Arnhem, the Netherlands is built with this principle. No matter where you are in the city there has to be a piece of nature or park within a 15 minute walk.
@@donaldthompson4044 My only American point of reference would be the prices in a small town near Atlanta, Georgia. Compared to that, yes. Sure rent is rising like anywhere. Nothing as bad as I've seen while looking to rent in the US. 1200 Dollars for a cockroach infested 1 bedroom apartment nowhere near the town center.
Any city that developed from a bunch of towns and villiages growing together into one sprawling mass will do that. Lots of mini-centers and main streets all over the place.
@@donaldthompson4044 I don't live in Arnhem but nearby. In general rents are relatively high at the moment in NL (I pay 1250€ on a one bedroom flat, though it's decently large and utilities are included), but it's definitely doable. Edit: did a quick search, the highest rent price I found in Arnhem is 1400€. I'm sure there are more expensive one if you search for more than 2 minutes like I did, but still =P Expensive but doable, if you want to live in a big city
So true about this BLOODY shit ass infrastructure being a silent killer. It’s fucking hell. So demotivating to consider a 30 min drive… to take a leisurely walk
The most demoralizing part of going to the gym for me isn't the workout, it's the 25 minute drive to the gym and back that turns what should take me just over an hour into at least 2.
I’m really glad Vaush is discussing this. I live near San Jose, CA which loves to consider itself the tech capital of the world but has arguably some of the worst urban planning. Housing isn’t affordable causing homelessness to be at all time highs, traffic is getting to critical levels with the amount of suburbs around the San Jose areas, and the city continues to try to bend over backwards to make room for the Google campus expansions and other corporate land grabs. This is what happens when a city doesn’t view the citizens as people, just assets essentially.
Honestly I feel like the whole bay area peninsula is turning into this. I live in San Bruno so urban planning/homelessness aren't the worst here, but the RUclips building is practically all the city cares about anymore
I lived in Mountain View during my uni days. And damn, outside of my small neighbourhood, shit is so unwalkable. Just walking to the local Safeway takes at least 30 minutes, and for all of Google's head office trying to be "accessible" within Mountain View, going there without a vehicle takes for fucking ever!! WITHIN MOUNTAIN VIEW!!
I'm living in Seoul right now as an exchange student. All the cities in South Korea are built up with easy access to the things you want to do. Every apartment I've owned is within walking distance of countless stores, activity centers, gaming cafes, bars, and resturaunts. The public transportation is fast, legible, and efficient with routes that take you to all the locations you want to go. You will never explore everything even if you spent your entire lifetime cafe hopping. It really is a completely different environment than any place I've lived in California. A good time is always just a short walk or subway ride away.
Are the locations much bigger than residential housing? The stores, I mean. The possibility of conversion from urban sprawl to a more community minded plan is endlessly interesting to me...
I don't get this approach to happiness at all, psychology classes I took in College emphasized approaching happiness through maximizing internal factors rather than external factors. And all of the literature I most respect regarding the improvement of wellbeing focuses on the within. From Christian D. Larson to modern youtube channels like HealthyGamerGG, David Snyder and What I've Learned. If I want to improve my happiness I study the science, I don't read about urban planning. I read about fasting, meditation, scientific thinking, proper diet, nutrition, exercise, how language scientifically effects the mind (NLP, social constructionism), don't do drugs, don't drink or smoke, etc... All proven ways to improve wellbeing, happiness and mental efficiency, as well as health.
Stayed near Seoul for a year as a teacher. Plenty of aspects of Korean society arent great but they clearly built their cities for people. You can own a car but I never needed one. Everything besides niche hobbies is within a 10 minute walk or a few bus stops. Taxis are cheap and fast, busses are frequent, train lines are abundant and there are electric scooters and bikes everywhere that you can just pick up , scan your bus pass and ride. Its nowhere near a perfect country but it decimates North America in terms of infrastructure and accessibility.
@@ninjacats1647 There's a difference when discussing maximizing happiness at the individual level vs. Societal. When we're talking about being happy as a person, obviously we focus on intrinsic factors because those are what we can control. In that case, we talk about meditation, healthy habits, exercise, etc. But if we're talking about what we can do *as a society* to maximize happiness thru public policy, urban planning, then we enter a whole new discussion. They are not mutually exclusive. There are many different ways to improve happiness and we can do all of them together. We can work and better ourselves internally, while also pushing for policy that will improve happiness in general, like universal healthcare, urban planning, social services.
@@ninjacats1647 both are clearly important? It's much easier to go on a relaxing walk if you have a park or river near you, and much easier to meditate without constant construction or traffic, its easier to eat well when you have healthy food options withing walking distance and easier not to do drugs if you don't live in a depressing environment you need a form of escapism for. Obviously at a personal level you need to look within for happiness but completely ignoring societal conditions is clearly a mistake at least from my narrow perspective
Urban planning and design is something I think about every day. My hopes are to start a company that just makes the places we live nicer to look at and be in
I lived in the Rural areas of South America, I loved walking to places. I came to the Rural Areas of US… and to drive everywhere…. I lived in Rural Germany. THEY HAD TRAILS TO WALK BETWEEN TOWNS! BETWEEN THE CROPS AND FARMS. That’s not taking trains into consideration. US has SHITTY infrastructure.
I visited Barcelona for for a week three years ago and as someone who was born and raised in the Midwest in areas that are basically impossible to live in without a car I just fell in love with the city based on their public transportation alone. I was ready to leave everything behind for Barcelona. Except moving abroad is actually a lot harder than I'd anticipated :(
This is exactly why the argument of "if you don't like it here then just leave" is so weak, like maybe if the US didn't make it EXTREMELY hard to leave then we would???
I think you can do it if you want to. I think the most difficult part is to leave you home country. But in case you want to move there I could recomend you to get a work visa and work in spain for a single year then see if you like it or not. There is no danger in testing it, and you got the advantage of being able to work anywhere in the EU since a work/studie visa can be used all over the EU. You can always go home if it does not pan out.
As someone who's lived in Atlanta for nearly my entire life, I resonate with this a lot. The city is extremely sprawled out, making walking to places very difficult unless you're in a city center like Buckhead, Decatur, or metro Atlanta. That, combined with our dog-shit public transportation, makes it a very isolating experience, especially if you're on the outskirts.
Vaush was the first person to bring the importance of urban design to my attention, and I'm extremely grateful for that. I've since studied the topic a little on my own and holy shit this stuff is so important I can't even fathom it sometimes. Suburban sprawl really is a silent killer of both people and the environment. Designing your country around cars makes it uninhabitable to humans. It isolates us, makes us lonely and depressed, and even suppresses the cognitive development of children's brains. Thank you so much for talking about this subject Vaush! I wouldn't have even thought about societies problems in a different light if you had never brought up urban design or Eco Gecko's videos on the subject.
When I was in America for a summer, we went to see the redwoods somewhere near San Francisco. I was reluctant at first, as most 15 year olds, I wanted to walk around the city. When I saw the trees though, I was so filled with awe that I almost cried. Those probably weren’t nearly as big as some others. I think we took 4 or 5 people and tried to hold hands around a tree and we were almost able to do it but not quite. It was a humbling moment that everyone has at least once, when you realize how much bigger the world is than you could ever comprehend. It really is beautiful there.
