Why don’t Americans embrace urban living?

[Anonymous]

You couldn’t pay me to live in DC. I lived in Georgetown during law school and I never liked it. Who want to haul their groceries to their house? The crime is an issue. One that I don’t want to deal with on a regular basis.

I love my big house in the burbs. I go into DC once a year. Nothing there I need.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So I was in an Arlington bakery today and parked next to a car with a DC license plate. I went inside and spotted the DC people immediately. Scruffy beard man with beanie, biking shorts, and Yale sweatshirt; aggressive woman with hair in messy topknot, long skirt, and ill fitting shirt; two scraggly looking kids with net skirts and tangled hair bumping into people and yelling. Woman and man were separately arguing with teenage kids who did not get their orders right -- man wanted his two donuts in a box rather than a bag but didn't tell the kid until he handed them to him in a bag and said he "expected" a box; wife complaining that the bread did not smell fresh. People just stepped away from them and let them melt down. In a bakery -- on a Sunday afternoon. After trying to get a discount because the donuts were crushed, they got into their Prius and drove away.

They are definitely city folk.

As someone from neither Arlington nor DC but familiar with both, I love that you differentiate so much between the two when Arlington is literally like a mile from DC proper. I have seen many men in biking shorts in Arlington and lots of people in general from Ivy League universities in both the inner "suburbs" and DC proper. To me, this just sounds like people who feel entitled, and I am pretty sure there are A LOT of those people in Arlington. LOL.

[Anonymous]

Why don't more people live in the cities? Because they're afraid of brown people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why don't more people live in the cities? Because they're afraid of brown people.

They’ve never been to Ashburn, Wheaton or PG County, then.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why don't more people live in the cities? Because they're afraid of brown people.

Nope it’s because of crime and schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You couldn’t pay me to live in DC. I lived in Georgetown during law school and I never liked it. Who want to haul their groceries to their house? The crime is an issue. One that I don’t want to deal with on a regular basis.

I love my big house in the burbs. I go into DC once a year. Nothing there I need.

+1. I live only 15 mins away from DC but I never go to the city. No reason for us to hardly.

[Anonymous]

I once saw a study showing that areas with the highest % of car ownership tended to be where the fittest people live.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I once saw a study showing that areas with the highest % of car ownership tended to be where the fittest people live.

That study sounds fake. I have family that live in a county where the closest grocery store is a Walmart 1hr a way. You literally cannot live there without a car.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You couldn’t pay me to live in DC. I lived in Georgetown during law school and I never liked it. Who want to haul their groceries to their house? The crime is an issue. One that I don’t want to deal with on a regular basis.

I love my big house in the burbs. I go into DC once a year. Nothing there I need.

+1. I live only 15 mins away from DC but I never go to the city. No reason for us to hardly.

Good. B&T

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why don't more people live in the cities? Because they're afraid of brown people.

OMG. I live in Clarksburg, and there are more brown people here than in DC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I once saw a study showing that areas with the highest % of car ownership tended to be where the fittest people live.

That study sounds fake. I have family that live in a county where the closest grocery store is a Walmart 1hr a way. You literally cannot live there without a car.

Nope. I recall it was for NYC vs Westchester County.

[Anonymous]

Sad to say, but American cities are not that nice, at least compared to European cities. If our cities had better layouts and more charm, maybe more people would live there.

I lived in DC for 6 years and thought it was fun then. But when I moved to a close-in suburb, I was surprised how much my quality of life increased.

[Anonymous]

My suburban TH has a walk score of 93. It’s one of the most desirable neighborhoods in moco. A lot of Americans want to live in walkable areas. They often just can’t afford it.

Oh and we drive a fully electric car.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why don't more people live in the cities? Because they're afraid of brown people.

I live in Gaithersburg, which is more diverse than DC.

https://wallethub.com/edu/cities-with-the-most-and-least-ethno-racial-and-linguistic-diversity/10264

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sad to say, but American cities are not that nice, at least compared to European cities. If our cities had better layouts and more charm, maybe more people would live there.

I lived in DC for 6 years and thought it was fun then. But when I moved to a close-in suburb, I was surprised how much my quality of life increased.

+1

I lived in DC and had to dodge bullets, robberies, drunk homeless people, you name it.

I don’t worry about this at all where I’m at in the burbs now. And I’m quite walkable to things. I’m not surrounded by weed, alleys that smell like piss, drunk college kids, etc. That lifestyle is only fun for so long but it’s no place to raise a family unless you want them to become druggies by the time they’re 20.