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Why don’t more people live close to friends?

annehelen.substack.com

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Re: Why don’t more people live close to friends?

#121

Post by polygamous_bat »

scarface74 wrote: post #106
rcarr wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here’s another thing no one talks about because it’s taboo: drink driving. Right up until the mid 70s, it was completely socially acceptable to drink and drive. Now I agree that it was probably a good thing that’s it’s been banned, but having to pay for and organise transportation to go to whatever event it is you want to go to adds another substantial layer of friction to socialising. Not to mention the fact that th…

Uber makes things a lot simpler.

Maybe, but it also adds a (let's say) $20+$20 to your bill at the end of the night. For a lot of Americans that's not exactly cheap.

Re: Why don’t more people live close to friends?

#122

Post by Krisjohn »

All these articles about "just moving". Who can afford it? We would lose A$24,890 just on stamp duty - a "tax" that goes to the government based on nothing other than the value of the property that they've been inflating over the last three decades. If I had a spare $25k kicking around, using it just to pay off creditcards would make me much happier than moving next to friends.

Re: Why don’t more people live close to friends?

#124

Post by habosa »

naremu wrote: post #25

I've been wondering how related these feelings of distance and isolation in the middle of society are to how the area is designed. I had always known for a long time the "why" I didn't want to go out on weekends and such, but it wasn't until I watched some of those videos from "Not Just Bikes" that it really, really struck me. I literally dread finding parking more than I enjoy finding friends. And suburban (and fran…

Americans are friendly but when it comes to the decisions that matter (voting and the votes with our wallets) the preference is for the private over the public. People are scared to depend on each other or to be forced to interact with strangers.

So we’ll all try to have our own cars and drive on huge suburban streets and put our kids in private schools and build fences around our yards and vote down zoning laws that would promote density. And we’ll wonder why the people in that cute little European town we visited that one time seemed so much happier.

Re: Why don’t more people live close to friends?

#125

Post by Gigachad »

rcarr wrote: post #101
naremu wrote: post #25

I've been wondering how related these feelings of distance and isolation in the middle of society are to how the area is designed. I had always known for a long time the "why" I didn't want to go out on weekends and such, but it wasn't until I watched some of those videos from "Not Just Bikes" that it really, really struck me. I literally dread finding parking more than I enjoy finding friends. And suburban (and fran…

Here’s another thing no one talks about because it’s taboo: drink driving. Right up until the mid 70s, it was completely socially acceptable to drink and drive. Now I agree that it was probably a good thing that’s it’s been banned, but having to pay for and organise transportation to go to whatever event it is you want to go to adds another substantial layer of friction to socialising. Not to mention the fact that th…

This is why I love living in a city with a reliable train network. So many times I have left a party completely drunk late at night, and been perfectly able to manage my way back home. Seems like Americans are left with the choice to either risk killing someone/themselves driving home or just not going out.

Re: Why don’t more people live close to friends?

#127

Post by abalashov »

zamnos wrote: post #37
naremu wrote: post #25

I've been wondering how related these feelings of distance and isolation in the middle of society are to how the area is designed. I had always known for a long time the "why" I didn't want to go out on weekends and such, but it wasn't until I watched some of those videos from "Not Just Bikes" that it really, really struck me. I literally dread finding parking more than I enjoy finding friends. And suburban (and fran…

This is a bit of an unconventional POV, but I don't consider large areas of suburban sprawl to be cities but just really big towns. This covers Houston, swaths of Atlanta, lots of Southern California. There are lots of people living there compared to rural areas, to be sure, but without the density to support usable public transportation (once-an-hour buses don't count), it's really not a city at all. It's endless su…

I don't think it's that unconventional. I'm a published critic of American-style automobile sprawl, and I've argued that 90% of what notionally passes for a metro area in Middle America should be reclassified as a rural area in the eyes of most reasonable people from elsewhere in the world.

Re: Why don’t more people live close to friends?

#128

Post by bradlys »

switchbak wrote: post #61
bradlys wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know my current neighbors at all (I live in an apartment building with 150+ units) and I'm fine with that. However, when I was in a house... I met some. They were often the worst kind of people. The most NIMBY neolib white-flight our-neighborhood-is-going-to-hell 60+ year old assholes you could imagine. The one we thought was nice apparently would beat one of his kids and make him sleep outside the house. Tha…

Damn, maybe you live in a crappy town?

It's a lot like that in all of SV tbh.

Re: Why don’t more people live close to friends?

#129

Post by Zach_the_Lizard »

trinovantes wrote: post #119
naremu wrote: post #25

I've been wondering how related these feelings of distance and isolation in the middle of society are to how the area is designed. I had always known for a long time the "why" I didn't want to go out on weekends and such, but it wasn't until I watched some of those videos from "Not Just Bikes" that it really, really struck me. I literally dread finding parking more than I enjoy finding friends. And suburban (and fran…

My personal theory is that suburban sprawl killed the "third place" in modern society. If you have to drive to a place to socialize (which probably involve drinking), then you're probably not going. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place

My hypothesis is it's connected to the decline in religion, or, more specifically, the mandatory church on Sunday type of religion, no matter what flavor it took.

A built in semi-mandatory third place seems pretty nifty as far as building social relationships goes.

I'm an atheist but I do remember building bonds this way in those heady pre-smartphone days. It's a shame the baby is stuck in the bathwater.

Re: Why don’t more people live close to friends?

#130

Post by earthboundkid »

rcarr wrote: post #101
naremu wrote: post #25

I've been wondering how related these feelings of distance and isolation in the middle of society are to how the area is designed. I had always known for a long time the "why" I didn't want to go out on weekends and such, but it wasn't until I watched some of those videos from "Not Just Bikes" that it really, really struck me. I literally dread finding parking more than I enjoy finding friends. And suburban (and fran…

Here’s another thing no one talks about because it’s taboo: drink driving. Right up until the mid 70s, it was completely socially acceptable to drink and drive. Now I agree that it was probably a good thing that’s it’s been banned, but having to pay for and organise transportation to go to whatever event it is you want to go to adds another substantial layer of friction to socialising. Not to mention the fact that th…

Move to Baltimore, my friend. There are at least six bars within five blocks of my house. You’d have to get pretty sloshed to not be able to make the walk back.
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