Vaush's point about stroads and the current standards of urban planning being expensive is absolutely true. I live in a small but growing midwestern town, and city council has made quite the commitment to improved walkability explicitly because the old methods are too expensive
The happiest I've ever been was when I lived in Somerville, MA. Every single square was super fun and unique. They were all within walking distance. Public transportation that could get me anywhere in the metro area in less than an hour. Commuter trains that could get me almost anywhere in the state.
Boston area has alot of similar sections. I used to live in south Boston with the beach across the street. I think places that were planned before the car was invented are the best.
One of the better videos ive seen from Vaush. I used to live in LA and meandered around all of the city for different things. The urban planning is mindboggling, and its so blindingly apparent which parts are rich areas and which are not. You feel like it changes on a block by block basis. LA has enough corruption to make sure that never changes.
I used to do daily catering deliveries in LA, on a route that would take me from Culver City, to Beverly Hills, and into skid row. The contrast is immediate, like a punch to the face. So depressing. I'd roller skate through my neighborhood after work, and I'd be able to tell the change in income level by how well maintained the sidewalks were.
@@samanthaamburgey4128 yep its pretty crazy to experience. I lived in an old house near universal studios, played shows down at space in hollywood, go to downtown for another show after, then end up at my buddys place in skid row. The change in income is as visible as the scenery, and not to mention some of the extreme contrasts that you can see walking 2 blocks. Im in Orange county near long beach/huntington beach now. Its more mellow and a little cheaper, but the politics of this area is gag worthy. Definitely miss LA
@@bigpooper4156 Zephyr's a cool name, gonna copyright that shit so you beter set out your plan to leave your family behind when the FTC death squad shows up at both of your houses for copyright infringement
I live in a large town in the UK AND THERE IS NOTHING TO DO You go to the town centre where the most development is, we've got malls large buildings hundreds of shops, But there is fucking nothing to do, no arcades, no bowling alleys, no sporting areas, no social events outside night clubs and betting stores People are always complaining that kids and young adults are always stuck at home, but wtf they suppose to go? The only places available are pubs and night clubs
@@JukeboxTheGhoul no joke if you want to go to any kind of entertainment you have to drive miles out to sone random bowling alley in the middle of fucking nowhere you need to take a sharp right turn to enter because the sign is obscured by overgrown trees or your gonna be stuck on that road for another mile until you can find an opportunity to turn around
Barcelona's blocks were designed in the 1850's and the architect designed it to be less high to allow more sunlight to the streets and the spaces inside each square to be green spaces and more open, but to put more housing they closed most of them down and made them taller. Recently there have been "superblock" initiative where there are areas of 4/5 square blocks that are closed to cars and it's fully walkable between blocks, look for "mercat de Sant Andreu" it's a really nice one.
thank God for this video, my sanctuary hills settlement's happiness keeps going down even though all their needs are met. very grateful for this video.
When I visited the US, I was living in a suburban neighborhood for the elderly (staying with a family friend) and I felt suffocated by it. Me and my friend wanted a snack but the people who could drive were busy and couldn’t drive us. It was an unfamiliar place, it was getting dark and the nearest store was like a half hour walk away so basically there was no way for us to do anything but stay in the house and whine. It’s honestly horrifying to me that so much of America is like this. Where I live, there are 5 different grocery stores within a 5 minute walking distance, of varying size. You’ll also find a pharmacy, liquor store, a fast food or hole in the wall restaurant nearby too. And a 30 minute walk next to a two lane road to get to a big mall. And I live on the edge of the city, go a couple blocks west, you’ll get to an airport and just north of the mall is an ironworks.
A lot of Hawaii looks like the sections of Beverly Hills you showed. The richest houses are literally up in the hills with the only walkable city streets being down by the coasts. The "real" city consists of a bunch of concrete apartment buildings and some not-so-nice trash-covered neighborhoods. It's the kind of place where income inequality is EXTREMELY noticeable.
I think it stems from the fact that we all want to be seen as successful in our community but what that means keeps changing. In like the 1900’s it use to be if you feed your family you were successful. How we finna got get a degree or become rich and have the vice president role or be rich. It feels like we can’t just be who we are but we gotta be exhaustively chasing the bag.
That’s something I hate about Texas. Our cities are trash in that sense… urban planning. I’m happy Austin and Dallas are getting better though. We need to build less freeways and more train and bus lines. We need to expand from downtown outwards and not the other way around otherwise most of the city will end up being nothing but cancerous suburbs.
I like to walk. I think most people like to walk. Our ancestors, from the moment the planet gave us sentience till everyone used horse carriage, were walking ALOT. They walked to work, to home, to shop, and to gather for feast, for dance, for prayer, and for other purpose. The car, be it drawn by horse or by the steam engine on a rail or by a gas engine; is great for a long journey but I don't want to take a long journey for every purpose every day. I want to walk to work, walk to a shop, walk to school, and more. I think most people also want to. Walking is healthy. There's a tribe or nation in Bolivia (I believe) that are among the longest living people on average because they walk alot inspite of having less tech with them.
Yeah. Live in Bergen rn and even though I’m a shut in, the ABILITY to go out and do stuff the moment I walk outside is so much nicer than it was any other place I’d lived. Driving sucks and I refuse.
I'm in a Resident of a suburb of Chicago. I can walk 2 blocks and go to a seed developing place and look around in their beautiful garden. I can walk 3 blocks more and go to a local charity flower shop that is well known and popular for it's amazingly big flowers for a much lower price than the big stores or other bigger nursuries.
Glad this is getting discussed more! I've been just walking and being outside a lot more the past few weeks, and it's been amazing (especially because the weather is finally becoming bearable).
You know what's awesome? I live in a third world country (Ecuador) and it's still easy to find stores, restaurants, parks, etc. close to almost any residential area in my city. And the transport system is quite good actually -- regular buses that allow you to arrive pretty quickly to lots of places. I just started appreciating this after visiting the US last year!
Vaush u 100% need to watch people like Gareth Dennis, Trashfuture and Well There's Your Problem podcast. They talk about how bad alot of this is so much and offer really good solutions (bike infrastructure (not just lanes, like infrastructure) pedestrianisation of cities, massive improvement in public transport so you can make roads smaller and allow for more walking and alooot more.) This to me is one of the most important issues facing us today with the climate disaster here Edit: also obviously Adam something is excellent at talking about this problem.
Before i had a car, i walked and took the bus everywhere i went. I was so much more active and actually wanted to leave the house. Now that i have a car and it’s actually convenient to go out i dont really feel like going anywhere. Weird.
This is something I think I've always been partially aware of, back when I was twelve and playing SimCity '89 I put things in neat 3x3 blocks, business, residential, industrial, and the middle spot of all of them was a park.
If you want to see something more depressing look at pretty much any Arizona city. Every building is either light gray, or beige. The gound is either beige sharp rocks or black road. All while designed pretty much the same (with no leafy trees.)
