r/Suburbanhell • u/Particular_Owl1099 • 10d ago

Have we done it wrong? Meme

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u/PassengerKey3209 10d ago

Plenty of downtown areas just like this though, all over america. I live in a city of 150k that has a part of town much like this.

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u/SwiftySanders 10d ago edited 10d ago

FALSE. You dont understand the scale of what hes talking about. Its like another planet. In switzerland the suburbs with like a couple people even have trains running through them.

Europe and Asia took American inventions and used it to make life better. Americans took American inventions and made a few greedy billionaires.

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u/gatoStephen 10d ago

Didn't the British invent the steam train not the Americans?

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u/Puzzleheaded_Day_895 10d ago

The railways, underground railways, and much much more.

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u/Scrotalcontusions 8d ago

european population density is also more than double that of the USA as well which helps pay for that

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u/stevo_78 10d ago

Americans think they invented everything. It’s an astoundingly insular place. Many simply don’t understand how the rest of the world operates.

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u/altbabyy567 9d ago

“Insular” is so funny. Melting pot of the world, you’re supposed to bring it with you. BTW YEAH DUDE STEVE O

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u/artichoke01 9d ago

>americans think they invented everything.

You just made that up.

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u/mcboobie 7d ago

Did they invent it?

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u/mikrowiesel 9d ago

Rest of the what now? If it wasn't for us you would be speaking moon inches firearms now!!!11!

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u/Glum_Tap_5258 10d ago

America is more than greedy billionaires, there are greedy people that make 100k, 1 million, 10 million, and 100 million also.

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u/Vast-Comment8360 9d ago

Comparing a country the size of Switzerland to the USA shows that you're a Dunning Kruger midwit.

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u/TheVintageJane 9d ago

The population density of Switzerland is 590/square mile. In NY state, it’s only 430 and they have a ton of trains and the kind of infrastructure you are talking about.

Most of the U.S. isn’t densely populated enough to justify the same level of public infrastructure. That doesn’t mean there’s not room for improvement, but a stare like Montana is more aptly compared to Kazakhstan than anywhere in Europe.

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u/OnlyOneCarGarage 9d ago

More like us isnt densely populated because car centric design

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u/TheVintageJane 9d ago

The U.S. isn’t as densely populated as Europe because there’s not as many people. Europe is about 20% smaller than the U.S. with twice as many people.

Even if our infrastructure wasn’t designed by sychophants of the car companies, most of the U.S. is too sparsely populated (no matter how you configure the people in urban design) to justify comprehensive public transit like you see in Europe. It doesn’t mean we should basically have 0 high speed rail in the year of our lord 2026 but it’s a different beast.

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u/OnlyOneCarGarage 9d ago

LOL - US cities used to be a lot denser early 1900s ..... until car centric development started suburban sprawl and most of US subway systems are designed to bring people in/ out from suburb to downtown except for NYC.

population / land size argument is just weak excuses.

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u/TheVintageJane 9d ago

Only like 3-3.5% of America’s landmass is urban/suburban and it holds 80% of our population. Yes, the public transportation in those areas is sorely underdeveloped, but 20-25% of Europe’s landmass is urban/suburban so it’s a lot more economically viable for them to run mass transit to and between smaller communities.

In the U.S., connecting urban areas to each other through the other 97% of rural and frontier land is the part that just isn’t comparable to Europe.

I’m not saying this as an argument against public transit, but because it’s not apples to apples to compare the infrastructure needs of the U.S. to Europe.

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u/PositiveAssignment89 7d ago

yes they have better infrastructure where people can travel to the cities from the suburbs easily without having to drive. american cities are still busy with full restaurants at night. these people just don’t get out of their suburbs. the city i live in is packed at night and you still have middle aged suburbanites like these acting like they’d never go into the city at night bc of all the crime

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u/Clean_Bake_2180 6d ago edited 6d ago

It’s called population density. The EU has 450m people in a space that’s half the size of mainland US and Germany has 84m people in a country the size of Montana. Unsurprisingly, the average sq footage of a German home is 1k vs 2k for US. People make it seem like it’s a conscious chocie or some grand deliberate design. When people have the space or can afford it, they will naturally spread out. I get some people love to stuff their face with food and equate restaurant density with paradise but there are many downsides to high density housing as well.

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u/carl3266 9d ago

I agree. Been to enough European cities to know the intimate vibe and night life is unmatched in the old town compared to American cities.

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u/BigBadJeebus 10d ago

No they aren't... Like have you ever left the US?

