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Comment by makeitdouble | Hacker News Reader

Laundromats look like rented parking space to me: a way to utilize a space that would otherwise be lost, but won’t be anywhere near the revenue of actually having a full business/tenant in that spot.

In some areas laundromat are basically cost/revenue neutral and inly make sense as a service to the community and keeping the light on.

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Maybe businesses that provide an essential service to a community, like the logistics company from the article that many farmers depend on, should be donated the that community. Make it a coop of some sort, run not for profit, but for the needs of the community that uses it.

Laundromats usually only exist and survive in areas with lots of old and/or small apartments without enough place for an own washing machine.

It's not just a "service", it's vital for the community.

An apartment too small for a washing machine? It occupies less than a square metre of floor space; how small is your apartment?

> Laundromats look like rented parking space to me [...] In some areas laundromat are basically cost/revenue neutral and inly make sense as a service to the community and keeping the light on.

Which is why laundromats / launderettes (as they're sometimes still called in the UK) are the stereotypical example of a type of business providing a very different kind of laundering service.

IIRC I've never used one, but I've also never owned a washing machine. By sheer luck both apartments I've been living in since 2006 have had a communal washer/dryer/drying room - but at least I would have the space to get my own washing machine here.

I do know of a few, but as someone said, I think they're in neighborhoods with old buildings where not everyone might have their own.

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