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Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

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Re: Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

#81

Post by midasuni »

DrBazza wrote: post #54
noduerme wrote: post #26

After spending a few weeks back in Europe (after 8 years in the US), it quickly came back to me how much easier it is to live a healthy daily pattern of life there than it is here. In particular: Shopping for food in the US is almost always a separate trip in a car or a bus or on foot. Whereas in Spain it's common to go meet friends, pick up some bread and veg from the store, meet more friends and pick up things from…

In the UK, the supermarkets, the Internet, and modern 'town planning' have largely caused the demise of the UK high street. In the 70s towns were smaller, fewer people had cars, and there were hardly any supermarkets, so people walked into the town centres and did their grocery shopping there. Then in 80s we started getting the first out-of-town supermarkets with free parking. You have always had to pay for parking i…

Your rant is from a decade ago. Everything is delivered nowadays. Sure in the 70s the average housewife wouldn’t work and would walk to to the local shops during the week. Nowadays everyone works, so shops need to be open more hours.

The restrictions on Sunday trading are the worst things - the one time I do actually go to a shop is when I’m doing something like DIY and find that I need something at 4pm on a Sunday and a redox is closed, or when I’ve been away for the weekend and can’t stop at the normal local Morrisons as it had to close early.

If you want a town centre to be appealing then make it worth going to.

Re: Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

#82

Post by rsynnott »

sofixa wrote: post #70
rsynnott wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, when I’ve visited San Francisco, it seems to have supermarkets all over the place too (albeit rather expensive, not-very-good ones), so they even have a local model.

When I visited SF I found that to be the case in some neighbourhoods, but in others like... everything West of the downtown, e.g. towards Golden Gate Park, Richmond, Sunset, Twin Peaks, etc. was extremely barren from anything other than single family houses, with the occasional street with restaurants and shops.

Ah, yep, that's a point; I was mostly on the east side when I was there. Density did fall off pretty dramatically to the west.

Re: Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

#83

Post by RetroTechie »

ant6n wrote: post #39
dtech wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the difference? In Europe we call basically everything a supermarket and its a synonym for grocery store. The only exceptions would be minimarket which are extremely tiny and hypermarket which is your US Walmart-style extremely large store that also sells electronics and clothes etc.

Not exactly true. There’s the notion of a corner store, in different languages. But these things don’t really exist anymore since supermarket chains have taken over, some in really small spaces. Btw, the chain stores are often franchises, so owner operated like in the old days, but with scale, brand and prices of big chains.

> There’s the notion of a corner store, in different languages. But these things don’t really exist anymore since supermarket chains have taken over, some in really small spaces.

They still exist, you just need to know where to find them.

Your corner bakery, butcher & vegetable store are still around, but they tend to serve an upmarket / luxury customer segment these days.

In most big(ger) cities there's "night stores", often run by people of Arab origin (like Lebanese), "toko" (Indonesian grocery store), and Turkish supermarkets (my go-to for dried legumes like lentils, chickpeas, mung beans etc).

Relatively new are organic / "bio" focussed supermarkets. Usually expensive... But they sell many products that regular supermarket chains don't.

Re: Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

#84

Post by DrBazza »

midasuni wrote: post #81
DrBazza wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the UK, the supermarkets, the Internet, and modern 'town planning' have largely caused the demise of the UK high street. In the 70s towns were smaller, fewer people had cars, and there were hardly any supermarkets, so people walked into the town centres and did their grocery shopping there. Then in 80s we started getting the first out-of-town supermarkets with free parking. You have always had to pay for parking i…

Your rant is from a decade ago. Everything is delivered nowadays. Sure in the 70s the average housewife wouldn’t work and would walk to to the local shops during the week. Nowadays everyone works, so shops need to be open more hours. The restrictions on Sunday trading are the worst things - the one time I do actually go to a shop is when I’m doing something like DIY and find that I need something at 4pm on a Sunday a…

It's not a rant, but thanks for the sarcasm. It's an observation, given that I've lived through those decades.

You would have loved the 70s. Nothing open on a Sunday, and shops closed half day on Wednesdays.

Re: Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

#85

Post by sejtnjir »

em500 wrote: post #80

Maybe the more interesting stats for parents: Average distance to primary/elementary school: 500m (with on average 3.6 schools within a 1km radius, 27.5 within a 3km radius) Average distance to secondary/middle-high school: 900m (with on average 10.8 schools within a 3km radius) That's why starting from age 8 or so most kids cycle or walk to school themselves (there are no school busses in the Netherlands AFAIK).

I can confirm there are no school buses in Amsterdam. School kids do use the extensive public transport network to get to school on occasion.