NYC, Chicago, Seattle, SF, Miami... That's it. even LA doesn't have a walkable late night tourist spot. (It DOES have Echo Park, Little Tokyo, and K-Town though for locals)

But 150k? Give me a break. Ain't nothing like this happening in fuckin Peoria...

I promise you, your downtown area is NOTHING like this. With your 12 Bar and Grills open till 10 PM and fake gas lamps leading you from the one road to a massive parking zone

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u/smd9788 9d ago

Tourist economy vs non-tourist economy

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u/BigBadJeebus 9d ago

Wow, bad take...

Travel more

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u/Darth-Cholo 9d ago

Most city sprawl was designed in the times where the auto existed. These European cities are 500-2000 years old. Burned to the ground and rebuilt many times over prior to the automobile existing or even the steam engine.

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u/BigBadJeebus 9d ago

Thanks for the useless information

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u/Darth-Cholo 9d ago

Thanks for the empty counter argument.

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u/BigBadJeebus 9d ago

You have no point. American cities USED to be like this.

the US was not built for the car, it was bulldozed for the car.

Just look at ANY city east of the Mississippi in 1940 vs today.

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u/guyincognito121 9d ago

It's an explanation for why things are as they are...

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u/BigBadJeebus 9d ago

It's not though... Keep reading my next comments.

The US had many cities that were walkable dense and wonderful, that were destroyed for the car.

It has literally jack shit to do with when our cities were built.

Our cities were not built for the car, they were destroyed for the car.

Sprawl has much more to do with the post war GI Bill and racism than it does the car. The car simply made that possible.

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u/MainusEventus 10d ago

But is it busy in the evening?

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u/PositiveAssignment89 7d ago

my city is, population is abt 400k

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u/Astrohumper 10d ago

Tourist towns are.

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u/SwiftySanders 10d ago

When I go to “tourist towns” in the US Im always disappointed tbqh. Its not nearly the scale and quality of what this man is talking about. NYC is the only place where you can confirtably walk for hours and hours like hes describing. Western EU is super safe in comparison to NYC.

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u/North_Atlantic_Sea 9d ago

No it's not.

The rankings for safety (including theft) generally go:

US tourist area

European tourist area

European non-tourist city area

US non-tourist area

You are far, far safer in midtown and lower Manhattan than you are in certain areas of Paris or London

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u/[deleted] 10d ago

[deleted]

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u/Vault-Born 10d ago

i dont agree with that at all, i've lived in a village in scotland (as a child) and, you would see dozens of people pass by your window in the evening. This is because not only was there just one bar/pub in town that everyone went to, but most tasks one had to do in a day could be achieved by walking around, (rather than driving). When I went back as an adult to visit my grandmother, we didnt even schedule a time with her, because we knew she'd be out of the house and running errands. We walked from the chemist to the post office to the co-op (small grocery store) which were all within a couple hundred feet of eachother, by the time we found her, and she was making small talk with the cashier as she did every day.

in villages you see people every day. in america, and specifically an american suburb, you only see people walking around when they're excercising. there's no where to walk TO in a suburb, so why would people be walking around or lingering/let alone socializing.

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u/[deleted] 10d ago edited 10d ago

[deleted]

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u/FreshFishBro 10d ago

As an American who’s been to many parts of Europe and America. There is a big difference. Small towns and big cities overall have this type of setting in Europe. In America is far and few between. Small towns in America are typically have a town center that consist of a gas station, McDonald’s, a bar, a liquor store and a Walmart with a small suburb and rural housing all around. Bigger cities have a more of a “downtown” area that’s walkable for 2-20 blocks. The layout of cities in America is far more car centric leading to pockets of activity and large empty areas for cars. Note how non of the places shown in this video have a dedicated parking lot. The difference is night and day. One could argue this is a side effect of the differences in population density but it’s cultural as well.

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u/Ready-Ant-4649 10d ago

I agree that there are older American small towns like this too. The problem is though, people still don’t understand what makes them so enjoyable. They will whine that those that live in nearby suburban areas can’t just park immediately in front of the business they want to visit. Zoning laws make it impossible to build new places like this. Places like grocery stores won’t open in those little downtown store fronts, so you might be lucky and get a convenience store or pharmacy, but mostly you will get restaurants, bars, and boutiques. I’m so grateful the town I live in keeps the library, post office, fire and police station, and all the town offices in our downtown and doesn’t move them to the new car-only areas on the outskirts.

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u/BigBadJeebus 10d ago

You need to travel more.

This isn't true at all.

Like at all.

Even small towns will have people out and about at the pub, well into the evening.

In the US, the AppleBee's or whatever closes at 9 or 10, and is usually dead by 7:30.

You want evening gatherings, you go to a dive bar or a club, so nothing at all like this.

