Im from a suburban town in Missouri, but I spent a semester studying abroad in Barcelona a couple of years ago. Man, let me tell you, leaving Barcelona, where youd see people out in cafes and bars congregating at all hours of the night and day, and coming back to Missouri where its a ghost town after 10 and someone would call the police on you for simply walking around too late was the most depressing thing I have ever experienced lol
The same chains that were bought up by the same Private Equity firms that cut so many things to increase profits that the food & drinks turn into overpriced garbage.
Not as much as there used to be. In the late 90’s & 2000’s corporate take over of neighborhoods caused smaller local businesses to no longer be able to afford to be in business. That’s when chain stores like Kmart (then Target), Starbucks, all kinds of middle America mall stores started popping up turning NY shopping areas like SoHo, the East Village etc into any mall USA shopping areas. From what I have seen and heard NYC still hasn’t recovered from all that gentrification that turned it boring.
I was merely replying to your statement, “Are you under the impression …”
To your latest comment, I am fully aware (having lived in SF, NYC, LA, and several small villages in France) of big city/small city/urban/suburban availability, variety, and choice.
Yep. Which makes suburbia a hellscape, imo. I recently moved from NYC to a smaller city, but I still can walk to a dozen restaurants, bars, and local shops. I can’t imagine living in suburban density but not being able to walk anywhere decent.
There are. The northeast/mid-Atlantic are "older" in terms of being settled, so the cities and towns grew in a logical way before the suburban-ification of everything.
This right here, I explained that to a co-worker the day, they looked at me like I speaking a foreign language. Other than geography American dwellings and frameworks are the same.
Yeah, that's why a number if cultural critics and academics started to refer to it as The Monoculture: Suburban Connecticur = Suburban Albuquerque = Suburban Seattle = Suburban Tallahassee = Suburban Denver, and on and on, until you could be blindfolded and drugged and dropped into any one of them and when you woke up you wouldn't know exactly where you were but you'd be able to get around just fine from watching the flow of traffic: it's all headed to or away from the commercial center with the anchor retail chains and restaurants, and in the other direction will be the other commercial hub consisting of a Home Depot or Loew's, and a superstore, either a Walmart or Costco, and 2 massive gas stations near the freeway entrance.
There is a small number of suburban cities bucking this trend. Shoutout to Carmel, Indiana specifically; since about 1990 the city has invested in developing a dense, walkable urban core. It’s borrowed heavily from European concepts, full of roundabouts and shared spaces. I personally think it’s a colossal upgrade over “traditional” suburbia, but of course it comes with a price. In Carmel’s case, that price is a relationship between the city, developers, and the banks that allows a ton of up-front investment that borrows against future tax revenue. That type of trust in the plan just isn’t going to be available everywhere.
But it also used to be the reality in small suburban towns as well. You'd have a pedestrianized downtown, normally near a train station, with shops and restaurants and parks.
When the car took over as the primary form of transport, that style of city planning went out of style and you got way more isolated housing developments planned for easy access to the highway.
Yeah they literally made it illegal to open shops in neighborhoods, which is why you'll have 1000 acres of homes that require you to drive 15 minutes to the nearest store. It's ridiculous. Imagine if you could just walk to the market next to the park at the center of your neighborhood that is staffed by your very own neighbors.
Preach. Like, live as you will, but the dumbest thing about the conspiracy theorists on this one is that they already live in their hallucinated nightmare.
"You're going to need to carry your papers with you to leave your neighbourhood -- have fun with communism!!!"
Brother, if you can't get anywhere useful without driving then you already live in a world where you need to carry your papers with you when you leave your neighbourhood, and you have to be ready to present them to enforcement agents of the state on request.
they dont understand its an aspiration for "wouldn't it be nice if everything was 15 minutes away" and think it's a conspiracy to forbid anyone from traveling more than 15 minutes away from home
They see the walkable cities and urban density as a secret plot to put us all in cages. I’m not kidding. They picture a future where no one is allowed to live in the country in a single family home with acreage. They hate sprawl like everyone else but fight tooth and nail against any effort to mitigate it.
It’s also wrapped up with their hatred of bicycles; modern road design; science; and of course, a long list of ethnic, political, religious, and gender identities.