People even factory workers at turn of the century had more free time and were more connected to their community. This is a known phenomenon. There was a push in US a few years ago to encourage people to actually take their vacation days, There has been a massive increase in productivity but wage stagnation and ppl fear taking their benefits and vacations because employers are so predatory
Wow... this hit home so hard. I am watching LA and just totally triggered at the way this is. I lived in Omaha, and it was bad, but this is worse. Now I live in Europe, and it is much better, but still not great. I have no idea how cars took over and everything became so terrible.
i lived in costa rica for 2 years with no car, no problem. busses are everywhere, 20 cents can get you anywhere in the San Jose metro, bus to the coast is about 10 bucks and it’s easy to walk anywhere in most of the cities. living there made me realize how absurd the huge freeways and endless blocks of strip malls are in the US.
This right here is why I'll likely never leave Chicago. The taxes might be awful, but at least (most) of the city prioritizes public transportation. They could improve their bike access (and are trying to) but otherwise, walking around the city is both easy and, in a lot of places, visually interesting.
There was a neighborhood in San Diego that I vacationed at about a year ago maybe 2, and there were, I shit you not, 4 churches on the same block, and some of them were the same kind of church. There were 2 protestant churches. Different buildings! On the same block. Why.
I live in utah which, ofc, has its crazy issues on its own. But the scenery is BEAUTIFUL. Giant mountains with snow and it's just gorgeous. But it's got this horrible suburban hell of city design and and it honestly makes me feel SO SAD when walking and driving around. Like I look up at the mountains and think about how extremely beautiful it could be if there weren't 6 lane streets, giant car dealerships, run down sushi restaurants, McDonalds''s and nothing else. Like I legitimately feel depressed everyday when I have to walk through it to get to class.
All these cities that are supposed to be so unwalkable look like a paradise to me. Where I live, its a 3 mile walk to the nearest store. I mean theres nothing to do out here in this rural wasteland but I still walk around all the time. I don't need sidewalks to walk and I got an electric scooter so I can get to places but it would be so much nicer to live in a city or someplace with more to do, even a poorly designed one.
In my childhood I could have taken my bike to school it was far for walking but perfect for biking. However there was one intersection in the morning that would have made it suicidal to attempt to bike. My mom teased me about being lazy but she was hit by a car in that area and left on the side of the road passed out with a concussion. While living there we encountered a few bicyclists injured on the side of the road and had to call an ambulance. Walkability would help diminish so many problems. Obesity Depression Isolation Teens feeling helpless The poor kept in a cycle of debt from car ownership On Netflix there is from Japan showing 3 year olds going off on chores walking to grocery stores to pick up a few items. That’s insane and shows how backwards the us is
Yeah, I love New York beacuse I can just walk anywhere. I do not like people and like forests and needless to say that is not New York. But I could walk in that city for hours and not get bored. Walk into a place, get food, see stuff, go to places just because I am bored. It was nice, at least for a vacation. I would not want to live there though.
Dude I live in god damn SAN DIEGO literally 1.5 miles from the coast, and I don’t remember the last time I went to the beach because it’s so goddamn inconvenient. And I LIKE the beach :(
I think I realized how important this type of planning is once I moved from the huge sprawled out Suburb to the urban city school college I attend now. Like the difference in quality of life is so drastic when you can walk almost anywhere for your everyday life
I live in a city with low population density and long, brutal winters...it can be depressing. Everything that was bad about living here, was made worse by the pandemic. The lockdowns, working from home, not even having co-workers to shoot the shit with...very isolating.
Too bad Victoria is overrun by drug addicts and thieves because of lacking housing policies and the opioid pandemic (+ the covid pandemic on top of that, I myself was illegally evicted even though I paid rent on time, stayed a couple nights in a tent at the notorious Beacon Hill). As a poor man it was a way too expensive city to live just because of theft. Thankfully I came to my senses and took off.
I visited victoria in 2014 and even then the sidewalks were covered with needles, they need to implement safe injection sites and take care of the drug addicts
30:00 Vaush lived here when he was in University. Vaush attended Cal Poly Humboldt University. He met his best friend at the shop. Vaush ate at Ritas. The Plaza had community events. Vaush lived in south beverly hills. Vaush Never shopped at rodeo drive. Vaush delivered food to a place once and they told him to go through the back. Vausha ttended Beverly Hills High School. Vaush likes pico avenue. Vaush had meetings at the Arcata community forest park 39:10. Vaush would go hiking through the redwood forest, he hiked everywhere Vaush injured himself at a hikinh trail. A LIGHTNING STRIKE DESTROYED A TREE LEAVING ONLY THE STUMP AT SUNNY BRAE FOREST TRAILHEAD 2 42:10 AND 4-5 PEOPLE CAN EASILY SIT INSIDE THE STUMP. Old town eureka has nice urban planning . Vaush never walked here he had to drive. Vaush went to the little brick square 43:30 The oldest redwoodsare bigger and furhter in 43:50 MOST GIANT TREE IN THE WORLD 46:38 IS 2000 YEArs old bible
7:06 more practical too, and more cost efficient. But you already know that since you watched eco gecko. So if you are truly a fiscal conservative, you should _hate_ suburbs and car centric city planning.
Both of Chuck Marohn’s books are excellent. Strong Towns and Confessions of a Recovering Engineer. I’d also recommend RUclips channels like Not Just Bikes and City Beautiful and podcasts like Strong Towns and War on Cars.
I live in houston... yeah. I try to ride my bike to my college classes every day but sometimes it just isnt possible. I attend a community college in a community that I don't live in so I have to ride 10+ miles to get there on roads that are 8 or more car lanes with no sidewalks or bicycle lanes. It's really very scary but I do it because I want to show the local government that there is demand for sidewalks and bicycle lanes. I also do it because I'm opposed to the draft, and in texas you get automatically signed up for selective service when you get a driver's license. So i'm doing my part.
as someone who grew up in LA and recently moved to Florida with my family, as much as i disagree with politics here, quality of life is a thousand times better.
@@andrewdominowski4631 i miss some things about LA but it a prime example of what people mean when they say that america is a third world country in a gucci belt especially beverly hills
This one RUclipsr I watch, Life of Boris, recent posted a video where he went to Dubai. (He's form Europe.) He isn't a political RUclipsr at all, but he complained about the lack of sidewalks and how unwalkable it is. I mean, if even normies see how ubran planning affects them...
When you do have to go out for groceries or whatever, you should at least enjoy the trip or have it be very convenient 5 minute walk instead of taking a 20 min drive
1:02:00 I pretty much know this, moving from the countryside into a big european city, I thought that alone would make me more outgoing because of all the opportunity right outside my doorstep, but no, it really takes effort to see what's going on around you and to then actively take part in it
I moved to Salt Lake City, and it's the only place in the US I can really walk everywhere I need to go in SOME places, and that's the best I've found. We're moving at the beginning of May to a place in the "central city" neighbourhood, and the largest park in the city is a few minutes walk south, 5 different big grocers within a four minute walk, and like a two minute walk from the main boulevard that has the tram rail, all the entertainment, restaurants, fast food and public transit, the university is really close, and then we're also like a few minutes walk from one huge mall and then a 20 minute walk to the massive mall and even some community gardens. The biggest problem is the fact it's one of the most polluted cities in the fucking world. Before that, in my home town, it would've been an hour and a half walk to the nearest grocer, or anything like that. A car is 200% required in such places obviously, plus there's nothing else to really do, or anywhere to go for any sort of social life.
how is salt lake city culture wise? I feel like since it's the mormon capital of the world, it would be super religious and super conservative. And also I'd imagine it's hard to have a social life there if you aren't a mormon, but I could be wrong.