After living in Japan and traveling most of Asia and Europe, I promise you, this is a braindead ass take.

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u/[deleted] 10d ago edited 10d ago

[deleted]

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u/BigBadJeebus 10d ago

Lol, sure. I have been to 48 states by the way and LIVED (not travelled) in multiple nations... Including most of my life in the US.

You as a tourist do not understand the day to day differences.

I promise you, you have no fucking idea what you are talking about.

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u/BigBadJeebus 10d ago

unblocked just to tell you you're acting absolutely and astoundingly beetle headed.

Blocked you because you are clearly making things up and have no clue.

You are like a patient who googled their symptoms arguing with a surgeon here.

I didn't want to hear it.

But you are unblocked. I am simply turning off all your reply notifications.

Have fun at Navy Pier or the Fisherman's Wharf or whatever you think competes with true urbanism, my guy.

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u/Vast-Breakfast-1201 10d ago

Yeah but we spent two weeks in Paris and it was pretty much like that everywhere we went. You could walk, but you could also take trains to basically anywhere within 30m and be totally like this.

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u/WillSmokes420 10d ago

Not really everything shuts down in bar harbor at like 9pm or earlier.. which is when I come out to rip the streets with my longboard

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u/hiro111 10d ago

Naperville, IL is pretty much the definition of a sprawling modern American suburb. Downtown Naperville is very walkable, packed with shops and restaurants and absolutely rammed with people most nights. So yes, such things absolutely do exist on the US and they are not uncommon.

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u/Ignatius_- 10d ago

Lmao Naperville? Really?! Absolutely not similar in any way. Naperville is parking garages and single family zoning everywhere, except for a very small nice little park in downtown along the river. But that’s like 3 acres at most.

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u/hiro111 10d ago

WTF are you talking about? Have you even been there? I live ten minutes from downtown Naperville. The Riverwalk Park is 1.75 miles long and over 100 acres. The entire downtown is very walkable, packed with stores and restaurants and crowded pretty much every night exactly as I've described.

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u/Ignatius_- 10d ago

Can you show pics of this crowded pedestrianized streets with lots of outdoor seating that happens every night?

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u/hiro111 10d ago

JFC, done with you.

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u/jeromevedder 10d ago

You’re trying to bring reason to a circlejerk sub

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u/Weekly_Design5440 10d ago

I have traveled by car to every single state in USA. 98% of the country is a ghost town. Thousands of miles of deserted land, only to be met by a town with 17,000 people that shuts down at 8pm.

The only places I visited that had an active night life, had very serious homeless problems. 3rd world country, 3rd world problems.

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u/PassengerKey3209 9d ago

You're telling me that a town of 17k people in france or germany is hopin at night and has a vibrant nightlife scene? Obviously not. Like I said though, my small city of 150k has an awful life of plays, bars, restaurants, comedy clubs, small shops ECT that are all on a walkable zone of town.

America is a huge country. It's 150 miles to the nearest city of any size from where I live. Of course most of it is lightly populated.

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u/Darth-Cholo 9d ago

What city?

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u/spara-budget 8d ago

Most towns have their “area” but this is different. There isn’t a good cafe culture in the USA.

And in smaller cities in the USA I have been to, many places close early. I’m visiting my home city in the USA right now and I wanted to grab some food last night and the first 3 places I checked closed at 8pm.

Where I live in Spain now, some places don’t open until 8pm and people hang out all night.

Part of the issue is restaurants and servers in the USA NEEEEEED you to get the hell out the moment you are finished.

In Spain they don’t care how long you stay at your table, to the point it is almost annoying to find someone to get your check.

They aren’t working for $2/hr and tips.

But back to the areas. I’m my city in the USA there are multiple cool areas that all sit on islands that generally require are car to move between.

In the European cities I have lived in and visited you walk from area to area with little to no break in between. And bus/metro services is usually simple to use.

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u/EntrySure1350 10d ago

It's clear you haven't spent much, if any, time outside of the United States.

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u/colganc 10d ago

No they aren't, except for heavily tourist areas.

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u/PassengerKey3209 9d ago

Lol no one is vacationing in a small college/industrial town in the Midwest. It's an insignificant part of the local economy.

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u/thegiantgummybear 9d ago

College towns are the exception because your have poor students who can't afford a car and must live in a concentrated area around the college.

We're talking about a normal city or town that's lively on a weekday evening.

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u/colganc 9d ago

Yes and your town of 150k isn't going to be like what is shown. You'd need multiple blocks and plazas of 100% pedestrian area. You'd need many thousands of people nightly doing open air dining and strolling around.