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Comment by d--b | Hacker News Reader

It's always a tradeoff...

- super dense cities like Tokyo or New York can feel suffocating. A lot of people can't bear it. The lack of green space, and the overcrowding of people and cars increases the stress levels by a lot. Yet, being able to walk around the city is excellent for exercising and mindfulness, it's easier to meet with people, etc.

- super sparse cities (like LA or Brasilia) on the other end tend to isolate people, and to mediate the experience of daily life. Life is constantly split by episodes of driving / parking. Yet, these cities offer a lot of space, greenery and privacy.

The fact that both very dense cities and sparse cities exist and are successful only shows that different people enjoy different kinds of cities, so it would be a bit preposterous to claim that one style is better over another.

That said, electric cars and self driving car fleets will most likely help reduce pollution (both noise and air) by a lot and make living in dense city much easier.

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People always focus on these extreme endpoints, but to get a vibrant walkable neighborhood you don't need anything remotely close to New York or Tokyo densities.

My street in Somerville, MA has a WalkScore (91) that's higher than the average score for New York city (89), yet every building in my neighborhood is detached and three stories tall. I have a back yard with grass. Not a big one, but it feels nothing like lower Manhattan. And I can walk or bike to literally everything I need in a given week.

People equate "crowded" and "ugly" with "walkable" when it's just not accurate. Being more green and more attractive is literally one of the components of being walkable, because people need to actually want to walk.

You remember an apartment fire there about a year ago by any chance?

Is it really fair to compare Somerville to NYC? For example since you post on Ynews and live in Somerville, there's a high chance you work at MIT or one of the offices at Kendall. It's almost like someone who lives on 70th street in NYC, and works on 55th saying "NYC is perfectly walkable, most weeks I can get everywhere I need to by just walking." I.e. I don't really know whether it's worth talking about small towns or neighborhoods in the context of this thread.

In terms of density, yeah, I think they are comparable. At least, as much as any other place in the US is comparable to NYC. Somerville's astounding density is one of my favorite facts, since it seems so neighborhood-y to walk through. Somerville is the most dense area in the US outside of the metropolitan areas of NYC, LA, and Miami. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_b...

The GP's point was that we should look at extremes between super dense cities and super sparse cities, and Somerville fits nicely there.

Somerville is a very dense city by American standards. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_b...

It would also be illegal to build almost any of Somerville as it exists using current building codes, in Somerville. Discussion from a year and a half ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11918230

> super dense cities like Tokyo or New York can feel suffocating. A lot of people can't bear it. The lack of green space, and the overcrowding of people and cars increases the stress levels by a lot.

I strongly suspect when people say that, they're thinking of the day time population of the tourist/business districts in those cities. The daytime population of Manhattan is nearly 4 million people, mostly concentrated below 130th street. The density is probably 200k-250k people per square mile. The resident population density is actually only 70,000 people per square mile. I was there after Hurricane Sandy, when the commuters and tourists were gone, and it was empty.

Here is a typical side street in Rogers Park Chicago: https://www.google.com/maps/@42.0103744,-87.6640436,3a,75y,2.... At 30,000 people per square mile, it's about double the average density of Tokyo.

Here's one of the newer business districts in Tokyo: https://www.google.com/maps/@35.6807167,139.7630674,3a,75y,9.... That area probably has way above the average population density of the city.

> That area probably has way above the average population density of the city.

Interestingly, Chiyoda, the Tokyo ward in which the street view you provided is located, has the lowest population (by which I mean the `resident' population density) among all wards in central Tokyo[1]. I believe that this strongly supports your point that the `suffocating' parts of a city does not really have many people living there.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_wards_of_Tokyo#List_of...

Agreed. I would feel suffocated if I lived in Midtown Manhattan.

In my Brooklyn neighborhood the density feels fairly low (10-15 visible in the street). Green space isn't great for most but I happen to live two blocks from a park.

Many places in Manhattan also feel like this if they aren't business or nightlife heavy.