As a Kenosha resident, I will never understand how cities work without being a grid system or why cities use named roads instead of just numbers. you can visit kenosha and within 2mins know how to get anywhere in the city without a map. just need to know two things. Avenues go up as you West. Streets go up as you go South. knowing this you can get anywhere you want easily, impossible to get lost, and within 2-3 turns can get anywhere from anywhere.
You know, as much as a travesty as my city's road infrastructure is, I really am happy that at least getting to places within my neighborhood doesn't take forever(even though it kinda feels like that because of the horrific traffic here at times lol).
I’m glad my bucket list desire to visit the Pacific Northwest someday is well founded, those forests look f-ng beautiful. And for the volcanoes close by too. I wouldn’t mind the rain at all, I’m British 😂
Honestly this kind of thing is possible, if you've taken any time to look at downtown Minneapolis/Saint Paul. They're intelligently designed compared to the rest of the US. Skyways allow walking through the entirety of downtown without going out into the cold, parks that line the Mississippi, it's a great place to live.
Please talk more about urban planning stuff!! It’s so important and even though you recommend channels like not just bikes I think it would have more of a reach if you tried to bring people on and or talked about it yourself
As some context for our american comrades I live in a fairly medium sized city in sweden, 35k population sitting landlocked smack-dab in the middle of a vast expanse of farms and woods. It is by no means a rich city and by US standards it's fucking tiny. And yet i only have a 5min walk to the grocery store, a 10min walk to the nearest galleria, a 30min walk to the city center and town square which is also reachable by a bus ride that takes like 5min tops, costs 3 bucks and the ticket is valid all throughout the entire region for 1.5 hours meaning you can take the bus in to run a quick errand and get back home on the same ticket. There are 4 different bus stations within 5min of the apartment, one of which is so close that i can see it from my window. I can even walk to my place of work in like 15-20min. There's a small mountain within 40min walking distance with a little ski-slope, an outdoors sports center, public ice-skating rink, a 4 dollar outdoors pool, tooons of hiking trails and a very small fishing lake surrounded by about a dozen little wind-shelter huts that all provide a safe public fireplace and free firewood stacked in boxes that get resupplied every few days. The largely car-free city center has like five pubs, two parks(one right next to town square and one that's larger and has a small public bathing lake), another galleria, a bunch of cafés with plenty of outdoor seating and there are a few yearly festivals and stuff. The food festival is a big one, like 4 blocks + the town square gets filled up with tents that exchange food from all kinds of different cultures for a punch on a ticket you buy. There's also a free concert in one of the parks and a traveling amusement park opens up on the largest parking lot for 2 nights, it's honestly a lot of fun. This is what a MEDIOCRE city can be like if you build it right. This is what suburbia and excessive car infrastructure is robbing you of. I've been to Cape Coral, Florida once because our neighbor could get us a crazy deal on renting a place there for a week. I've seen the horrors of living in the US, even in the fancier parts. Both the house we stayed at and the included lawn were more spacious than anywhere i've ever lived in my life and yet i've never felt so incredibly claustrophobic. I was entirely stranded in the house unless the entire family was going to like a mall or something. It was suffocating. You should not accept things the way they are, get involved in your local community and demand change.
Arnhem, the Netherlands is built with this principle. No matter where you are in the city there has to be a piece of nature or park within a 15 minute walk.
Can you actually afford to rent in the city tho? Rent prices are insane globally.
@@donaldthompson4044 My only American point of reference would be the prices in a small town near Atlanta, Georgia. Compared to that, yes. Sure rent is rising like anywhere. Nothing as bad as I've seen while looking to rent in the US. 1200 Dollars for a cockroach infested 1 bedroom apartment nowhere near the town center.
Any city that developed from a bunch of towns and villiages growing together into one sprawling mass will do that.
Lots of mini-centers and main streets all over the place.
@@donaldthompson4044 I don't live in Arnhem but nearby. In general rents are relatively high at the moment in NL (I pay 1250€ on a one bedroom flat, though it's decently large and utilities are included), but it's definitely doable.
Edit: did a quick search, the highest rent price I found in Arnhem is 1400€. I'm sure there are more expensive one if you search for more than 2 minutes like I did, but still =P Expensive but doable, if you want to live in a big city
Aren't a lot of cities in the Netherlands like that? Or maybe it only feels like that..
So true about this BLOODY shit ass infrastructure being a silent killer. It’s fucking hell. So demotivating to consider a 30 min drive… to take a leisurely walk
The most demoralizing part of going to the gym for me isn't the workout, it's the 25 minute drive to the gym and back that turns what should take me just over an hour into at least 2.
I’m really glad Vaush is discussing this. I live near San Jose, CA which loves to consider itself the tech capital of the world but has arguably some of the worst urban planning. Housing isn’t affordable causing homelessness to be at all time highs, traffic is getting to critical levels with the amount of suburbs around the San Jose areas, and the city continues to try to bend over backwards to make room for the Google campus expansions and other corporate land grabs. This is what happens when a city doesn’t view the citizens as people, just assets essentially.
Honestly I feel like the whole bay area peninsula is turning into this. I live in San Bruno so urban planning/homelessness aren't the worst here, but the RUclips building is practically all the city cares about anymore
Live SJ adjacent. I can't believe how stupid the urban planning is oh my god. It's a joke.
Yeah we know, San Jose isn't a real city
Dude! I'm looking for a place in San Jose for work and the apartments there are stupid expensive.
I lived in Mountain View during my uni days. And damn, outside of my small neighbourhood, shit is so unwalkable. Just walking to the local Safeway takes at least 30 minutes, and for all of Google's head office trying to be "accessible" within Mountain View, going there without a vehicle takes for fucking ever!! WITHIN MOUNTAIN VIEW!!
I'm living in Seoul right now as an exchange student. All the cities in South Korea are built up with easy access to the things you want to do. Every apartment I've owned is within walking distance of countless stores, activity centers, gaming cafes, bars, and resturaunts. The public transportation is fast, legible, and efficient with routes that take you to all the locations you want to go. You will never explore everything even if you spent your entire lifetime cafe hopping. It really is a completely different environment than any place I've lived in California. A good time is always just a short walk or subway ride away.
Are the locations much bigger than residential housing? The stores, I mean. The possibility of conversion from urban sprawl to a more community minded plan is endlessly interesting to me...
I don't get this approach to happiness at all, psychology classes I took in College emphasized approaching happiness through maximizing internal factors rather than external factors. And all of the literature I most respect regarding the improvement of wellbeing focuses on the within. From Christian D. Larson to modern youtube channels like HealthyGamerGG, David Snyder and What I've Learned.
