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[Deleted member 752119]

This thread is super weird.

There's seems to be a conversation by two separate sides who (seemingly) have never experienced the other.

People are just being weirdly combative over the preferences. I grew up (18 years) in a rural area in a rural state with only small towns within driving distance. Spent 4 years in college at a big state college in a small city in the same state. Then 7 years in the suburbs in the DC Baltimore area for 7 years with kind of sucked (loved the cities, but hated the suburbs) and then have been in the Atlanta area for going on 8 year. First 4 in midtown which imo is the best part of the city by a landslide, 3 years in a shit suburb 16 miles or so east of the city which really sucked, and a year or so where we are now in a little neighborhood in East Atlanta just barely outside city limits--which is ok but still sucks compared to midtown. But at least we're only 3.5 miles or so from Kirkwood and the cool part of Decatur (though as before Kirkwood kind of sucks as there are so many young parents lugging their kids to all the cool spots and letting them run rampant while they drink lately).

So I know what I like from my own experience. A big point of tension with my fiance is not being able to do the condo life because of her large, elderly dogs and how long she can go without dogs if we move back to midtown after they pass.

That said, I have no animosity at all towards suburbs or rural living. I just know they're not for me as someone not having kids, who doesn't like dealing with a yard or spending much time outside in the yard we do have, and likes being out and about and having lots of restaurants, concerts, art galleries etc. within walking distance or a short uber ride. I just got sick of being a shut in and playing games, watching tv/movies all the time and just like being out. Even if I want to read or game a lot of times I'm more apt to go to the park or a pub or a coffee shop and read on my Kindle or play my Switch than sit at home these days if time permits.

 

[Jellycrackers]

This thread is super weird.

There's seems to be a conversation by two separate sides who (seemingly) have never experienced the other.

Definitely. I don't mind people sharing their experience and what they do/don't like about the suburbs or cities. But insulting one or the other and making huge generalizations is just childish. Different strokes for different folks. It's how life works!

This reminds me a bit of a youtube comment section where people are saying you can either be a Halo or Call of Duty fan But with better grammar.

 

[sazabirules]

Both have their own pros and cons. I don't have a preference. I wasn't surprised the suburb mentioned in the OP is my hometown.

I do find it funny that people in this thread seem to have some animosity towards chain restaurants and stores.

 

[Lucky Seven]

Latest headline - Millennials are KILLING the suburbs

 

[Lasthope106]

Both have their own pros and cons. I don't have a preference. I wasn't surprised the suburb mentioned in the OP is my hometown.

I do find it funny that people in this thread seem to have some animosity towards chain restaurants and stores.

Yeap. I will go wherever my job takes me. Be it a city, suburb, or small town, I'm sure I can find a way to be happy in all of them.

 

[PumpkinSpice]

This thread is super weird.

There's seems to be a conversation by two separate sides who (seemingly) have never experienced the other.

Yeah I got the same impression.

From my perspective the right environment is something in the middle of both extremes. Like transit oriented suburbs, or a mid-rise area just outside a city core.

The false dichotomy between expensive shoebox in the sky vs one-of-a-million identical McMansions on a loops-and-lollipops street plan 10 min drive away from anything is pretty strange.

Everywhere you can live is ultimately about compromises. I used to live above a grocery store on an old streetcar suburb a 10 min walk from downtown in a mid-size city. It was extremely convenient, but you know the ambulances going by every 30 mins or the drunk people trying to sing opera at 2am were not so great, nor was a shared laundry facility, or the university nearby meaning tons of stupid students, and that 10 min walk to downtown isn't so convenient when my job was in a business park out of town.

Everyone's circumstances are different and it's important to recognize the good and bad. Like I would be the first to point out the bad of my neighborhood.

 

[Google]

Doesn't a suburb by nature mean you're close to the city?

Or am I confused?

 

[Lasthope106]

Doesn't a suburb by nature mean you're close to the city?

Or am I confused?

Some can be pretty far from the core, then you also have to factor how bad does the traffic get.

 

[PumpkinSpice]

Doesn't a suburb by nature mean you're close to the city?

Or am I confused?

Kinda sorta. As suburbs have continued further and further you end up with the 2 hour drives in big cities to get to downtown. Nowadays the furthest out areas tend to be called exurbs.

Toronto is a good example of this. People keep moving further out and the "GTA" keeps expanding to include more areas.

 

[Deleted member 752119]

Doesn't a suburb by nature mean you're close to the city?

