That's not true for any city I've been to in the U.S. I'm seriously trying to think of a single one that doesn't have sprawling bungalow neighborhoods near the

That's not true for any city I've been to in the U.S. I'm seriously trying to think of a single one that doesn't have sprawling bungalow neighborhoods near the center of the city. These are historically known as "streetcar suburbs", as most cities had actual fixed transit networks throughout the city itself. Today these are close-in neighborhoods full of generally smaller homes with yards. They tend to have small yards, as they are generally built pretty close together. I live in Denver which has an enormous number of those homes ringing Downtown. New Orleans has the garden district and surround. San Francisco fits that bill with the huge number of row-homes in the city(although the costs are nuts). Portland most certainly has a lot of that stock. Capitol Hill all the way to the Queen Anne in Seattle fits that bill. Dallas has the park cities. New York City has queens. Little Rock even has an excellent selection of inner-city bungalows (the neighborhoods are in poor repair, but they exist). The issue we have in the U.S. is cultural. I think it's a widespread mental disease. We're willing to drive enormous distances, spending huge chunks of our lives in cars, so that we can own giant houses full of rooms we don't even use. It's nuts.