I live in a small, but dense, rural town in the Midwest. It has it’s problems, but there is a better sense of community here than any of the half dozen suburbs i grew up in, mostly because most of the homes are within walking/riding distance of a thriving little downtown. Some people are shut-ins who don’t want to mingle, and that’s fine. Some people i see regularly i have never talked to. There are even people in town who i hate, and others who hate me. The whole point of the OP is that small and walkable communities are how humanity evolved and has existed up until 100 years ago, and study after study has shown that every quality of life metric deteriorates when people live in car-centric environments.
Speaking of things I have a hard time explaining, particularly to people in NA, being car-centric and being large and urban are not the same thing. There are more functions of daily life that need a car here than in the large cities I’ve lived in. I walk to more things here, but there are also more things I don’t do for lack of a car. I’ve lived in cities where I never met anybody twice outside of work but I used public transportation for everything and had more access to certain services.
It’s not a binary between large and car-centric and small and walkable. It’s not even a binary between car-centric and walkable. There are different ways to organize transportation (each leading to different consequences in terms of social interactions).
What annoys me is this perception of walkable (implicilty smaller) towns being this haven of community and in turn a mental health refuge by way of whatever stereotype of healthy socialization the speaker happens to project. I am pretty versatile when it comes to this and not needing a car is my red line, but I dispute both the idealization of the small community and the notion that the mode of socialization presented as ideal in the OP’s thread is best for all, or even most people. If I was less of a recluse I would feel a lot more constrained in my small, walkable town, and I am very much not alone in that. The sense of isolation and constriction isn’t rare in this environment.
I live in a small, but dense, rural town in the Midwest. It has it’s problems, but there is a better sense of community here than any of the half dozen suburbs i grew up in, mostly because most of the homes are within walking/riding distance of a thriving little downtown. Some people are shut-ins who don’t want to mingle, and that’s fine. Some people i see regularly i have never talked to. There are even people in town who i hate, and others who hate me. The whole point of the OP is that small and walkable communities are how humanity evolved and has existed up until 100 years ago, and study after study has shown that every quality of life metric deteriorates when people live in car-centric environments.
Speaking of things I have a hard time explaining, particularly to people in NA, being car-centric and being large and urban are not the same thing. There are more functions of daily life that need a car here than in the large cities I’ve lived in. I walk to more things here, but there are also more things I don’t do for lack of a car. I’ve lived in cities where I never met anybody twice outside of work but I used public transportation for everything and had more access to certain services.
It’s not a binary between large and car-centric and small and walkable. It’s not even a binary between car-centric and walkable. There are different ways to organize transportation (each leading to different consequences in terms of social interactions).
What annoys me is this perception of walkable (implicilty smaller) towns being this haven of community and in turn a mental health refuge by way of whatever stereotype of healthy socialization the speaker happens to project. I am pretty versatile when it comes to this and not needing a car is my red line, but I dispute both the idealization of the small community and the notion that the mode of socialization presented as ideal in the OP’s thread is best for all, or even most people. If I was less of a recluse I would feel a lot more constrained in my small, walkable town, and I am very much not alone in that. The sense of isolation and constriction isn’t rare in this environment.