If I want to improve my happiness I study the science, I don't read about urban planning. I read about fasting, meditation, scientific thinking, proper diet, nutrition, exercise, how language scientifically effects the mind (NLP, social constructionism), don't do drugs, don't drink or smoke, etc... All proven ways to improve wellbeing, happiness and mental efficiency, as well as health.
Stayed near Seoul for a year as a teacher. Plenty of aspects of Korean society arent great but they clearly built their cities for people. You can own a car but I never needed one. Everything besides niche hobbies is within a 10 minute walk or a few bus stops. Taxis are cheap and fast, busses are frequent, train lines are abundant and there are electric scooters and bikes everywhere that you can just pick up , scan your bus pass and ride.
Its nowhere near a perfect country but it decimates North America in terms of infrastructure and accessibility.
@@ninjacats1647 There's a difference when discussing maximizing happiness at the individual level vs. Societal. When we're talking about being happy as a person, obviously we focus on intrinsic factors because those are what we can control. In that case, we talk about meditation, healthy habits, exercise, etc. But if we're talking about what we can do *as a society* to maximize happiness thru public policy, urban planning, then we enter a whole new discussion. They are not mutually exclusive. There are many different ways to improve happiness and we can do all of them together. We can work and better ourselves internally, while also pushing for policy that will improve happiness in general, like universal healthcare, urban planning, social services.
@@ninjacats1647 both are clearly important? It's much easier to go on a relaxing walk if you have a park or river near you, and much easier to meditate without constant construction or traffic, its easier to eat well when you have healthy food options withing walking distance and easier not to do drugs if you don't live in a depressing environment you need a form of escapism for. Obviously at a personal level you need to look within for happiness but completely ignoring societal conditions is clearly a mistake at least from my narrow perspective
Urban planning and design is something I think about every day. My hopes are to start a company that just makes the places we live nicer to look at and be in
why do we all repeat certain words in our sentences in comments?
@@two_number_nines for me it happens with voice to speech, my bad
I lived in the Rural areas of South America, I loved walking to places. I came to the Rural Areas of US… and to drive everywhere….
I lived in Rural Germany. THEY HAD TRAILS TO WALK BETWEEN TOWNS! BETWEEN THE CROPS AND FARMS. That’s not taking trains into consideration. US has SHITTY infrastructure.
US is just shit in general :c
MORE! URBAN! PLANNING! CONTENT!
This stuff is so important, I'm really happy Vaush keeps coming back to the subject.
I visited Barcelona for for a week three years ago and as someone who was born and raised in the Midwest in areas that are basically impossible to live in without a car I just fell in love with the city based on their public transportation alone. I was ready to leave everything behind for Barcelona.
Except moving abroad is actually a lot harder than I'd anticipated :(
This is exactly why the argument of "if you don't like it here then just leave" is so weak, like maybe if the US didn't make it EXTREMELY hard to leave then we would???
I think you can do it if you want to. I think the most difficult part is to leave you home country. But in case you want to move there I could recomend you to get a work visa and work in spain for a single year then see if you like it or not. There is no danger in testing it, and you got the advantage of being able to work anywhere in the EU since a work/studie visa can be used all over the EU. You can always go home if it does not pan out.
Barthelona
@@QuantumTelephone thumo de naratha
As someone who's lived in Atlanta for nearly my entire life, I resonate with this a lot. The city is extremely sprawled out, making walking to places very difficult unless you're in a city center like Buckhead, Decatur, or metro Atlanta. That, combined with our dog-shit public transportation, makes it a very isolating experience, especially if you're on the outskirts.
For real. Not to mention every MARTA stop is full of middle-aged homeless men.
I cant express with words how inconveinent Atlanta is.
Long time Atlantaen and I feel your pain. It's not safe or convenient to get anywhere outside metro.
Roswell here, I feel this
Sandy springs here, I work in the eav area and the ambient change in how much happier everyone seems is astounding.
Vaush was the first person to bring the importance of urban design to my attention, and I'm extremely grateful for that. I've since studied the topic a little on my own and holy shit this stuff is so important I can't even fathom it sometimes. Suburban sprawl really is a silent killer of both people and the environment. Designing your country around cars makes it uninhabitable to humans. It isolates us, makes us lonely and depressed, and even suppresses the cognitive development of children's brains. Thank you so much for talking about this subject Vaush! I wouldn't have even thought about societies problems in a different light if you had never brought up urban design or Eco Gecko's videos on the subject.
Well said. The same thing happened to me and I honestly think this is the most important thing we need to change if our country is to improve
When I was in America for a summer, we went to see the redwoods somewhere near San Francisco. I was reluctant at first, as most 15 year olds, I wanted to walk around the city. When I saw the trees though, I was so filled with awe that I almost cried. Those probably weren’t nearly as big as some others. I think we took 4 or 5 people and tried to hold hands around a tree and we were almost able to do it but not quite. It was a humbling moment that everyone has at least once, when you realize how much bigger the world is than you could ever comprehend. It really is beautiful there.
The nature in America is amazing. The cities are not.
Vaush's point about stroads and the current standards of urban planning being expensive is absolutely true. I live in a small but growing midwestern town, and city council has made quite the commitment to improved walkability explicitly because the old methods are too expensive
When I was like 16 I went on a trip to Germany and I realized they could day drink because of their cities and not just a cultural thing
You should have joined, beer and wine is allowed at 16 in Germany.
Wegbier all day everyday
I’ve been dealing with some existential dread for the past two days. I’m all here for the hopium whether hypothetical or not.
There is no hopium for u.s. infrastructure & city planning :(
I've also been experiencing existential dread. At least we're not alone in it.
Been researching how to leave the U.S altogether
@@SEESBoy-hy8jz why do people stay
@@pelletrouge3032 a number of factors I'd say, but usually it's just due to a lack of money/being tied down to their job
The happiest I've ever been was when I lived in Somerville, MA. Every single square was super fun and unique. They were all within walking distance. Public transportation that could get me anywhere in the metro area in less than an hour. Commuter trains that could get me almost anywhere in the state.
nice place, i lived there when i was little
Boston area has alot of similar sections. I used to live in south Boston with the beach across the street. I think places that were planned before the car was invented are the best.
One of the better videos ive seen from Vaush. I used to live in LA and meandered around all of the city for different things. The urban planning is mindboggling, and its so blindingly apparent which parts are rich areas and which are not. You feel like it changes on a block by block basis.
LA has enough corruption to make sure that never changes.
I used to do daily catering deliveries in LA, on a route that would take me from Culver City, to Beverly Hills, and into skid row. The contrast is immediate, like a punch to the face. So depressing. I'd roller skate through my neighborhood after work, and I'd be able to tell the change in income level by how well maintained the sidewalks were.
@@samanthaamburgey4128 yep its pretty crazy to experience. I lived in an old house near universal studios, played shows down at space in hollywood, go to downtown for another show after, then end up at my buddys place in skid row. The change in income is as visible as the scenery, and not to mention some of the extreme contrasts that you can see walking 2 blocks.
