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While I get how it must be tricky for Londoners to escape the chaos for a few hours, the UK is a tiny island and you're never more than a short train ride away
by nly 12y ago
While I get how it must be tricky for Londoners to escape the chaos for a few hours, the UK is a tiny island and you're never more than a short train ride away from countryside.
- DrJokepu 12y agoGreat Britain is the 9th largest island by area in the world[0]. It's not tiny by any measure. [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_islands_by_area http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_islands_by_area
- mobiuscog 12y agobut you're also never more than 72 miles away from the coast.
- DrJokepu 12y agoWell, yes, but that would be also true for an island with the shape of a rectangle that is 144 miles wide and 10000 miles long.
- mst 12y agoThe difference between England and America is that in England 200 miles is a long way, and in America 200 years is a long time.
- lmm 12y agoDepends how you're defining "countryside". If you want to go to a large unmanaged forest, tough, there aren't any (e.g. Epping Forest is nice but it's too narrow to get lost in). If you want to go up a mountain that feels like an actual mountain, you've got to go over the border into Wales or Scotland. In all these cases you'll rarely be far from a village.
- mangecoeur 12y agoThat doesn't address the political and social issue though: who is a the city for? Who should have access to public space? I believe that in a crowded city it's really important that things like parks and riverbanks are accessible to everyone. Otherwise you slowly create a city of gated communities, a two-tier society. Saying "you could go somewhere else" is basically admitting that the city is becoming unlivable to the common man.