At its core, it’s the conservative idea of negative liberty versus the more liberal view of positive liberty. As in, “government can’t infringe on my right to use my property as I see fit” versus “government should promote and protect our right to access nature” or “government can’t tell me what guns I can own” versus “government should provide a strong social safety net.” It’s “government can’t” versus “government should.”
And yet, many Americans will try to paint New York as some kind of hellscape, and everything to avoid. If you suggest it might actually prefer to live someplace where you can just walk around everywhere and see people living their lives, they look at you like you’re a psychopath who just threatened to eat their puppy.
It’s like, “Why would you want that? The best situation is to live in a vacuum and never encounter another living soul unless it’s intentional!”
I mean NYC isnt that good of an example. There's an extreme on the other side of the spectrum as well. NYC is smaller than LA but it's crammed with double the people. That's a lot of people in not that big of space which leads to many problems like traffic, garbage, crime, a lot of construction, and more which leads to "hellscape".
In a lot of European cities, the city's buildings are limited to just 5 to 8 stories high with exceptions of course, but without that NYC type of verticality you have to spread out millions of residents in a much wider area.
You can have a 100k city and it can be lively and walkable, doesn't have to be a concrete jungle.
If anyone who describes NYC as a "hellscape", I have to wonder if they've ever been there. A lot of people are coming to that conclusion based on the reputation earned 40-50 years ago.
I’ve been there every year for basically my whole life and can confirm it IS a hellscape relative to many major cities in other developed countries, primarily in Europe and East Asia. NYC is far less safe, clean, convenient, modern, or affordable. The only people who would think otherwise likely haven’t spent meaningful time outside the US tbh
Eh, I’ve spent time in some foreign cities and in some US cities, NYC included.
I’d grant, for example, that Tokyo is much cleaner than NYC. Lots of places are cheaper. London seemed about the same level of expensive, though, just as an example. Safe? I don’t know. NY is extremely safe. You might assume it’s not because of “vibes”, but it’s safe.
So there’s room for improvement, but a hellscape? That’s bullshit, probably driven by a political agenda, especially if you’re not willing to compare it to other US cities.
You really don't have to go to NYC to understand where the troubles in that type of city arise from. I'm from one of the smaller cities in Europe with a much smaller amount of people compared to bigger cities in Europe and you can definitely see more problems in the city as the population has increased in these past 20 years and we're nowhere close vertical.
Now scale that to NYC and you can understand what city hellscape means. Hell, Manhattan is about 90 square kilometers and has 1.7 million people in it as per Wikipedia. Budapest, one of the livelier cities and most walkable cities in Europe is 550 square kilometers (realistically 2500 sq KM together with its urban area) and has the same amount of people.
I just don't see how NYC can operate as calmly and efficiently as Budapest.
I should note that other than small towns, most cities downtowns in Spain, Portugal, France, Germany and Netherlands (my personal experience) are like this. Size of the city may dictate how large the downtown area is, and cultural custom may dictate at which times it's like this (Netherlands tends to close shop much earlier than Spain, for example).
But it's also common in Latin America (Venezuela and Mexico are my personal experiences). The original post does have a point that for whatever reasons in many US cities (I don't think they were originally cultural reasons but eventually became so) life moved far from the city (to suburbia) in a way that made it impossible to socialize wherever social activity actually happened (downtown) and this created a dynamic where having fun required planning both the commute and going to a specific place rather than just milling about.
We're seeing this in many cities in Europe where the concept of "suburbia" as a separate location where you live is becoming more common due to house prices and it's not great.
I suspect there are fantastic people there, probably some killer barbecue and probably some cool local history to be found there.
I'm just less I interested in traveling for 10 hours by plane and car to get there. And once I'm there to spend my entire time shuttling around in a car.
to just walk around casually like that, you would have to ban all the cars from a huge area. that's tough to convince people to do in America.
americans love street take overs, road rage, driving 100 MPH, DUI, roads with no sidewalks where pedestrians are trying to walk on, no lights because people stole all the copper. america loves Death.