The same goes for Hong Kong. Shopping districts like Causeway Bay https://www.google.com.hk/maps/@22.2784287,114.1833788,3a,75... and Central https://www.google.com.hk/maps/@22.2821186,114.1578335,3a,75... can be suffocating.

And yet the most densely populated districts don't feel all that bad for the most part. Kwun Tong https://www.google.com.hk/maps/@22.3138909,114.2268051,3a,60... and Wong Tai Sin https://www.google.com.hk/maps/@22.3435765,114.1929784,3a,75... for example. But Mong Kok is a subdistrict in Yau Tsim Mong, famous for being the most densely populated place in the world.. AND it's a shopping district too, with huge influx after working hours. https://www.google.com.hk/maps/@22.319367,114.1699535,3a,75y...

Even from the perspective of personal preference, I think it's fair to say that, at least in the US, there is a wide variety of sparse cities for people to choose from, and only a few actually dense cities. This leaves those preferring density at a relative disadvantage.

Unrelated: it's unclear to me how self-driving cars can help pollution. They're a solution to the problem of the high cost of labor, and not much else. If anything, self-driving cars will make it cheaper for everyone to ride cars everywhere, and so people will more often ride cars everywhere, and more pollution will be the result.

> This leaves those preferring density at a relative disadvantage.

100% agree. I much prefer to live in a dense, urban, walkable area, but most built environments that satisfy these criteria violate modern zoning regulations.

So, the USA's supply of pleasant, dense environments is dwindling because every time an olde/walkable area revitalizes enough to attract new development, that new development must comply with modern zoning, and kills the thing that that makes the area attractive.

It's thoroughly frustrating.

The only city I've been in the US that made me think "wow, that's kind of walkable" was Boston. Are there any other dense cities I should visit?

There's lots of old, walkable downtowns in the midwest that have a feeling of appropriate density.

Most of them are part of old cities that are past their prime in economic vitality, so those areas don't have the same liveliness as what you might get in downtown Boston. (I used to work for a company based there, and would spend hours walking around at night.)

I'd recommend Pittsburgh for walkability, too. It's one of the most delightful cities I've wandered around recently.

Unfortunately, even Boston, Pittsburgh, NYC, and the lesser-known but walkable/dense areas are pretty unappealing when compared to some cities in south/central america and Europe, that were built before cars took over everything.

I suspect once a few large cities go bankrupt and cannot enforce their zoning regulations, new construction will move in the direction of rational density again.

There are a couple pictures from the article that are in Hoboken, NJ. (My home-town although the article doesn't call it out.). The city is consistently rated among the most walkable cities in the US. It's right across the river from NYC but feels even more walkable than NYC.

This said, the only reason why Hoboken and many other walkable cities can get public-support for being so walkable (and encouraging city planning as such) is the ample public-transit options.

This leads to no need for having a car which leads to most people not having one which leads to most people preferring walkable versus drivable. It's kind of a chicken-and-egg problem.

Lots of DT areas of cities are walkable, but Boston is kind of unique in that it has miles and miles of walkable streets. Its urban core is just really big.

Portions of Seattle are very walkable (From the International District going north, quite a few miles), and individual parts of Chicago are walkable. Heck there are 2 or 3 mile stretches of San Diego are walkable (there might be more than that, I only spent a week there!)

I wouldn't call Chicago and San Diego walkable (I'm talking about like european cities walkable)

> Chicago

Some individual portions of Chicago are very walkable. Likewise with some small bits of San Diego, though you are right, not as good as European cities.

I don't know about European cities, but it's generally easier to walk around the San Diego Gaslamp Quarter than it is to drive.

I was there two weeks ago. It’s pretty much one street with a dozens of bars. Quite empty during the week.

Gaslamp is a tourist area, you wouldn’t want to live there, there isn’t much around. It used to be really dodgy, no one sensible would go there, but they rehabilitated it to a significant extent. Unfortunately, it is mostly only frequented by 20-somethings getting drunk at the myriad bars and tourists.

Seattle is among the most walkable cities in the US but San Diego is not. The nominally walkable areas of San Diego are for tourists with tourist desires; locals don’t live there for the most part and for good reason. I loved living there but walkable it was not.

