Your positive examples all have one thing in common: they're not happening in cities. Just because a car makes sense in the countryside or beach does not mean it makes sense inside of a city.
A problem with our approach to urban planning is that we get large, sterile apartment buildings or detached single family homes but absolutely nothing in between. If that missing middle was allowed by right, you'd find what I enjoy right now: both human connections and a car-lite lifestyle.
Neither is people willingly moving there. Dense urban living might appeal to young people but once you build a family and priorities change to peace & quiet, safety, good schools, and stable property values, dense urban living loses most of its appeal.
I grew up in a rural town (originally zoned for agriculture) where slowly over the next three decades became a town where rich doctors, lawyers, and accountants live now. I always get a kick seeing a certain individual sell a plot of farm land to build condos that now sell for $600k each next to a pond where I would fish as a kid. My ancestral home costs $80,000 and the land alone today is worth nearly a million dollars. Florida is definitely a case study where while zoning is relaxed, planning has little to zero forethought.
Growing up during this transition sucked. My family was poor so I didn't get a car until I was 21; there were also no sidewalks to walk anywhere, nearest bus stop was 3 miles from my home. It blew, I had to rely on my parents to do anything. There was no independence for me. If I wanted to go to a friends house that was 2 miles away, I'd have to walk across 3 difference highways and busy roads; highly dangerous for a 12 year old.
I remember visiting a cousin that lived Cambridge, MA and I was so jealous that she was able to do what she wanted without a car. She was 14 and had access to nearly the entire Cambridge/Boston/Quincy area by virtue of just walking. Bonus? My Aunt and Uncle had a SFH in Cambridge.
It is possible to develop areas like this. It's not a switch you turn on or off, but we purposely limit these areas to the affluent:
Now nearly 15 years later, I can live a similar lifestyle my cousin did but only because I have a well paying tech job.
edit: after reading some other replies you made, I'm not trying to make an either or situation but simply give people a choice on where to live. Walkable communities are extremely popular in the US, it's where land value is extremely high and homes are desirable. It's not just limited to NYC or Chicago or Boston, there are walkable towns in Minnesota (Milwaukee Avenue, Minneapolis) and even Florida (Seaside); if there were more walkable cities in the US I would bet my life's labor that they would become populated easily.
Those values are totally compatible with dense urban living! I have kids and enjoy all of those things in a walkable/bikeable community (Boston, MA). Most Americans have never seen it work so they think it's impossible. The reality is that it's illegal to build these places and the environment found here was built before NIMBYs strangled it.
I think you are discounting the desires of others. I personally love having my little slice of land. Cooking for myself in my own kitchen. I don't mind a drive every couple of weeks to get some more food. I know all my neighbors and bbq with them occassionally. I don't wish to break up dense city culture, why do you want to break up my preferred suburban culture? Can't we live in peace rather than dumping on each other's life choices?
They're talking about wanting dense urban living, and you're talking about preserving suburban living. Having one doesn't remove the other. Good, dense, urban living, however is very often shut down by suburbanites, because they work in cities, and actively shut down any attempts to reduce cars (and car amenities) in cities.
Once you build a family you need 3 bedrooms and probably don’t have $1.8 million for such a condo. But the reason condos cost so much per square foot is regulation. Fundamentally, they should be cheaper than comparable houses.
>But the reason condos cost so much per square foot is regulation.
Can you cite any specific examples of such regulations here? I currently live in a condo that was converted over from an apartments (quite common). If anything, the reason a condo might cost more per square foot is that smaller houses cost more per sqft period (less sqft to 'divide' fixed expenses across).
Try a zoning map, like San Francisco. Multifamily structures are illegal on the vast majority of the land. In those areas that do allow multifamily, it is mostly very small ones. And even when a large multifamily structure is permitted by zoning, it can be years of environmental litigation and discretionary review hearings.
Most areas in the US have regulations along the lines of "Ratio of floor area to size of lot must be no higher than X, must have at least Y parking spots per unit, building must be no taller than Z stories" which greatly increases the cost of multi-family housing units.
The Netherlands seems to pull off having a high fertility rate [1] and high population density [2]. Anecdotally, my friend who was born there in the late 1980s described being allowed to travel alone starting from a young age. I had one American friend born in the same generation who was allowed to bike around LA in his mid-teens, and my parents almost called CPS on him.
The idea of the post is that American cities are badly designed, and IMO current criticism makes no sense without looking at European cities and how American cities could look more like them.
Completely agree with you, and its telling that virtually every response here has been "That's only true in the US!". I've lived in Japan, and its true, urban living there is much better for families. But the premise of this thread is American cities and why people choose to live elsewhere, dependent on their cars. And the answer is precisely what you've said.
American cities are not only unpleasant families and the many people who don't fall in the young, single, relatively wealthy professional class, they are actively hostile towards them. Almost no one in the suburbs lives there because they love suburban life. They live there because it's the lesser evil compared to living in the city, given their personal situation. The people here calling for bans on cars are treating cancer with cough medicine. If people want to remove the American dependence on cars, they need to make American cities a more than a playground for the young professional class, and make them places a large proportion of Americans would actually want to live in.
> If people want to remove the American dependence on cars, they need to make American cities a more than a playground for the young professional class, and make them places a large proportion of Americans would actually want to live in.
This is precisely what happens when you remove cars from cities.
Maybe you think that because the only dense urban living options available to you are the car hellscapes?
I've been raised in Warsaw (a dense capital of Poland). I've had good schools within walking distance. I've had access to quiet green spaces within walking and biking distance (they weren't paved over for parking lots). I've had lots of places to hang out with my friends, who lived nearby, or whom I could reach myself via frequent, reliable, and affordable public transport.
And Warsaw wasn't a particularly utopian city. Just built with decent public transport and without NIMBY zoning policies.
I'm just giving a counter example that dense cities can be appealing for raising a family, and even an unexceptional city like Warsaw can manage it with the right priorities. The fact that something exists doesn't mean it's the only and forced option.
These "Cars Bad" articles are always written from the perspective of people who live in cities, and like city living. If you live in Chicago or NYC or SF, of course we should have fewer SFHs, more apartments, fewer cars, use mass transit, make things walkable, and so on. It's hard to disagree with that.
But if you live in a county with 50 people per square mile, none of these things make sense. Cars are basically required, apartments don't make sense, mass transit is nonexistent, and nothing is walkable, and that's often why people move there.
I like the USA because you can choose where to live. If you want to live in a concrete honeycomb, walk everywhere, take the subway, great! Move to the city! If you want to depend on a car and live where you can't even see your neighbor's house let alone hear it, great! Move to the country! One choice is not objectively better for everyone.
A problem with our approach to urban planning is that we get large, sterile apartment buildings or detached single family homes but absolutely nothing in between. If that missing middle was allowed by right, you'd find what I enjoy right now: both human connections and a car-lite lifestyle.
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