Or am I confused?

It does, but as they expand they get further and further away.

Aside from that, it's a HUGE difference to living in a suburb where you're 30-60+ minutes away from the cool parts of a city depending on day of week and traffic and living there and walking out your door step to said cool stuff.

So the preference is mostly down to how much being IN all that stuff matters vs. how much you want a house, space for family and other perks people note of suburban life.

For someone like me and my fiance who aren't having kids, don't need a ton of space etc. city life makes sense as its easy for us to eat out and go to all the events we love. For others who are family oriented, spend more time inside their home, want a yard etc. suburban life is worth the trade off of being in the city. And some just don't like eating out, bars, city events etc. so of course city living isn't for them.

 

[Randdalf]

Somebody posted a fantastic video on here a few years ago about suburban sprawl, laying out all the problems that urban planning in that style causes. I actually went back and found it when having a similar conversation before, because I found it really compelling.

Anyway, the video is below, and I believe it somewhat answers the question in the OP:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMvwHDFVpCE&

 

[SpecX]

Depends on the burb. Where I grew up, I felt the exact same as the city lovers in here. There wasn't shit to do as a kid, commuting everywhere for excitement was the thing to do, and unique restaurants didn't exist. I still live in the burbs for my family/kids, but I enjoy where I live much better. I have plenty of unique restaurants, the clubs in the old town section are lively and enjoyable, things still require driving, but there's enough to do within our city limits that make it ok. I no longer need to go all the way to San Diego or LA to enjoy the nightlife and still get to enjoy a 15 min work commute down the road.

 

[Google]

I'm in Vancouver. My office is downtown and I live in White Rock (40KMs away).

White Rock is one of the few parts of suburbia that has some identity (seaside town, still feeling pretty old school) but it's close enough to:

1. Suburbia. Malls with all the H&Ms, GAPs and Old Navy you can shake a stick at.

2. Vancouver for the weekend trip to watch the football, enjoy the beaches or go to the seawall.

I guess for me, a 45-60 minute drive to have a nice day out with the family isnt really a big deal. But that's about the limit for me.

 

[smokeandmirrors]

Are you kidding me? My daily train rides are the best part of my day! 3 hours a day of peace to play my games and listen to my music and read my books, 3 hours free from the kids and the wife and the boss and the co-workers! I love it! Delays because of signal troubles? So good.

This is very location dependent.

I have a 30 min bus ride into work, which is a great opportunity to play handheld games without it feeling long at all. I actually really prefer this arrangement to a 30 min walk even as I get a lot of use out of this time.

then you live in a decent suburban area. Train/Bus where you get your own time to game, read, sleep, etc. is far better than driving.

Traffic was way worse when I lived in the city, and it took longer to commute to/from work.

did you live in a city with good public transit?

Somebody posted a fantastic video on here a few years ago about suburban sprawl, laying out all the problems that urban planning in that style causes. I actually went back and found it when having a similar conversation before, because I found it really compelling.

Anyway, the video is below, and I believe it somewhat answers the question in the OP:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMvwHDFVpCE&

seconding this: this is a great video.

 

[Weevilone]

I just took a trip to the PNW, spend most of my time in Portland and Seattle and really loved both those cities. Now I'm finding myself depressed at being back in my boring DC suburb. I somewhat feel this way every time I go to an urban area, but even more so this time. It feels boring and lifeless here, and I hate how spread out everything is and that you have to drive almost everywhere.
Is this just a grass is greener thing? I'm sure there's annoying stuff about living in a city too, and there are definitely worse places than NOVA (I'm listening to S-Town right now, glad as hell I'm not in rural Alabama). I do software/sysadmin work so I could probably find a job in one of those places pretty easily, but part of me feels like I'd just be contributing to the gentrification everyone complains about.
Does anyone who's gone from rural/suburban to a city have some words of wisdom?

Just live where you prefer to live. Doesn't mean the other choice sucks. Every time I'm in the city and return home, I feel like I've escaped.

 

[gutter_trash]

I lived in both; I like both but also hate both for different reasons.

City Love:
Walking, going-out, public transit, proximity to work, restaurants, parks, biking.

City Hate:
street closures, traffic, too many people, noisy, road work 24/7, trouble parking, shitty neighbors, not family friendly, can't buy a house.

Suburb Love:
parking, ease of shopping/ groceries, space, backyard, more quiet, family. bigger sidewalks. House.