Re: Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

#87

Post by withinboredom »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #68
DrBazza wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not so much 'the way they were', rather, I'd prefer to live in a small town with a butchers, bakers, and grocers, so that I'm spending my money in the local economy, and that I'm getting higher quality produce, and back to the original post, shops that are within reasonable walking distance. The number of towns or villages in my area that have this are vanishingly small. In fact, my medium sized town (20-30,000…

Well, McDonalds, Costa, etc. provide jobs to locals, especially young people. That's the local economy as much as other shops. Independent butchers and grocers have mostly disappeared because they are expensive and less convenient. Places were you can still find some are usually either 'posh' or where the local demographics has special meat/dietary requirements, shall we say... The advantage of an independent butcher…

Those big chains drain money from the local economy though. Small independent stores only send the cost of supplies/restocking out of the local economy. Chains mean there is continuously less money circulating in the town and requires people who import money from other local economies. Having chains in your town means that within a generation or two, the town will be effectively dead and hardly ever grow.

Re: Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

#88

Post by alphakappa »

mavamaarten wrote: post #53
noduerme wrote: post #26

After spending a few weeks back in Europe (after 8 years in the US), it quickly came back to me how much easier it is to live a healthy daily pattern of life there than it is here. In particular: Shopping for food in the US is almost always a separate trip in a car or a bus or on foot. Whereas in Spain it's common to go meet friends, pick up some bread and veg from the store, meet more friends and pick up things from…

Indeed! I was in SF for a few months. Finding affordable food was insanely hard. Fast food was both really cheap and everywhere. Fresh produce and basics like bread were expensive or hard to find, a long bus / tube drive away. Of course it's much easier to fall into that trap of shitty and cheap food. Where I live the balance is much easier. Vegetables, fruit, meat, ... it's all relatively cheap and easy to get, ther…

Curious to know where in SF you lived. Generally there’s bodegas all over the place and you can find fresh produce there. Not to mention, the city has good bakeries everywhere. Fast food (the well known chains) are quite hard to find in most neighborhoods.

Re: Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

#89

Post by [deleted] »

anovikov wrote: post #3
2Gkashmiri wrote: post #2

in india, that is your local grocery store. every street has them. of all kinds, stocking different things, sometimes similar things. these give employment to a huge number of people who are simple passive shopkeepers, they do not do any advertising, do not have to raise loans (though some do) or "invest" in anything exotic. just their stock in hand. since the "concentration" of power is distributed, everyone owns th…

This model also means using of lots and lots of labor because sales volume of those shops is very small and it keeps entire family occupied. It means those people are unavailable for other productive activities. The world is entering labor shortage zone that will last for as long as we don't figure how to fix reproduction without abandoning human rights (which isn't an option anyway because there are many countries a…

[deleted]

Re: Average distance to a supermarket in Amsterdam is 400 meter or 1300 feet

#90

Post by reacharavindh »

midasuni wrote: post #81
DrBazza wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the UK, the supermarkets, the Internet, and modern 'town planning' have largely caused the demise of the UK high street. In the 70s towns were smaller, fewer people had cars, and there were hardly any supermarkets, so people walked into the town centres and did their grocery shopping there. Then in 80s we started getting the first out-of-town supermarkets with free parking. You have always had to pay for parking i…

Your rant is from a decade ago. Everything is delivered nowadays. Sure in the 70s the average housewife wouldn’t work and would walk to to the local shops during the week. Nowadays everyone works, so shops need to be open more hours. The restrictions on Sunday trading are the worst things - the one time I do actually go to a shop is when I’m doing something like DIY and find that I need something at 4pm on a Sunday a…

I live in one of the cities the Netherlands which for the large part gets around this problem because of a luxury(population density). We have both walkable shops and boutique stores, and if you’re the kind that prefers to drive to a big store that has it all, then they are in the outer rings of the city. Still bikable with a cargo bike to give you some context. But they have big free parking.

The thing that irks me is - I love shopping at these boutique specialty shops. But man they want to be open 9- 5 on weekdays and mostly are closed when I can actually go there to spend my money. This is just wildly illogical to me. Sure, the people who work there needs their evenings and weekends too.. but, who cares if they are at the shop on a Tuesday at 1 PM?

Looking at the next generation, I don’t have much optimism that such special shops would stay on for long. Some perhaps will cater to the niches and those that can afford very expensive shops. But, the largest parts of stuff is going to be delivered to home from industrial warehouses outside the cities.

Groceries (veggies, milk, meat and stuff) are probably going to be the o lot ones one has to walk into a neighbourhood shop for.

Need DIY stuff? Electronics? Clothing? Toys? Paper towel? Detergent? Anything non-perishable? You’re probably going to need to get online.

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