Precisely. My general theory is that you could significantly improve most suburbs by knocking down a block (or even just half a block) near the center of the suburb and building a mini "downtown" - a commercial area interspersed with a few modestly-sized apartment buildings.
That's far from the optimal design if you're starting from scratch, but it solves a lot of problems without massive changes.
I grew up in American suburbia and hated it. It wasn't even one of the worst examples, but you still literally could not walk to the local LIRR station or to the park, which were just 1-2 miles away. Absurd. Build commercial areas and some more sidewalks, and it would've been much less terrible.
That's far from the optimal design if you're starting from scratch, but it solves a lot of problems without massive changes.
I grew up in American suburbia and hated it. It wasn't even one of the worst examples, but you still literally could not walk to the local LIRR station or to the park, which were just 1-2 miles away. Absurd. Build commercial areas and some more sidewalks, and it would've been much less terrible.