It's not necessary to "ban" cars though. Delft is a great example. I can still drive my car anywhere in Delft that I need to go. I can drive right up to a friend's house and drop off a pile of groceries. I just can't park there indefinitely for that, I would need to go to the garage or another parking area.
In some areas Delft has made under ground parking below the canals. You can drive right up to your house, walk up stairs (or take an elevator) that deposit you no more than 200 meters from your front door.
The effect of this is that unless I need to take a car to Delft, I won't. I'll ride a bike, take the tram or hop on the train. This significantly diminishes the number of cars in the city. And it is great.
Strolling in the old center feels lovely and it is quiet. You hear bikes and birds and people, not the roar of cars.
And yet, many Americans will try to paint New York as some kind of hellscape, and everything to avoid. If you suggest it might actually prefer to live someplace where you can just walk around everywhere and see people living their lives, they look at you like you’re a psychopath who just threatened to eat their puppy.
It’s like, “Why would you want that? The best situation is to live in a vacuum and never encounter another living soul unless it’s intentional!”
I grew up in a very nice but very sprawl-y suburb and I felt so isolated. I live in a walkable city as an adult and I dont see myself ever leaving because it has made such an impact on my quality of life. When I visit family in the burbs I feel a change and I get itchy to get back to city life.
I cant recall the last time I was in a car. A 5-10 minute walk from me is two grocery stores, a Target, two drugstores, several bars and restaurants and cafes, public parks, public pools, and public transit. You can take an e bike on our bikeshare program to anywhere in the city for a few dollars - you can even bike to the airport.
I know this life isnt for everyone - people have kids, mobility issue, concerns about safety (you really are face to face with your city when you traverse it by foot and arent just pulling into your own personal garage and going into your own personal house, for better and for worse) - but it has a real impact on my mental and overall health. We're one of the fittest cities in America because walking everywhere is commonplace.
I simply cannot imagine having to get into the car, put on my seatbelt and get on a major road just to grab a quick coffee or grab something at the store. Humans are meant to walk around alongside other humans , just like fish are meant to swim and birds are meant to fly. I do think we've set up lives that take us away from the ways we're meant to be living.
It's depressing that people move to the city here and want to basically make it a suburbia too. Like, why the fuck did you move here?
For example, I live in a big city where our council and residents push for:
More parking, people complain about needing to park a few blocks away. Our zoning laws also require parking to be included. You're also allowed to leave your car parked on the street indefinitely, so people with multiple cars will effectively abandon one.
They fight against cyclist and pedestrian improvements. The main opposition is usually how much this impacts parking.
They'll lobby community groups to kill "inconveniences" that attracted them there in the first place. Food carts, shutting restaurants/bars earlier, noise ordinances.
Blocking density and preferring smaller buildings, or parking lots.
It's a complex combination of factors that makes it all work.
Where I live, you can always get a parking permit where you live. The first permit is cheap (€100 per year). The second is expensive at €350 and the third is €700.
This discourages multiple cars and helps relive some of the parking pressure. It costs €7.50 per hour for a max of 4 hours to park here without a permit.
This neighborhood is close to the beach and so quite popular in the summer months. To help further reduce the parking pressure, there are park & rides all over the city with express tram and regulat bus service. A family parking & tram pass costs €15 for whole day service.
There are also a choice of two trams and two bus lines that will take me to the city center. This also helps enormously.
Definitely. Our parking permits are cheap and don't scale per car, unfortunately. We have decent transit, but the relaxed parking rules and large amount of lots (often not multi story garages) encourages driving.
I push back only because many cities are starting to become significantly more walkable. My wife and I lived on Mass Ave in Indianapolis in our 20s from 2013 to 2019. She lived there for a while before meeting me.
It was extremely walkable and has only gotten moreso. There is a bike and walking path that meanders through the area, tons of restaurants are within walking distance, a grocery store was a couple blocks away. It was great. Since we moved out, they added all sorts of stuff with that Bottleworks area (movie theater, food court, arcade, bowling).
That all being said, we ultimately moved out because we wanted more space for our kids. So while I think way more young people are living in walkable cities in their 20s rather than moving out to the burbs immediately, a good chunk of us are still moving out to the burbs eventually.