Im in Orange county near long beach/huntington beach now. Its more mellow and a little cheaper, but the politics of this area is gag worthy. Definitely miss LA
Oh, look at me! I'm making people happy! I'm the Magical Man from Happy-Land, in a gumdrop house on Lollipop Lane!
This but unironically
Didn’t expect simpsons quote but will up vote.
Hey name thief stop having my name, name thief
@@bigpooper4156 Zephyr's a cool name, gonna copyright that shit so you beter set out your plan to leave your family behind when the FTC death squad shows up at both of your houses for copyright infringement
This comment made me happy, if just a little bit
vaush’s urban planning videos are always fun, even when he’s just fucking around
I live in a large town in the UK AND THERE IS NOTHING TO DO
You go to the town centre where the most development is, we've got malls large buildings hundreds of shops,
But there is fucking nothing to do, no arcades, no bowling alleys, no sporting areas, no social events outside night clubs and betting stores
People are always complaining that kids and young adults are always stuck at home, but wtf they suppose to go? The only places available are pubs and night clubs
PREACH!
@@JukeboxTheGhoul no joke if you want to go to any kind of entertainment you have to drive miles out to sone random bowling alley in the middle of fucking nowhere you need to take a sharp right turn to enter because the sign is obscured by overgrown trees or your gonna be stuck on that road for another mile until you can find an opportunity to turn around
Which large town might i ask? Cuz i live in a fairly smallish town where my uni is and theres not that much to do.
Barcelona's blocks were designed in the 1850's and the architect designed it to be less high to allow more sunlight to the streets and the spaces inside each square to be green spaces and more open, but to put more housing they closed most of them down and made them taller. Recently there have been "superblock" initiative where there are areas of 4/5 square blocks that are closed to cars and it's fully walkable between blocks, look for "mercat de Sant Andreu" it's a really nice one.
Also look for Idelfons Cerda he designed the riginal block lay out and he was one of barcelonas architectural geniuses like gaudí
thank God for this video, my sanctuary hills settlement's happiness keeps going down even though all their needs are met. very grateful for this video.
When I visited the US, I was living in a suburban neighborhood for the elderly (staying with a family friend) and I felt suffocated by it. Me and my friend wanted a snack but the people who could drive were busy and couldn’t drive us. It was an unfamiliar place, it was getting dark and the nearest store was like a half hour walk away so basically there was no way for us to do anything but stay in the house and whine. It’s honestly horrifying to me that so much of America is like this. Where I live, there are 5 different grocery stores within a 5 minute walking distance, of varying size. You’ll also find a pharmacy, liquor store, a fast food or hole in the wall restaurant nearby too. And a 30 minute walk next to a two lane road to get to a big mall. And I live on the edge of the city, go a couple blocks west, you’ll get to an airport and just north of the mall is an ironworks.
A lot of Hawaii looks like the sections of Beverly Hills you showed. The richest houses are literally up in the hills with the only walkable city streets being down by the coasts. The "real" city consists of a bunch of concrete apartment buildings and some not-so-nice trash-covered neighborhoods. It's the kind of place where income inequality is EXTREMELY noticeable.
I live in K-Town of Los Angeles, and it was really fun watching Vaush zooming in on streets and locations that are in my backyard.
I feel like the difficulty that he had getting anywhere in street view throughout the video does a lot to prove his point by itself.
I think it stems from the fact that we all want to be seen as successful in our community but what that means keeps changing. In like the 1900’s it use to be if you feed your family you were successful. How we finna got get a degree or become rich and have the vice president role or be rich. It feels like we can’t just be who we are but we gotta be exhaustively chasing the bag.
That’s something I hate about Texas. Our cities are trash in that sense… urban planning. I’m happy Austin and Dallas are getting better though. We need to build less freeways and more train and bus lines. We need to expand from downtown outwards and not the other way around otherwise most of the city will end up being nothing but cancerous suburbs.
I like to walk. I think most people like to walk. Our ancestors, from the moment the planet gave us sentience till everyone used horse carriage, were walking ALOT. They walked to work, to home, to shop, and to gather for feast, for dance, for prayer, and for other purpose.
The car, be it drawn by horse or by the steam engine on a rail or by a gas engine; is great for a long journey but I don't want to take a long journey for every purpose every day. I want to walk to work, walk to a shop, walk to school, and more. I think most people also want to.
Walking is healthy. There's a tribe or nation in Bolivia (I believe) that are among the longest living people on average because they walk alot inspite of having less tech with them.
Naturalistic fallacy
.
@@QuantumTelephone explain
Just doin a little debatelord trolling. Obviously walking is good lol
@@QuantumTelephone
Oh you blueballed me
I posted that dot so I could get notifications for a fun viewing experience
Yeah. Live in Bergen rn and even though I’m a shut in, the ABILITY to go out and do stuff the moment I walk outside is so much nicer than it was any other place I’d lived. Driving sucks and I refuse.
Bergen Norway?
1 hour urban planning stunlock? You're too bountiful good sir
Love these urban planning vids
I really enjoyed the segment on redwoods and the Humboldt region. Really helps me appreciate what I've lived next to in BC
1:02:03 Genuinely great life advice I intend to follow
I'm in a Resident of a suburb of Chicago. I can walk 2 blocks and go to a seed developing place and look around in their beautiful garden. I can walk 3 blocks more and go to a local charity flower shop that is well known and popular for it's amazingly big flowers for a much lower price than the big stores or other bigger nursuries.
Glad this is getting discussed more! I've been just walking and being outside a lot more the past few weeks, and it's been amazing (especially because the weather is finally becoming bearable).
You know what's awesome? I live in a third world country (Ecuador) and it's still easy to find stores, restaurants, parks, etc. close to almost any residential area in my city. And the transport system is quite good actually -- regular buses that allow you to arrive pretty quickly to lots of places.
I just started appreciating this after visiting the US last year!
45:50 glad he gave a shout out to falling through brush and injuring yourself in the redwoods! Just did that a few months ago on my first trip there
Vaush u 100% need to watch people like Gareth Dennis, Trashfuture and Well There's Your Problem podcast. They talk about how bad alot of this is so much and offer really good solutions (bike infrastructure (not just lanes, like infrastructure) pedestrianisation of cities, massive improvement in public transport so you can make roads smaller and allow for more walking and alooot more.) This to me is one of the most important issues facing us today with the climate disaster here
Edit: also obviously Adam something is excellent at talking about this problem.
and not just bikes
@@rishabhanand4973 oh yeah not just bikes is brilliant too
Before i had a car, i walked and took the bus everywhere i went. I was so much more active and actually wanted to leave the house. Now that i have a car and it’s actually convenient to go out i dont really feel like going anywhere. Weird.
This is something I think I've always been partially aware of, back when I was twelve and playing SimCity '89 I put things in neat 3x3 blocks, business, residential, industrial, and the middle spot of all of them was a park.
LITERALLY vonch
If you want to see something more depressing look at pretty much any Arizona city. Every building is either light gray, or beige. The gound is either beige sharp rocks or black road. All while designed pretty much the same (with no leafy trees.)
