Poland could pull it of, so could the richest country in the world.
    - beaglesss 2y ago
      Getting to school works but that's because everyone on the bus is going the same place. A child can walk to say a cornerstore in the US many places no problem but the parents will be placed under arrest for negligence. Most any other place they'd like to go is most practical with public transit involving a long wait or driving by what appears to the child as a private car chartered at his convenience.
      - badpun 2y ago
        There are no school buses in Polish cities. I was using regular city transit buses, just like grownups do when going to their jobs.

itsoktocry 2y ago

>It is a great tragedy that the US with all its money and diversity of geography and people has only really managed to produce a single walkable city Have you considered, then, that many people do not actually want this? >So many cities outside the US manage to do this on a fraction of the budget. Young yuppies with their Silicon Valley salaries get to spend time in European city AirBnbs and wonder "why can't America be like this?"

klabb3 2y ago
> Have you considered, then, that many people do not actually want this? If so, the European city planning wouldn’t be popular within the US, but it’s the opposite. The few European style cities are incredibly attractive to live in. > Young yuppies with their Silicon Valley salaries get to spend time in European city AirBnbs and wonder "why can't America be like this?" Right.. and? They’re not representative? Or it’s unrealistic? That’s a perfectly reasonable question to ask for those that do get the opportunity to see functional dense urban areas in other places, especially as they don’t require anywhere near SV salaries yet are still lively and safe. I don’t think the US will drop car centrism, partly because of the perpetual lower class social issues that make it dangerous to share public space with strangers, but you can get pretty far if you mix in high volume public transit like in NYC (or even SF BART for a smaller example), which greatly reduces the dead spaces that prevent walkability.
- rangestransform 2y ago
  > because of the perpetual lower class social issues that make it dangerous to share public space with strangers I never quite figured out why the US is so allergic to enforcing the public order laws already on the books with any degree of vigour
alright2565 2y ago
> that many people do not actually want this? The concept of supply & demand shows people obviously do want this, given that the cost of living in that walkable city and in walkable places is so high. The real reason? Americans become infatuated with the latest technological marvel too easily. For a while, this was the car. And unfortunately, rolling back all these car subsidies takes a while and is heavily fought against because people hate the feeling of having something taken from them.