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Comment by ricardobayes | Hacker News Reader

Living in HCOL metropolises is like thinking ICE cars make sense because they make a 'vroom vroom' sound. I visited a big city for the first time in two years this past weekend and couldn't stay for more than 30 minutes. People on top of people, litter, crazy traffic you name it. I moved to a cozy coastal area where people know each other by their first names. People take the time to get to know you, make a joke, or help you out. After living all my life in big cities now the whole concept of it seems so foreign.

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I think there's a lot of people who live in these areas who don't take full advantage of them. Jobs funnel these people into the cities when they could have a higher standard of living elsewhere.

That said, I hate the cities vs. towns debate because it dismisses the fact that people are different, and value different experiences. Cities offer a lot of things that smaller communities don't. There's much more vibrant arts scenes, a greater variety of amenities (bars, restaurants, concert venues, museums, etc.) and much greater diversity. Traffic isn't a problem if you don't own a car, and city neighborhoods (outside downtown) can provide more a sense of community than you might think. The tradeoff is, of course, space and affordability. For some people, that tradeoff is worth it, and for others it isn't.

So don't. It's not for everyone. Apparently it's not for you. That's okay. Some of the "people on top of people" like cities better.

When you visit a city, venture out of the downtown area. Most people that love living in big cities actually live in the neighborhoods, not in the high rises.

The best thing with big cities are the scales bake in selection and redundancy. What happens if your nearest x, be it neighbors, restaurants, shops, whatever, just sucks? Tough for you. For me I have backups and backups. Neighbors all over the place. Food from around the world at all price points. Every hobby I have manages to have enough supporters in the population to support a specialist shop or three. My neighbors we know eachother, we help eachother out. The fact that there are more of us in the group chat means that we can more reliably get some people together in the common areas for wine.

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