Also it seems hard to live in the desert.
"This city should not exist, it is a testament to man's arrogance"
-Peggy Hill
I really like the message at the end there.
Thank you so much for uploading this segment!
People even factory workers at turn of the century had more free time and were more connected to their community. This is a known phenomenon. There was a push in US a few years ago to encourage people to actually take their vacation days, There has been a massive increase in productivity but wage stagnation and ppl fear taking their benefits and vacations because employers are so predatory
Trade offer: we Europeans help you do urban planning and you guys help us be a bit more social and chit chatty with each other 🤝
Y'all don't like brown people too much so no.
DEAL 🤝
Wow... this hit home so hard. I am watching LA and just totally triggered at the way this is. I lived in Omaha, and it was bad, but this is worse. Now I live in Europe, and it is much better, but still not great. I have no idea how cars took over and everything became so terrible.
Oh cool! I did research at Humboldt State University back in 2007...interesting that it's now called Cal Poly Humboldt.
I _just_ finished binging Not Just Bikes and you post this!
This is such a banger segment.
"this has urban potential. This can be rebuilt"
It's sad to live in US
No protection from the sun. No places to chill, benches, bo bus stop in sight
i lived in costa rica for 2 years with no car, no problem. busses are everywhere, 20 cents can get you anywhere in the San Jose metro, bus to the coast is about 10 bucks and it’s easy to walk anywhere in most of the cities. living there made me realize how absurd the huge freeways and endless blocks of strip malls are in the US.
I didn’t realize quite how bad the US is in this respect, since I have been in Europe my whole life. Wow.
This right here is why I'll likely never leave Chicago. The taxes might be awful, but at least (most) of the city prioritizes public transportation. They could improve their bike access (and are trying to) but otherwise, walking around the city is both easy and, in a lot of places, visually interesting.
There was a neighborhood in San Diego that I vacationed at about a year ago maybe 2, and there were, I shit you not, 4 churches on the same block, and some of them were the same kind of church. There were 2 protestant churches. Different buildings! On the same block. Why.
I live in utah which, ofc, has its crazy issues on its own. But the scenery is BEAUTIFUL. Giant mountains with snow and it's just gorgeous. But it's got this horrible suburban hell of city design and and it honestly makes me feel SO SAD when walking and driving around. Like I look up at the mountains and think about how extremely beautiful it could be if there weren't 6 lane streets, giant car dealerships, run down sushi restaurants, McDonalds''s and nothing else. Like I legitimately feel depressed everyday when I have to walk through it to get to class.
Lovin the new hair style, Vaush, very Cute!
Great point at the end. Best way to make a river is with water flowing to the ocean. Nice fortress planning session.
All these cities that are supposed to be so unwalkable look like a paradise to me. Where I live, its a 3 mile walk to the nearest store. I mean theres nothing to do out here in this rural wasteland but I still walk around all the time. I don't need sidewalks to walk and I got an electric scooter so I can get to places but it would be so much nicer to live in a city or someplace with more to do, even a poorly designed one.
51:39 In fact, motorcycles were especially common in Europe after WWII because they were more cost-effective.
In my childhood I could have taken my bike to school it was far for walking but perfect for biking. However there was one intersection in the morning that would have made it suicidal to attempt to bike.
My mom teased me about being lazy but she was hit by a car in that area and left on the side of the road passed out with a concussion.
While living there we encountered a few bicyclists injured on the side of the road and had to call an ambulance.
Walkability would help diminish so many problems.
Obesity
Depression
Isolation
Teens feeling helpless
The poor kept in a cycle of debt from car ownership
On Netflix there is from Japan showing 3 year olds going off on chores walking to grocery stores to pick up a few items. That’s insane and shows how backwards the us is
Madrid, Virgo, Porto, and Lisbon are STUNNING places
Yeah, I love New York beacuse I can just walk anywhere. I do not like people and like forests and needless to say that is not New York. But I could walk in that city for hours and not get bored. Walk into a place, get food, see stuff, go to places just because I am bored. It was nice, at least for a vacation. I would not want to live there though.
Dude I live in god damn SAN DIEGO literally 1.5 miles from the coast, and I don’t remember the last time I went to the beach because it’s so goddamn inconvenient. And I LIKE the beach :(
I think I realized how important this type of planning is once I moved from the huge sprawled out Suburb to the urban city school college I attend now. Like the difference in quality of life is so drastic when you can walk almost anywhere for your everyday life
I live in a city with low population density and long, brutal winters...it can be depressing. Everything that was bad about living here, was made worse by the pandemic. The lockdowns, working from home, not even having co-workers to shoot the shit with...very isolating.
Too bad Victoria is overrun by drug addicts and thieves because of lacking housing policies and the opioid pandemic (+ the covid pandemic on top of that, I myself was illegally evicted even though I paid rent on time, stayed a couple nights in a tent at the notorious Beacon Hill). As a poor man it was a way too expensive city to live just because of theft. Thankfully I came to my senses and took off.
I visited victoria in 2014 and even then the sidewalks were covered with needles, they need to implement safe injection sites and take care of the drug addicts
@@melissahalle8398 It will never happen, would need federal housing first policy but the Canadian middle class is too full of itself.
30:00 Vaush lived here when he was in University. Vaush attended Cal Poly Humboldt University. He met his best friend at the shop. Vaush ate at Ritas. The Plaza had community events. Vaush lived in south beverly hills. Vaush Never shopped at rodeo drive. Vaush delivered food to a place once and they told him to go through the back. Vausha ttended Beverly Hills High School. Vaush likes pico avenue. Vaush had meetings at the Arcata community forest park 39:10. Vaush would go hiking through the redwood forest, he hiked everywhere Vaush injured himself at a hikinh trail. A LIGHTNING STRIKE DESTROYED A TREE LEAVING ONLY THE STUMP AT SUNNY BRAE FOREST TRAILHEAD 2 42:10 AND 4-5 PEOPLE CAN EASILY SIT INSIDE THE STUMP. Old town eureka has nice urban planning . Vaush never walked here he had to drive. Vaush went to the little brick square 43:30 The oldest redwoodsare bigger and furhter in 43:50 MOST GIANT TREE IN THE WORLD 46:38 IS 2000 YEArs old bible
7:06 more practical too, and more cost efficient. But you already know that since you watched eco gecko. So if you are truly a fiscal conservative, you should _hate_ suburbs and car centric city planning.
14:20 that’s nothing compared to Bell Road in front of Arrowhead Mall in Arizona. There’s like a 12 lane road with a median in front of that mall.
Does anybody have any good book recommendations for worker cooperatives and urban planning?
Both of Chuck Marohn’s books are excellent. Strong Towns and Confessions of a Recovering Engineer. I’d also recommend RUclips channels like Not Just Bikes and City Beautiful and podcasts like Strong Towns and War on Cars.