Suburb Hate:
blend, boring, chain restaurants, most commute like a bitch to get to work, public transit is weaker.

 

[ccbfan]

Depends on the Suburbs.

I like my situation and I've live in major cities, minor cities and rural before.

30 minute train ride to one of the biggest cities in the world. (40 to the center)

20 minutes drive to four other cities.

1-2 Mile walk to some nice restaurants and bars (Or I can drive there in 5 minutes and easily find parking.)

No chain restaurants though. My village (and the villages around me) doesn't allow chain restaurants for some reason. I have to drive to the city to get McDonalds and Taco Bell which is my guilty please.

 

[smisk]

Having lived in big cities my whole life, I think it boils down to having no sense of culture or community - no 'human connection' in your immediate vicinity.

• yes, there's a "community", but it's in a nominal, arms-length way, where everyone's walled apart and they can see each other more easily than they can talk to each other or meaningfully interact.
• there are no shops or services within immediate walking distance, so you don't get lots of people walking back and forth
• there are no 'watering holes' at frequent intervals - no bars, maybe a rare kids' playpark - meaning there's no place to go and sit when you just want to interact with people
• you don't have signs and art and creativity everywhere - not even in the architecture. There's no sense of humanity in the environment. Front lawns don't count imo - they don't feel like a shared endeavour

It's a horrible culture that emphasises living in a bubble and seeing your neighbours/community as the 'other'.

I think this sense of isolation is what really gets to me. I don't know anyone in my apartment complex, and every time I go somewhere it's in a metal and glass bubble. There's a few places near me I can walk to, like my gym, but it's very limited.

 

[Doctoglethorpe]

I like the compromise between the peace and quiet of rural and closeness to essential locations in cities that suburbs provide. Cities are noisy and dirty. Rural is too desolate. Suburb is just right.

 

[ezrarh]

Arguing over preference leads nowhere and is not that constructive. Question is are they financially viable? In many cases, their construction requires municipalities taking on large amount debt to service pipes roads, new schools, etc. Often times, low density suburbs do not generate enough income to service long term maintenance hence why you see "cycles of decline" - especially in the older 1950s suburbs.

 

[KingV]

Latest headline - Millennials are KILLING the suburbs

But I'm 5 years they will likely be saving them. IMO, it's cyclical, and millenials are getting married and having kids later.

 

[Walter White Walker]

I first grew up south of Seattle and then moved north of it when I was a little kid. I've never had any desire to live in that city. It used to be nice to visit but it's gotten so much freaking worse in every way over the years that has resulted in a city that is binarily either poor (especially homeless people) and those with a lot of income with everyone else being increasingly pushed out.
Even if that wasn't the case I really just don't want to live in an urban setting. I like going out my door and within not that many minutes being able to hike in the woods without a crowd around me or not having to deal with the noise and nonsense of a city. It's a lot more relaxing out in the suburbs while not being so far out like a rural setting. If for some reason I really want to do something in the city (which is rather rare for me) it's not like it's that far away.

 

[ElNino]

did you live in a city with good public transit?

This is/was in Toronto. It can be a decent public transit system if you live on the subway line, but hit and miss otherwise. My wife and I lived right on the subway line when we were first married, but it was still often a 45 minute commute downtown. When we moved to a townhouse off of the subway line, the commute went to 60-90 minutes depending on traffic.

Conversely, on the east side of the city I'm a 45 minute train ride from my office. Really, the only "bad" part of my commute is getting out of the parking lot at the end of the day, but even that is only 5-10 minutes.

 

[Beach]

Live in an LA "suburb" like Pasadena, Burbank and Glendale and you have all you need.

Many of these post describing suburbs sound straight out of a 60s movie.

 

[Chozoman]

What is your response to how you are living the most Earth unfriendly like possible?

Yep, It truly is the "most Earth unfriendly life" ever imagined by the human race. It took a while, but I did it! Sorry everyone, but I've got to have my hammock trees.

 

[FrontalMonk]

I think this sense of isolation is what really gets to me. I don't know anyone in my apartment complex, and every time I go somewhere it's in a metal and glass bubble. There's a few places near me I can walk to, like my gym, but it's very limited.

I grew up in NOVA, and I think the thing about the burbs is that you have to drive everywhere. Like, there's plenty of shit to do but unless you're a stone's throw away from RTC or Tyson's or something chances are good that you're gonna have to drive to get to a mutual meeting place.

