151–160 of 303 posts
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It's not obvious to me how blood pressure affects happiness, or how you would even prove a link here without asking people how they feel. I also feel like it is important to point out that asking people how they feel is a scientific measurement, you just have to be careful on how to use that data.
> It's not obvious to me how blood pressure affects happiness People are typically pretty unhappy following a heart attack.
I've examined a number of phds on this topic as a relative outsider to the field and have been pretty unimpressed by the claims of env-psych on green/bluespace. The methods used to unpack confounding by class/wealth are pretty minimal and, although lip service is occasionally paid to this in discussions sections after reviewers require it, nobody in the field seems to take it seriously. The effects are an order of magnitude smaller than those of social class. The real story here is 'don't be poor' rather than 'get outdoors more'.
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Berlin has large parks in the city, and even larger ones at the edges. It doesn't only work as a suburb - people in any central Kiez are within walking distance of a park. I love that city for that. Milan felt claustrophobic without all the parks.
Due to the unique history and political situation (city state), the city also just "suddenly ends", with little suburban sprawl. That said, Germany is so densely populated overall that there are few areas of "untouched" nature that the topl level commenter seems to be craving for.
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It feels weird to argue against suburbs while I'm living there, but... Most pro-density/pro-mass-transit people aren't arguing against rural lifestyle. They're against suburban, car-dominated lifestyle. I'll conjecture that, for many people, the potential benefit of living "close to nature" is more than negated by driving everywhere. Commuting in a subway in a mega-city easily racks up thirty minutes of brisk walking…
I hear a lot of them argue about how rural people waste space and how they’re sick of subsidizing rural infrastructure and we should impose policies which further incentivize people to migrate from rural to urban areas. The thrust of the issue seems to be directed at suburbs (if only because many of these folks are only marginally aware of the world beyond the suburbs), but rural life is still wholly incompatible wit…
I mean, it’s fine if you want to live somewhere rural, but why should that be subsidized?
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Anti-car is pro-nature not pro concrete jungle. Cars are a big part of why we have a concrete jungle and not nature intersected with density. Think of cities with substantial nature passages, botanic gardens and reserves throughout. Not just one big one but many. Suburbia isn't nature either, at least not standard suburbia. It's carbon intense lawn, concrete and asphalt. A front lawn and a big tree isn't nature. The…
Why do people keep framing this as a dichotomy between urban areas and suburbs? I agree that suburbs aren’t “nature”, obviously. There’s a lot more to the US than urban cores and suburbs.
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Europe does this much better. It's not so difficult to find yourself on a quieter, greener path just on your way to work. The countryside has a network of footpaths that connect everything. Wherever I am in Europe, I can count on a quiet evening walk. Berlin is outstanding for this. Wherever you are, it's easy to escape loud traffic and sit in a green, public space. Some have cafés and Biergarten in them. I find retu…
Berlin is better than most other places I've lived, but there is still so much room to improve. In my (sub-)district, pedestrians, cyclists, bars and trees share around 30% of the space on the street, while an additional 40% is parking and the last 30% is driving. The thing is, only around 35% of households here even own a car, and the vast majority of those probably just have it as a convenience. Public transport is…
In Berlin in comparison only 30% of the city area is green spaces and woodland, totaling ~260km2.
One of the reasons why Berlin population is 1.2 times larger than Rome, even though the surface of the city is only 70% of the Italian Capitol.
Funny thing is, making cities more green isn't even _that_ difficult. I see above conversations on living closer to nature, or mountains vs parks - but the vast majority of time spent is walking and driving in the cities. So it seems a no-brainer that before everything else, before thinking about taking a 2 hour drive to hike, or making the time for a weekly visit to the park, we should first make sure the places peo…
And make it bicycle friendly. People like nature but they also like and need exercise. There's a number of European cities that have made huge leaps in recent years beautifying themselves while allowing more people to bike every day.
even better, make them walkable.
Funny thing is, making cities more green isn't even _that_ difficult. I see above conversations on living closer to nature, or mountains vs parks - but the vast majority of time spent is walking and driving in the cities. So it seems a no-brainer that before everything else, before thinking about taking a 2 hour drive to hike, or making the time for a weekly visit to the park, we should first make sure the places peo…
This is one benefit of commieblocks nobody's talking about. They lead to green cities. This is how commieblock districts of my city look like: https://spoldzielnialsm.pl/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Obecni... https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ud9-Z0UHVHg/W7-qUjfNT9I/AAAAAAAAi... Modern car-centric districts are much worse, and single houses districts are car-centric concrete hell in comparison.
Personally, I would not mind sharing a TV (barely use one) or washing machine or garden with more people, but the way western society works in terms of building defaults is biased towards individualism not community building.
Funny thing is, making cities more green isn't even _that_ difficult. I see above conversations on living closer to nature, or mountains vs parks - but the vast majority of time spent is walking and driving in the cities. So it seems a no-brainer that before everything else, before thinking about taking a 2 hour drive to hike, or making the time for a weekly visit to the park, we should first make sure the places peo…
This is one benefit of commieblocks nobody's talking about. They lead to green cities. This is how commieblock districts of my city look like: https://spoldzielnialsm.pl/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Obecni... https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ud9-Z0UHVHg/W7-qUjfNT9I/AAAAAAAAi... Modern car-centric districts are much worse, and single houses districts are car-centric concrete hell in comparison.
Now it looks pretty shit (just imo), and it's hellish in summer - no shade, hot as hell, the buildings with their new windows and white finishes are blinding. I used to love walking there, now I avoid them.