Seattle, on the other hand, is a city where I’ve never really needed a car no matter where I lived or worked. I think that part of the lifestyle is brilliant. I have a car, but the battery goes dead between usages as often as not.

Northgate, West Seattle, Delridge. There are lots of suburban enclaves within the city.

Seattle has plenty of walkable parts, but I grew up in a working class suburban neighborhood within the city where driving to the store was most certainly necessary.

Most cities have a walkable area someplace, normally just outside of downtown (close enough to downtown that residents walk downtown), but often note actually downtown. Often is is just a few blocks so it is easy to miss (and there is a lot of traffic which is not ideal)

San Francisco is quite walkable -- when I lived there, within a 5 block radius (roughly a 10 minute walk) I had 2 grocery stores, at least a half dozen corner markets, miscellaneous shops (dry cleaner, shoe repair, a cigar store, produce market, etc), numerous bars and restaurants.

The entire city is only 7 miles wide, so about half the city is within a 30 minute walking radius.

Brooklyn. Provincetown, MA. Charlestown, SC

> Unrelated: it's unclear to me how self-driving cars can help pollution.

Well, d--b said "both noise and air". Drivers can contribute a fair amount of noise in busy cities when they get irate and lay on the horn...

Maybe I'm wrong on that one, but I'm thinking that when cars and bus drive themselves, there will probably a lot more cheap options to go from one place to another than using one's own car.

Dense cities will most likely restrict access to personal cars by a lot (using congestion fees or whatever), that's why I think that self driving cars will bring down the number of cars in the city.

Self-driving cars can significantly reduce the need for parking space, which in itself is not great for the environment and causes many transit distances to be longer.

I think it's possible that self driving cars could increase total driving like you explain, but i think it's also possible that they will drive down car ownership. Once you pay primarily based on usage (parking, insurance, depreciation are mostly fixed costs), you are more likely to drive sparingly.

Self-driving in itself won't help, but it's much more feasible for a fully autonomous system of cars to be totally electric since you can plan for the charging logistics as part of the system's design.

A walkable, pro-self-driving-car city could also theoretically tax self-driving-car rides to offset environmental impact.

Isn't this pretty much true by definition, though? People who want density will tend to all go to the same relatively few places (that's how you get density), whereas people who want to avoid density will go to different places (because if they all went to the same place it would become dense).

Most people have much more complex wants and density if at best a small part of the picture.

People want the best of all worlds. I want to own 100 acres (for my pet goats - even though I don't have the time to care for them I want them). I want my kid's school to be a most 200 meters from my front door (with a playground). I want my office, church, a dozen restaurants, and 30 other retail stores to be at most 500 meters from my front door. I'm not rich enough to afford that though so I have to compromise. Even if I was that rich, it is not possible for more than 2 people rich enough to afford that to live within 1000 meters of each other, and to support that requires thousands of not rich people living in 1000 meters.

People will choose a walkable neighborhood when they think it is a good compromise. Some valuable large livestock more than others and so will be late to move to the walkable city. Others want to spend their free time at the theater and will move to the walkable neighborhood early just because it is the fastest way to bed after the late night show. Most people are not so into either choice that one answer is obvious.

If you want a walkable neighborhood to work you need to fix the local schools. At least in the US most walkable neighborhoods are old areas of town where the schools are bad, those who want children feel compelled to move to the suburbs and the car lifestyle just because of how much better the schools are.

If you want walkable neighborhoods you need to fix zoning so that it is possible for them to happen. Strongtowns has a lot of analysis of what makes it possible - there are thousands of subtle things required, heavy handed efforts tend to leave a lot of the subtle problems in place.

When the streets are only used by self driving cars, then traffic will flow much more smoothly. No accidents, no police stops, one speed, smooth computer merging. Less hard acceleration and braking, less idling, less time spent in a running vehicle by each user.

You have a lot more faith in technology than I do -- there will still be accidents, as good as self-driving cars are, they are still subject to the laws of physics and sometimes cars will run into each other or other objects or people.

