Which is your preferred environment?
suburb of either Portland/Seattle. I don’t like being deep in a city, but I like being near cities and enjoy the weather of the PNW.
Do you live in that area already? It’s so nice up that way, I miss Portland a lot sometimes. Most underrated food scene in the country imho, it’s way better there if you’re vegan/vegetarian than pretty much anywhere else. The landscape up there is just awe-inspiring too. Portland’s suburbs are weird though lol, Milwaukie was the only one that didn’t give me bad vibes.
i want to live in a city so bad i love a walk but where i live now im like walking on the side of a busy road with no sidewalks
That’s fucked 😣
My answer is basically anything but the suburbs. I grew up in the suburbs and live there again. I hate it. I lived in the country for some time and I liked it quite a lot honestly. If the political attitudes were better I’d never feel fully inclined to leave.
As I’m afraid of driving in basically any environment where I can expect cars to be around in great number, the only way I can see myself driving around regularly is if I’m basically in the absolute middle of nowhere. If the area is actually properly populated, I’d basically need things to be hyper-walkable and ideally transit-oriented as well. If I could help it I’d get to 100% of my destinations purely by walking. I don’t actually enjoy any mode of transit that’s not my own two feet, I find all the alternatives rather alienating.
My dream location is literally just a fantasy and nothing presently attainable, but it’d be like… a heavily forested and uber-dense smaller city or town with everything I could ever want or need basically within walking distance, if not basically or literally in the same building (imagine an uber-woke Whittier Alaska for that scenario I guess). There’d be like common’s areas where a bunch of food is grown and there’s an expectation that you should pitch-in and take what you need. Very little space is given to cars as far as infrastructural accommodation go, and it’s not expected you own a personal car, tho some are kept around for various purposes that we deem fit. You look around and mostly see foot travel. Maybe the odd bicycle or push scooter. Rewilded nature is most of what you see outside of town limits, if not all of it.
idk maybe like Ithaca New York or Eugene Oregon or something if I’m tryna be more realistic 🤷♀️
You need to look at New England, more specifically Western Massachusetts and Vermont. Pretty much the only part of the country where rural doesn’t mean conservative (it’s actually super left-leaning there). Find I-91 (highway that runs North-South) and look along there, towns like Brattleboro, VT, Greenfield, MA, and Northampton, MA are exactly what you want.
ur actually cooking with that I-91 recommendation 😳🤯 holy fuck thank you
if suburbs were like actual towns here in the US and not glorified strip malls with highways running through them id prefer them cause you get the best of both worlds that way.
but thats not what suburbs are here so probably a smallish urban center is what id like
There are lots of towns like you describe in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic! Like actual towns, not suburbs, that are in the orbit of larger cities. That style of development is generally restricted to older parts of the country only, unfortunately :/
yeah. i live in the midwest, great lakes area. and i like the idea of living here, but the reality is awful. there could be so much infrastructure developed around Chicago as like a big regional center with trains and shit but theres just nothing but highways and farmland.
id like to live in the north east but its expensive. idk
More expensive, but you get paid more (although that doesn’t always offset the higher cost of living). There are some cities in that region that still aren’t kooky crazy banana beans expensive though, take a look at Buffalo, Rochester, Hartford, Providence, Philadelphia and Baltimore.
Buffalo is actually where ive looked the most since its basically midwest (great lakes at least) still 😭
It’s not a bad place, you just have to be ready for some absolutely crushing winters! Plus, you’d be close to Toronto, which is wonderful city in and of itself.
oh im used to lake effect snow and cold winters already. another reason why buffalo is top of my list. i love winter and snow
I’ve lived in cities for my entire life. Going to the country or any sort of desolate place makes me feel very uncomfortable, the lack of people or just things in general. So I’d probably pick ‘‘city’’
Yeah, I grew up rural, and I have fond memories of my largely pastoral upbringing, but once I hit my late teens, I was ready to get the fuck out lol. Having that little to do and being so far from stuff does things to your mind.
Country, I grew up in small towns and now that I’ve lived in a medium sized city for a few years I yearn for the country. It’d be hard to make and keep social connections but I find free nature very calming. Ideal would be an hour and a half from a major city ok the outskirts of a small town with a national park nearby. One can dream
The country does offer more peace of mind for sure. The isolation would probably be manageable with a partner, only way I’d ever move back somewhere like that.
