Ok that’s misleading a bit. The poll asked if you’d rather live in a larger house that’s further from other people but stuff like restaurants are miles away, or smaller and closer together but stuff like restaurants are within walking distance. I’m paraphrasing but only slightly here.
You’re extrapolating the car based and walking based part, but these people could also want more public transportation and bike routes. Maybe these people already live in cramped apartment buildings and just dream of having a big house. There’s other factors than just “me dum American me want car”
Seriously, I just don’t want to be bothered by people or live in an apartment where I get to hear my neighbors or constantly encounter them.
Most Americans are selfish fucks.
Signed,
An American.
Probably due to most of them already living in car based societies that are far apart. Living like that makes me people hate their neighbors, and they want no one to encroach on their kingdoms
Every apartment I have ever lived in has been akin to hell on earth. Loud, unruly neighbors. Unwalkable area. So far away from amenities it takes 15 minutes of driving to get anything. No shade. Bad smells.
Its no wonder. There’s a few awesome neighborhoods i would love to move to, with great walkable street, groceries, books, restaurants all only a few minutes of walking away. I would love to move to those places but they are so expensive I could never dream of it.
54% of Americans read below the equivalent of a sixth-grade level.
I bet there’s a lot of overlap between these two groups.
I don’t necessarily want a big house but I do want space for a workshop where I can build/fix furniture and such and a garden where I can sit outside and chill by myself. I don’t see how I could have those things living in an apartment.
Moot point though. I doubt I’ll ever be able to afford a house. Let alone a nice one.
Why does it have to be 1 or the other in a city? You can absolutely have both in mixed development, add in shops for basic needs as well. Is it going to be as big a a suburban place? No, but you can have a small garden and a garage.
It’s really weird and unnerving seeing American cities and suburbs. They are so badly planned/zoned for actual living, when compared to European countries
I don’t know, I’m not a housing developer. If I could those things and be able to walk to places that’d be dope, but if I have to choose I’m going with the option that gives me the things I want over walkability.
I would guess that many people have never lived in a good, dense, location. My parents would vote for farther apart, but when they think of the city they think of The Warriors
It’d be interesting to poll only people who have lived in a variety of places.
I grew up in a car-focused suburb and never want to go back.
Yeah the very idea of a non-car based community is so far removed from most Americans’ brains that they think they’d have to walk 10 miles through snow or ride “dangerous, unpredictable public transit” just to get groceries. I happen to live somewhere with a nice little “downtown ish” area. There’s just one line of blocks that’s got most everything you’d need: grocery store, post office, library, some restaurants/bars. My only complain is that there’s only like 2 or 3 little apartment complexes within a 10 min walk. Everything else is houses
I prefer a 80m2 apartment in a walking/public transport based community tyvm.
Some of us have big houses in walkable communities. You can have both, though you have to sacrifice on the yard / lawn (which is a good thing anyways, seeing what Americans do with theirs ; which is to say they do nothing, and on purpose too !)
For me the yard is what I really want. Being able to grow fruits and veggies and attract birds and pollinators is my jam. I think my family could live quite happily with basically a bedroom attached to a big kitchen. But I don’t think I could forfeit the yard.
I don’t understand it. Good public transit, a townhouse of an appropriate size, and most of what I need in walking distance would be amazing. Yeah I may still want a car, but I’d have to seriously ask myself if it’s worth the cost
If i were too fat to walk, i would too
That’s not the only reasons you might not be able to walk, and we do need to keep non-walkers in mind when designing cities.
I believe there are better solutions that each individual operating a multi-ton machine that requires non-renewable resources. (Even my EV requires tire changes, and AFAIK, we haven’t figured out a cyclic economy for them.)
I have the best of both worlds: small house in a car-based community. Sigh.
Well, it is a country famous for being stupid and selfish and celebrating both…
Why not both?
Big yard
Small town
Everything you need in the town centre
Bus going around every 30 minutes
Good enough for me.
When I started writing this post I thought
I would only write two or three
Lines
And now this format has proven
Inefficient
Doesn’t work if the small town is one gigantic stroad of abandoned or soon to fail local shops, that cuts the town in half. And the only flanking businesses are corporate mega chains that asphyxiate the local economy. Which are like 90% of small towns™ in the USA.
Hyperindividualism and apparent institutionalized agoraphobia.
My agoraphobia comes from a lifetime of being bullied by people so I don’t like people. I like my small house and small suburban backyard that I grow vegetables and have chickens in.
with a little AFFLUENZA mixed into it.
