Always more people, always more asphalt, always more buildings. When will this stop.
London's population today (8.7 million) is only marginally more than it was in 1939 (8.6 million). For much of the 20th century the population decreased - there's no reason that can't happen again, especially if people migrate out of London for work.
I've been living near or in big cities for many years, communing is impossible, in some cities it is completely full on the road, on public transportation. People become more and more aggressive on the road because they lose their mind spending so much time just sitting there and waiting for other cars to move.
I think it is a shame that so few companies do full remote work, especially in IT. It could really change things.
In terms of London though up is good, its way too much of a sprawl and would benefit from greater density.
Whilst the world population keeps growing and we keep moving forwards towards hire world average incomes we'll still be looking for growth.
Maybe I'm wrong here, but I'm afraid that shifts towards sustainability in developed parts of the world can only lead to less growth _in those parts of the world_. There will always be a buyer in a less developed country that will keep a less sustainable economy going. And the less-developed world is growing.
Efforts towards sustainability are neccessary for reasons too obvious to mention, but ongoing growth does seems inevitable.
[1] https://www.ft.com/content/c5d3e0ae-36eb-11ea-ac3c-f68c10993... (in here http://archive.ph/https://www.ft.com/content/c5d3e0ae-36eb-1... for those who don't have access)
The older generation would use day to day items (pots, pans, glasses, radios, TV sets, vehicles, even clothes) for what would feel like an eternity, repair till they wanted a well deserved upgrade and even then would either sell or donate the same.
Now I hear young people boast about how they upgrade their iPhones every year (or their cars every 3 years) and don't even sell the previous one because there's no point in getting $300 for it :(
While not everyone can afford to do that, but it does make it aspirational (in the minds of those vulnerable to herd mentality) to be a wasteful consumer h*e, smh.
[1] This mass cultural and spending to saving ratio shift is in the best interest of the government, who wants our economy to grow—at any cost.
It will take a paradigm shift to make location irrelevant.
Its a coping mechanism for dealing with death and you'll see many people as they age fall into it.
Sure, there are likely many factors but I would argue a pretty strong one is that the opinion is just preparing the oldie for acceptance of death by turning it into something more palatable.