We already have effectively self-driving cars with Uber and other car-sharing services, and all you need to do is go to SFO's departure level during peak travel times to see the traffic havoc that self-driving cars will bring -- too many cars and not enough curb space to drop off/pick up everyone.

When self-driving cars are cheap and plentiful then downtown streets will look the same -- self-driving cars will more than double car traffic since instead of 200 employees driving to work and parking into the parking garage (making one trip), now 1000 employees will be dropped off by their self-driving car, which will then have to drive away to park or look for the next passenger, making a second trip on already crowded streets.

The key really is self driving only. No human drivers. Communication between cars and road systems. At that point, collision avoidance becomes only about pedestrians, animals, and other random objects that enter the street unexpectedly. The self driving car will be able to see, predict, and respond to that, and communicate the need to stop to the cars behind far faster than a human driver.

With inter-car communication, there won't be any confusion about where each car intends to go. No long waits for an opening.

Car design will push towards passenger comfort, and no longer towards "power" and "handling". This could mean smaller cars overall. 1-2 passenger vehicles could be common.

Yeah, it's definitely far down the road, and there will be a lot of forces that'll make it difficult to reach, but I think self driving cars are a chance to make things better.

random objects that enter the street unexpectedly. The self driving car will be able to see, predict

How does a self-driving car predict the unexpected? Braking distance of a 30mph car is 45 ft (ignoring reaction time) so anything that happens less than 45 feet in front of a self-driving car is going to need evasive action. On a busy street with cars in all lanes, the self-driving car is going to need to decide whether to hit the object (which could be a person darting across the street), or swerve into the car next to it.

You're forgetting that the cars in front need to break as well.

With an intelligent mesh the emergency lane abort order will propagate from one to many within the local area and a standard algorithm will determine what each traveling vehicle must do as they all react at the same time to avoid the intruding objects and bring energy in play to a minimum, hopefully zero, value in the affected area.

At the same time emergency response services would automatically be notified as well.

You're forgetting that the cars in front need to break as well.

I don't understand? A pedestrian steps in front of a 30mph self driving car that's 20 feet away. There's a sidewalk to the right and oncoming traffic to the left.

The car needs 45 feet to stop, so it's going to strike the pedestrian. Which I assume you recognize this since you said EMS will be called.

You may think it's unlikely that a pedestrian will step right in front of a car, but wait until pedestrians are trained that the car will always stop for them.

yes this particular prediction of the future doesn't make too much sense to me.

if a car were to drive as if every thing in its vicinity has the potential to move rapidly in front of the car, and hence it takes precautions for all potential accidents, it can't be moving very fast can it? if it is traveling on a busy street with a lot of vehicular traffic and pedestrians on the sidewalk, must it take precautions for each and every vehicle and person around it? how fast can such a self driving car possibly go, if this were to be the case?

Yes, it must. This is why speeds drop in downtowns and residential areas, because lower speeds provide more safety for pedestrians. A good human driver also takes account of this by reducing speed and paying better attention.

Some corrections...

Tokyo is not a super dense city like New York. It has half the urban density as New York and doesn't even show up in the top 20 most-dense cities.

You also cannot put Los Angeles and Brasilia together. Brasilia has 1/8th the urban density of Los Angeles. Brasilia might as well be a suburb.

Furthermore, I am not sure how you are defining success but population and even GDP are not guaranteed measurements of a successful cities. A city can be both populous and miserable, such as Beijing, or economically insignificant and happy, such as San Luis Obispo, CA. So I would reconsider your claim... in truth, the happiest cities are among the most walkable.

>super dense cities like Tokyo or New York can feel suffocating

Not all of Tokyo looks like Shibuya Crossing! Do a Google search for "Tokyo residential neighborhood". You'll find mostly two- or three-story buildings. The main difference? Streets are extremely narrow by North American standards and represent alleyways. This sort of development is what urbanists describe with the buzzword "human-scale".

