It sounds like the “high quality outdoor space” you are referring to is something to be found in typical North American suburbia, but I would argue that this is typically a bleak crabgrass hell and not much higher quality or more alive than the road/parking-lot hell that surrounds it. But maybe you are instead imagining streets lined with elm trees (well elm was traditional but most died of Dutch elm disease—other species are used now).

Occasionally one may find an undeveloped lot which has more native species growing there, but perhaps we just disagree on what a high-quality outdoor space is, and you have something much more human-focused than natural in mind. I would argue that these do exist in the dense parts of big American cities (think Central Park in New York, which has a lot of space but also serves a dense population and so can afford more gardeners, flower beds, and varied features in general; New York also manages to sustain two botanical gardens which have reasonable examples of natural habitat too.) Though I would imagine the typical US city with a hollowed-out downtown mightn’t have good parks or shared spaces.