You said you're a sysadmin, right? If you like city life, there's plenty of good paying jobs in the city and you can just find an apartment in DC. I knew a lot of folks who lived in DC and worked in Arlington.

Edit: I saw your other posts and it sounds like you're in Centreville, commuting to Manassas? Yeah, that commute isn't bad because you don't have to deal with the majority of the BS of NOVA traffic, but I think I found your problem, lol. In your situation I would definitely try to get a job closer into the city and move into DC as a best case scenario, hit up Old Town Alexandria on the weekend as a worst case scenario. Either way, get more metro accessible.

 

[Faiz]

People freaking out cause they might actually see or God forbid have to interact with another soul.

Hilarious when I was replying to:

Opinion threads are always fun. I feel like some people have painted a weird dystopian picture of suburbs though.

Some urbanites in here are literally talking about some bizarre existential dread they experience being "disconnected" and not surrounded by conveniences when in the suburbs. Suburbanites are basically going "yeah I just don't like crowds". Difference is obvious.

 

[conman]

Live in an LA "suburb" like Pasadena, Burbank and Glendale and you have all you need.

This has been my solution. Find a city-like suburb or a suburb-like city. You get the lifestyle of a city with the convenience and lower cost of a suburb.

 

[Sho_Nuff82]

Suburbs are for families. Cities are for work and young professionals.

 

[UnObtainium17]

It depends on what city that is. I live in Houston suburbs (near Katy area) and I'd rather be here in suburbs than downtown Houston. If you say Miami or Orlando or Chicago then I'd rather be in the main city than the surrounding neighborhoods.

 

[Crispy75]

There is a strong argument that the whole concept of suburbia is a Ponzi Scheme: The large ongoing infrastructure costs of suburbia far outstrip the returns on that property. While growth was rapid, those returns could be used to pay the long-term costs. But now we're in the "Bank Always Wins" phase and the whole thing is coming unglued. Lots of reading: https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-scheme/

 

[teruterubozu]

Live in an LA "suburb" like Pasadena, Burbank and Glendale and you have all you need.

Including 110 degree summers.

 

[PumpkinSpice]

There is a strong argument that the whole concept of suburbia is a Ponzi Scheme: The large ongoing infrastructure costs of suburbia far outstrip the returns on that property. While growth was rapid, those returns could be used to pay the long-term costs. But now we're in the "Bank Always Wins" phase and the whole thing is coming unglued. Lots of reading: https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-scheme/

The argument here is that property developers did the streets, sidewalks, water/sewage work for "free" and that 50 years down the road the city needs to pay big $$$ to maintain it, much more than they would be getting in taxes from the residents.

The infrastructure maintenance costs of suburbs depends on various factors, but chiefly density. As always good city planning is leads to more sustainable cities. Poor city planning leads to situations where you have maintenance costs that are unreasonable for the population it would be servicing, as population per sq mile is low and the costs of rebuilding sewers is pretty much constant per mile of sewer.

Anyway the long and short of it is that you need a minimum density to have suburbs make any sense financially. You can still have most of the usual suburb stuff but you just need to have smaller lot sizes along with more townhouse / condo options mixed in. It's also good to increase transit penetration to reduce wear on streets, and to manage water using careful grading and ground penetration to reduce stress on storm drainage systems.

 

[Deleted member 752119]

Cities are for work and young professionals.

And those of us not having kids who enjoy city life.

 

[Gallbaro]

And those of us not having kids who enjoy city life.

And those of use who have kids and enjoy city life.

 

[Aiustis]

I'd just live in the country if I wasn't in the city.

 

[Deleted member 752119]

And those of use who have kids and enjoy city life.

Of course. ��

Just hard financially to get enough space for a lot of families in a lot of cities.

I'd just live in the country if I wasn't in the city.

Not me. I don't like the suburbs, but they at least have more options for dining etc. than the country and are at least close to the city. I grew up in a very rural area and hated it. Never again.

 

[finalflame]

I'd just live in the country if I wasn't in the city.

100% same.

 

[Beaulieu]

City and Rural are nice
Suburbs are death

 

[gutter_trash]

It depends on what city that is. I live in Houston suburbs (near Katy area) and I'd rather be here in suburbs than downtown Houston. If you say Miami or Orlando or Chicago then I'd rather be in the main city than the surrounding neighborhoods.

excellent point, all is relative to the quality of life depending on different cities and different suburbs surrounding cities.

a suburb that excellent commute to Down-Town is actually the best of both worlds since one can have a taste of both