Hacker News Reader

Comment by galkk | Hacker News Reader

When I rented an apartment in central part of large city for 2 years, I literally haven’t never seen people from 2 other apartments on same floor as me and maybe had one chat with last one. I rent house in suburbs, at nice cul de sac, I know names of neighbors in 2 houses and had chats with 2 more. So your mileage may vary A LOT. Although large city offers many more chances to randomly step up. Reaching literal center of city and it’s life in 30 minutes on subway is much different from reaching another burbs on car.

View on HN

Yeah the point of apartments is not to socialize with the neighbors specifically, it's more that the increased density gets you walkability and density.

It's much more appealing to get to the street and walk when you have 4 cafes, a theater, two libraries and a gym in a 10 minute radius than when you just get to walk next to lawns for an hour.

And there's a point to be made for the added friction of a small home. The more self sufficient your house is the harder it is to convince yourself to get out.

A lot of people are assuming that the main people you would be interacting with in a city are your neighbors. There are many more positive interactions you'd have, outside.

People often don't socialize with their neighbors in a big city because it's nice to have a place where you aren't expected to socialize.

Sometimes I don't want to have a conversation with my neighbor who I really don't have anything in common with except they live next door.

In a big city you can find people that are exactly your tribe or explore a new one.

Thats wild to me. When I lived in an apartment I couldn’t get out the door without having the crazy cat lady telling me her new smoking spot the cameras couldn’t see (she wanted to smoke on the rooftop). It was a riot, that place had some characters.

The suburbs were soul sucking to me, the people were largely insufferable. I knew my neighbors, but hated them because 90% of our conversations were some form of “I noticed your grass wasn’t cut this week” or “your cans sat on the curb until the morning”. There were some good ones, but like me they mostly hid in their back yard to avoid the Karen’s.

Taking care of the lawn, etc, you will definitely meet your neighbors.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com