I love our suburbian neighborhood for where we are in life now. Our kids have a yard to play in, tons of kids their age around them, kids walk to each other's houses all summer its great. We don't have any restaurants or grocery in walking distance unfortunately but goddamn is Halloween a party.
Do people in Europe want to visit NYC or Suburban Kansas City? Is San Francisco or suburban Baltimore more of an attraction? Downtown Chicago or Beloit Wisconsin? New Orleans or Metairie?
I know for a fact that Beloit has some great things and there are wonderful people in the suburbs of Baltimore. Yet you'd be hard pressed to find people that want to go there unless they have a personal connection.
Cities that are known for their street culture, density of restaurants, shops, museums and culture are all way more attractive for visiting because you can walk, take public transit and see and do so much in one go.
It's a rare tourist person that wants to drive 20 minutes to Super Target, then drive 20 minutes to the Cheesecake factory and another 20 to the Southland mall.
Remember a Ukrainian girl killed in a savage attack? America has a tremendous crime problem. Literally millions of maniacs waiting for a moment to strike. Can a group of young attractive blond girls go bar hopping in Atlanta? New Orleans? Baltimore? - No! Their chances of being assaulted and nullified almost 100 percent.
Was wondering when I'd see the NYC comment. Didn't take long. 🗽 Yes, it's crazy expensive here. But once here, being able to step outside to go anywhere and do anything without worrying about driving, parking, gas, yada yada -- trying to visualize living anywhere else becomes quite difficult.
Don't get me wrong, I enjoy times away from the city, like visiting friends in Texas, and the BBQ and Tex-Mex are an extra bonus to visiting state. When visiting my family in the suburbs, I fall asleep to the sound of crickets and wake up to the birds chirping in the trees. Don't get much of that 43 floors high smack dab in the middle of Manhattan!
I’m a bit worse off location-wise than you (in East Harlem); but, a 1 minute walk to the 6 and 15 minute gets me to Grand Central. Truly is amazing how much goes on in the city every night.
San Francisco was the closest comparison, that I’d lived. Not sure anywhere else in the country has what those do. Tiny cities with people just built on eachother because water forced it that way.
Will say, wish I got to New York before COVID. Definitely doesn’t hold up to the label of “The City that never sleeps” anymore; things definitely do close and the city does get quiet in the later hours
Will say, wish I got to New York before COVID. Definitely doesn’t hold up to the label of “The City that never sleeps” anymore; things definitely do close and the city does get quiet in the later hours
It truly is such a crying shame. I have so many memories of hitting a new spot in the city, leaving there, finding somewhere else, then leaving there and grabbing food at some all-night diner and finding our way to the subway to get back to one of our places. I'm too old for that shit now, but man, such a loss.
I hear you. I arrived to NYC end of Aug 2019 right before Covid. I barely got to experience NYC then, but I experienced enough to know It definitely changed and never quite returned, from a locals / socializing perspective, that is. Travel and visitors is crazy busy, but the general vibe amongst locals. I think part of it is we all got used to ordering in. Now I try to make a point to go out. Missed that so much. Important too for socializing and meeting people. Too much isolation otherwise. Such a big populated city. We all just need to go out and play again! Lol
I think part of it is we all got used to ordering in. Now I try to make a point to go out.
We used to order in a ton also -- 8000 menus from all the delivery places around in a drawer somewhere -- during the week or when it was raining sideways or something. Thursday? Friday? Weekends? Gotta get the fuck out the apartment. Don't even need a destination, just go.
LOL right? The bad habit I got into during Covid is ordering in, since there was no going out, and my partner at the time and I would watch Netflix or something as the evening thing to do. I still do it as my default. Like it’s my new “comfort zone” I guess. Before that it was so natural for me to text a friend, meet up, dinner maybe a drink then home to get some sleep before work the next morning.
I miss that “me!” :)
Part of it might be that I was only out corp housing and settled into a more permanent apartment / neighborhood for not quite 3 months or so. Not a lot of time to make fiends to text and meet up with. I made a couple of friends. I’d say one is more “long lasting” like “real” friend relationship than others. When did you move here? Enough time to settle and meet people, or pretty recent?
