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by snow_mac 1205 days ago
Why the hell would I live in an American city? I live in Colorado. Denver is our 'city', there is no parking, no room for my 2 dogs and my kid would not have a giant backyard to play in.

Instead, I have a 3400 sq ft house on 10,000 sq ft of land with giant trees everywhere. I'm within 2 miles of lightrail, that I will never use.

I work from home, I have a home office with a indoor, led powered garden with fresh fruit and flowers year round.

My wife works 30 minutes from home, she's a school teacher. We wanted to live closer to her school but we'd get a much smaller house with no parking and no room for the kids and dogs to play.

Again, why would I buy near or in any city? 15 minutes from downtown Denver is to close for my taste.

I love theatre, I love restaurants but honestly, I hate driving in Denver. The traffic sucks. I love driving. I love craft coffee, my house is 1 mile from the coffee factory that makes the coffee whole foods uses; I enjoy a craft coffee from that place once in a while.

Why is walkable so desired? When it's cold (like today) I don't want to leave my car. I'd drive through any day, I'd drive just to avoid walking half a mile.

Denver banned the scooters and other options from lyft and bird, so I have to lug my giant body from location to location? No thanks, I'll take my 4000 pound car to the restaurant instead.

Then I'll go home, enjoy my big beautiful yard and not worry about living in the city.

I don't go to the gym, instead I have a treadmill and a bike in my basement. If I want to do something, I just get in my car and go. I want to get a solar system and buy an electric car but so far no one will install on my style of roof

4 comments

> Denver banned the scooters and other options from lyft and bird, so I have to lug my giant body from location to location? No thanks, I'll take my 4000 pound car to the restaurant instead.

Is there a source for this? I live in Denver and am currently staring at a dozen Lyft scooters and a few bikes parked on the corner next to my apartment. Lime also operates scooters and bikes, which I usually see parked across the street at the apartments next door.

There are a few places that are geofenced (e.g. along 16th St Mall), but judging by how many people I see riding them on e.g. Cherry Creek trail as I'm biking, I don't think they're generally banned.

I was in Denver yesterday and rode two scooters and a Lyft e-bike…
Cities are terrible to get around in by car, that’s for sure. But why you feel you need to, and why there aren’t better options, ultimately trace back to the city’s concessions to suburban auto-centric attitudes. In cities whose populations actually embrace their being cities (vs. centers of suburban agglomerations), you find destinations close enough to walk, safe and plowed bike paths, fast and frequent buses, and extensive train networks.
> I hate driving in Denver. The traffic sucks.

> Why is walkable so desired? When it's cold (like today) I don't want to leave my car. I'd drive through any day, I'd drive just to avoid walking half a mile.

This is an amazing example of the terrible disease that is Car Brain.

Instead of having a walkable city where you can walk to the shops/gym/restaurants, take convenient public transport to the theatre, and take the kids/dog to the park next door, live in a massive isolated bunker, drive your massive pickup truck to buy groceries, and wonder why the city is so congested with cars and trucks all doing the same thing. Madness.

I wonder what effect the bunker life has on children... Since this kind of distance is relatively new in our typically communal existence
All the ‘walkable’ cities still seem to be congested with cars.
However much or little road space you build in cities, it will always be congested with cars (unless you charge or ban them). So the trick is to waste as little space as possible on that.
"If one simply becomes wealthier than the Earth can even potentially sustain for more than a tiny portion of the population at once, living within visual distance of any other person becomes undesirable."
Where's that quote from?