I don't think it is some decision or planning that leads to this. New York is so dense because it is geographically constrained, and as the city grew it had no where to expand out to, so it had to become more dense to grow. Los Angeles, on the other hand, was created as smaller cities grew outward and connected to each other.

They are both successful in growth for different reasons, but their density was determined by geography, not by 'what people enjoy'.

> their density was determined by geography, not by 'what people enjoy'.

But whether people choose to live in them is determined by what people enjoy.

No it's not.

People tend to stay in the area they were born.

People tend to stay near their family.

People tend stay were they can find work.

People can't always afford to just up and move.

Not everyone is living on a six figure salary with a slew of job offers to chose from. Most people don't have the options you may have.

People don't make decisions in a vacuum. I don't get to choose where I want to live based solely on what I enjoy. A big part of what keeps people in a city is the network effect; cities are where the jobs are, so the people have to live there, which makes companies want to move to where the employees are, which makes people live there.....

Plus, you have families, cost of moving, home ownership, etc, that keeps you in a place even if you might enjoy living somehwere else more.

Chicago was built densely, and it's flat Illinois land as far as the eye can see for 180 degrees. Zoning codes force people to build more densely than they otherwise would. The average lot size in my neighborhood (laid out before zoning codes) is 2,800 square feet. The minimum lot size in the county today is 15,000 square feet (five times less dense).

Los Angeles has extremely strict parking requirements, and green space requirements. People often have no choice but to build out due to expense. There was a fantastic write up on Reddit by an architect on the issue here https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.reddit.com/r/LosAngeles/com...

You're probably just thinking of Times Square. The vast majority of people that live even in Manhattan do not live in horribly suffocating/overcrowded neighborhoods. To give you one example, I live in Stuyvesant Town, which has a population density of 200k/mi^2 (which is greater than the overall population density of Manhattan at 170k/mi^2), and yet Stuyvesant Town feels positively residential. It's full of parks, playgrounds, trees, green spaces, walking paths, etc., and it certainly never feels overcrowded. If anything it feels like a respite from the parts of Manhattan that do get super-crowded, which are inevitably the commercial/tourististic hubs.

It takes population densities of greater than 1M/mi^2 to truly feel overcrowded, and even in NYC you only see such densities in localized incredibly high-traffic spots, like Times Square and Herald Square. The vast majority of Manhattan is never so crowded as to feel suffocating.

Ironically, the suburb/city of LA my parents live in (Glendale) felt extremely walkable and not suffocating.

My parents live in a residential area that looks like your average American suburb - no stores, just houses and cars. But if you walk west of their house for 10 mins, you go to a large boulevard full of restaurants, shops, and people hanging out. It felt like a nice balance, but I doubt there are many jobs in there for the residents, so most do make the highway trip to LA proper.

It's more what the gov't is subsidizing than what people enjoy. EG in the US it's easy to get a loan for a new single family detached house, gas taxes are low, lots of "general fund" money goes towards building highways, ample free/underpriced parking in every downtown. Contrast to Denmark where there is 100% taxes on cars, little parking, big investments in biking and transit.

Autonomous cars are going to give the suburbs a new lease on life. They will make it easier than ever to live in far flung places because you'll be able to work from the car on the way to work. Autonomous cars will require less parking downtown, but I imagine they'll convert the parking to driving lanes for the widely anticipated massive increase in vehicle miles travelled.

"A lot of people can't bear it"

You wouldn't know if by the tens of millions of people who live in those densest cities. It seems like an astronomical numbers of people can "bear it" just fine.

>super dense cities like Tokyo or New York can feel suffocating

I guess to some people but I love NYC and find strolling in central park very unsuffocating. The main problem with NYC is most people do like it and would quite like to move there so the prices are bid stupidly high. Property prices being high because people want to move to a place are generally a sign of successful design.

I didn't think Tokyo felt that dense when I was there but very big to get around - over 100km long and taxis costing something like the price of international flight within europe.

Manhattan feels way more congested than Tokyo. In Herald Square and Times Square, pedestrian traffic is so overwhelming it often halts to a standstill. I never really felt uncomfortably overcrowded in Tokyo.

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