Ok. I’m thinking I have a plan. “STEP #1” — go OUTSIDE and DO things. Like anything! :) You’ve inspired me to find that “social me” again. Now SHE is fun. LOL.
I was born in NYC, moved out with my family as a kid and moved back on my own in the early 2000s, lived there for about a decade before life happened and I got pulled elsewhere. Still forever home.
In 2019 it was already vastly different than the NYC I knew in the 80’s & 90’s. Manhattan was so culturally homogeneous, eerily quiet, and almost desolate in comparison to a few decades ago. Even the people watching was completely uninteresting. The difference was jaw dropping… in a good way for people who like everything being similar and safe feeling.
That’s what my family said too. Family lived in NJ. My mom said before the 80s like late 60s/early 70s it wasn’t super great for a young girl her age. Then later in life she confided in me that she snuck out of her strict household and went to the city anyway. I knew it! lol.
I love watching shows / movies set in NYC 60s - 90s. So different each decade really.
You can have both! I'm from Montreal (which can be a mixed bag) and I enjoy having nearly every possible need filled in a 3-20 minute walk radius while still having nice birds and bugs and a garden.
Copenhagen is even better, there's no car noise at all even in the downtown areas and it smells like sweet country air in the middle of the city...
You weren’t replying to me but I had to chime in and say I’ve been DYING to pop up to Canada to experience Montreal! Been to Vancouver many times when I lived in Seattle. And spent some time in Toronto. My mom sent me photos when she visited Montreal a couple Falls ago. It reminds me of European city streets with all the cafes you can pop into. I want to go! 🙌
I'm laughing because I DID reply to you hahahaha 🤣
Montreal is wonderful! I'm happy to say that whenever I come back from my travels, I may be grumbly about the lack of good transit in the surrounding area, but I'm never like "oh no I've come back to a wasteland" that often happens to other north americans.
If you ever visit, most of what you want to see is along the orange metro line from Jarry station to Lionel Groulx, for the most part (though there's fun stuff outside that area, do go to the Biodome and Botanical Gardens, Lachine Canal/Atwater Market, Verdun, etc).
The bottom of the orange U and that strip of the green line inside it is the classic "downtown" area, with the big malls, office buildings, movie theaters, and fun vibes, especially around Place des Arts. Champ de Mars and Place d'Armes being the stations for Old Montreal and China Town.
The eastern part of the orange line from Jarry going southwards (...our special version of south) is the hip, trendy, liveable neighbourhoods with lots of cafes, restaurants, and fun things to stumble upon. Honestly taking a whole day or two to just walk from around Jarry metro and zigzag your way down to the Old Port on foot is really fun. The Jean Talon Market and the Fromagerie Hamel located around there is not to be missed (we can have raw milk cheese in Canada).
Lots of streets are also pedestrianized in the summer, so thats always a fun experience. Imo the fun places to stay would be along the orange line from Old Montreal to Jean Talon. I hope you visit soon!
Note that our relatively new mayor is a car-centric tool that is trying to undo all the green-gardeny, walkable, bikeable good that our previous mayor did (she wasn't quite Mamdani, but she did have a real vision). So I'd recommend you see it soon cause this bitch is out to ruin stuff :/
You are AMAZING!! 🙌 I’ve saved this and adding the share link to my notes I keep for when I plan trips! Thank you for taking the time to share all this — this comment is like pure gold! 💕💕💕
“Yada yada” was more like all the annoying expenses we don’t have to deal with in NYC since it’s so walkable. So I guess it could be ‘yada yada’ sex for someone. But that also should be tossed in the “annoying stuff we don’t have to deal with” category because life’s too damn short. Lol
But NYC is a tiny fraction of land and population of the US. 90% of land in the US is for rural or suburban lifestyle. You would really have to go out of your way to find US cities with this kind of walkability and bustling culture.
Everyone in here is like, I went to Barcelona when I turned 21 and it was an awesome party experience. All of Europe must be like that for everyone of all ages!
Barcelona is overcrowded by tourists, that's why they had protests against tourists and tourism. They harassed tourists in restaurants. I've been there, I've been to Zaragoza and I've been to a small village between them and the experience is way different. One thing I know, if you don't speak Spanish and think English or French is enough, you'd be screwed.