I live in houston... yeah. I try to ride my bike to my college classes every day but sometimes it just isnt possible. I attend a community college in a community that I don't live in so I have to ride 10+ miles to get there on roads that are 8 or more car lanes with no sidewalks or bicycle lanes. It's really very scary but I do it because I want to show the local government that there is demand for sidewalks and bicycle lanes. I also do it because I'm opposed to the draft, and in texas you get automatically signed up for selective service when you get a driver's license. So i'm doing my part.
as someone who grew up in LA and recently moved to Florida with my family, as much as i disagree with politics here, quality of life is a thousand times better.
Ironic
@@andrewdominowski4631 i miss some things about LA but it a prime example of what people mean when they say that america is a third world country in a gucci belt especially beverly hills
But Florida floods tho.
@@donaldthompson4044 Florida floods about as much as la earthquakes
10:25 gawd look at those roads on bottom half ..............
This one RUclipsr I watch, Life of Boris, recent posted a video where he went to Dubai. (He's form Europe.) He isn't a political RUclipsr at all, but he complained about the lack of sidewalks and how unwalkable it is. I mean, if even normies see how ubran planning affects them...
Hope he does more like this.
I like the philosophical thinkibg even tho he is saying stuff i thought myself or heard before
But if you're terminally online what's the need for urban planning
having more of an incentive to go out I guess, like, unuronically that.
When you do have to go out for groceries or whatever, you should at least enjoy the trip or have it be very convenient 5 minute walk instead of taking a 20 min drive
@@Krazaz nah just do task rabbit or whatever
if everything is more efficient for everyone else it benefits the NEETs
1:02:00
I pretty much know this, moving from the countryside into a big european city, I thought that alone would make me more outgoing because of all the opportunity right outside my doorstep, but no, it really takes effort to see what's going on around you and to then actively take part in it
Customer culture makes people unhappy
I've been demonized by my community pretty much since i got here when i was 16.
I ain't making nobody happy any time soon 🤣
I moved to Salt Lake City, and it's the only place in the US I can really walk everywhere I need to go in SOME places, and that's the best I've found. We're moving at the beginning of May to a place in the "central city" neighbourhood, and the largest park in the city is a few minutes walk south, 5 different big grocers within a four minute walk, and like a two minute walk from the main boulevard that has the tram rail, all the entertainment, restaurants, fast food and public transit, the university is really close, and then we're also like a few minutes walk from one huge mall and then a 20 minute walk to the massive mall and even some community gardens. The biggest problem is the fact it's one of the most polluted cities in the fucking world. Before that, in my home town, it would've been an hour and a half walk to the nearest grocer, or anything like that. A car is 200% required in such places obviously, plus there's nothing else to really do, or anywhere to go for any sort of social life.
how is salt lake city culture wise? I feel like since it's the mormon capital of the world, it would be super religious and super conservative. And also I'd imagine it's hard to have a social life there if you aren't a mormon, but I could be wrong.
As a Kenosha resident, I will never understand how cities work without being a grid system or why cities use named roads instead of just numbers. you can visit kenosha and within 2mins know how to get anywhere in the city without a map. just need to know two things.
Avenues go up as you West.
Streets go up as you go South.
knowing this you can get anywhere you want easily, impossible to get lost, and within 2-3 turns can get anywhere from anywhere.
That sounds horrible. I'd feel like I live in the matrix.
@@ThePanMan11 Systems that are logical = matrix
@@ThePanMan11 Turn on 129th St NNW already. You're holding up traffic!
@@cdvideodump see? 😂 I don't want my address to be like a bunch of coordinates.
@@RaroHi no but living in a repeating patern would remind me of it honestly.
Vaush would remember the horse
You know, as much as a travesty as my city's road infrastructure is, I really am happy that at least getting to places within my neighborhood doesn't take forever(even though it kinda feels like that because of the horrific traffic here at times lol).
Lol I live in NYC and had a 6 month job in LA where I lived on Labrea. Didn’t have a car, walked to work everyday. Wild times
26:23 I thought they made that store up in shrek 2 lol
I’m glad my bucket list desire to visit the Pacific Northwest someday is well founded, those forests look f-ng beautiful.
And for the volcanoes close by too.
I wouldn’t mind the rain at all, I’m British 😂
I'm at minute 7 of this video, and I've never been so thankful to live in an european city.
Honestly this kind of thing is possible, if you've taken any time to look at downtown Minneapolis/Saint Paul. They're intelligently designed compared to the rest of the US. Skyways allow walking through the entirety of downtown without going out into the cold, parks that line the Mississippi, it's a great place to live.
this video triggered my stroadophobia
8:15 TBF LA does have a lot of walkable neighborhoods. They're just spread far apart and not well connected by transit.
Please talk more about urban planning stuff!! It’s so important and even though you recommend channels like not just bikes I think it would have more of a reach if you tried to bring people on and or talked about it yourself
As some context for our american comrades I live in a fairly medium sized city in sweden, 35k population sitting landlocked smack-dab in the middle of a vast expanse of farms and woods. It is by no means a rich city and by US standards it's fucking tiny.
And yet i only have a 5min walk to the grocery store, a 10min walk to the nearest galleria, a 30min walk to the city center and town square which is also reachable by a bus ride that takes like 5min tops, costs 3 bucks and the ticket is valid all throughout the entire region for 1.5 hours meaning you can take the bus in to run a quick errand and get back home on the same ticket. There are 4 different bus stations within 5min of the apartment, one of which is so close that i can see it from my window. I can even walk to my place of work in like 15-20min.
There's a small mountain within 40min walking distance with a little ski-slope, an outdoors sports center, public ice-skating rink, a 4 dollar outdoors pool, tooons of hiking trails and a very small fishing lake surrounded by about a dozen little wind-shelter huts that all provide a safe public fireplace and free firewood stacked in boxes that get resupplied every few days.
The largely car-free city center has like five pubs, two parks(one right next to town square and one that's larger and has a small public bathing lake), another galleria, a bunch of cafés with plenty of outdoor seating and there are a few yearly festivals and stuff. The food festival is a big one, like 4 blocks + the town square gets filled up with tents that exchange food from all kinds of different cultures for a punch on a ticket you buy. There's also a free concert in one of the parks and a traveling amusement park opens up on the largest parking lot for 2 nights, it's honestly a lot of fun.
This is what a MEDIOCRE city can be like if you build it right. This is what suburbia and excessive car infrastructure is robbing you of. I've been to Cape Coral, Florida once because our neighbor could get us a crazy deal on renting a place there for a week. I've seen the horrors of living in the US, even in the fancier parts. Both the house we stayed at and the included lawn were more spacious than anywhere i've ever lived in my life and yet i've never felt so incredibly claustrophobic. I was entirely stranded in the house unless the entire family was going to like a mall or something. It was suffocating. You should not accept things the way they are, get involved in your local community and demand change.
make them happy by introducing tennis 2
Vaush needs to binge some of that urban planning dude that hit it big on tik tok. His videos are actually pog at explaining
The guaranteed way to make my community happier is to show them all the awful streets of LA before concluding that there are no good places in LA
I'm from France, it's depressing to see what you have to live in in the US.
Blocking residential areas in donuts around parkland or special places (e.g. the town hall) was an optimal strategy for SIM city on the SNES.
A nice thing here in the UK are the trains. They could be better, but damn are they convenient!