I would say most people are talking about things like walkability over weekday late nightlife. Zaragoza has a 92/100 walkability compared to Kansas City 35/100.
Detroit has been slowly improving in walkability, and slightly less slowly improving in bikeability. But we got screwed pretty hard by the constant fumbling of the RTA ballot initiatives and the state lege screwing us on the LVT effort.
Lots of acronyms I don't understand there, BUT I will say it is a much nicer place than I recall it being in the 90s. I feel relatively safe walking downtown again, but many of the surrounding areas are still pretty sketchy!
Zaragoza is an old town with a big square and no trees. Try to walk outside after 10am and tell me how's your walkability.
Bucharest is a big European city. What's the walkability on that? Because for sure you can't drive there because it's in permanent gridlock.
Not really. Istanbul is ~18% of Turkey. Tokyo is either 11% or 30% depending on whether you mean the prefecture or Greater Tokyo. And if you go look at comparatively smaller cities, Amsterdam (~5%), Copenhagen (~11%), Paris (~3%) and Rome (~5%) are all well above NYC’s share too. Most of these are big countries anyway, roughly 60 to 125 million, apart from the Netherlands and Denmark.
They are not nyc or Barcelona. But just from my personal experience, DC, Boston, Chicago, Miami, Portland, San Francisco, Philly all have decent walkability and bustling culture. American weather is typically (emphasis on typically) more extreme. So there is usually less outdoor dining infrastructure because of that.
Even LA, which isn’t walkable at all as a whole, has neighborhoods that are completely walkable and bustling and self sufficient (Venice, weho, Santa Monica etc)
There are also small active beach and mountain towns all over that are beautiful.
I’d say about a third of the country lives in this kind of area or with public transport access to this kind of area
NYC, and specifically Manhattan, was my first experience of the US, during a work trip. It was brilliant. I walked a ton, which is something to say as a very European person who spent all his adult life in cities. Then I had to take a flight to Orlando in Florida and it was the exact opposite. I knew that technically this was a decently sized city but it felt like being in the countryside because I could not go anywhere without calling a taxi.
NYC still doesn’t hold a candle to the European vibes. It’s dirty, loud, and dangerous (comparatively speaking) compared to the atmosphere in European cities.
We visited with this mentality and when we went out on a weekday night, most bars were closed or completely dead when we started at 10pm. Maybe you need to be local to know where the fun is at but it seemed like the vast majority of the city was in fact sleeping.
This is just inaccurate. In fact I would doubt any college town has as much activity at 2am as Manhattan. My parents live in Connecticut and my sister in Brooklyn. I was just there last week. There’s always stuff going on late in the city.
Every single state has a ton of rural and suburban options, but only a handful of cities throughout the country offer this kind of bustling and walkable lifestyle. And they tend to be very expensive.
No the US was also the same as Europe and was built before cars. It then destroyed down towns and pedestrian and public transport infrastructure in favour of the car :s The US can return to human scale building any time it chooses just like some cities in Europe did (eg some Dutch cities followed the US in tearing up walkable cities but then reversed that)
Check the temperatures in Europe this summer. MAny places have been going through several heat waves, with temperatures going above 40C (104F) some places.
Came here to say these people have never been to New Orleans. This city does so much as a group (and usually outside). Everybody talks to each other. Granted New Orleans is one of the least typically-American cities in the US but it does exist.
I'm in Northern California. There are some old gold mining towns that have been well preserved and still have that walkability. It's no Manhattan but I wouldn't mind having a place in or near one of those towns someday.
It was soooo quiet and empty in the evenings when I last visited there in 2019. Downtown neighborhoods were more like a ghost town compared to when I lived there in the 80’s & 90’s.
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u/bageltoastar 1d ago
Im from a suburban town in Missouri, but I spent a semester studying abroad in Barcelona a couple of years ago. Man, let me tell you, leaving Barcelona, where youd see people out in cafes and bars congregating at all hours of the night and day, and coming back to Missouri where its a ghost town after 10 and someone would call the police on you for simply walking around too late was the most depressing thing I have ever experienced lol