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The best things about cities come from density combined with diversity. Having a lot of diversity means there's lots of niche interests; having a lot of density means those niche interests have enough adherents to come together to create communities; whether they're specialist shops, restaurants, discussion groups, music, theatre, political movements, sexual interests - whatever - the more niche your interest is, the more likely you'll only find like-minded people in a city.

I could say I don't understand why people don't live in cities. The countryside is boring - if you're not interested in the outdoors, there's nothing to do. Suburbs make some sense for people in middle adulthood to raise children in a safer environment without being too far from the city, but otherwise they're just a space / commute tradeoff, getting more space for your money than somewhere closer.

I don't think those things are always exclusive to cities. All of them go on in malls/community centers/etc. either in suburbs or the commercially zoned areas a few minutes away from them, or for some of them, certainly at the colleges. There will also tend to be more compact "mini-cities" (a real term probably exists) nearby with a lot more niche shops and different culture. I'm sure some of the more niche things do only go on in cities but just the internet plus conventions has been enough for me.

There are some more upsides to going a bit further into the country. No nearby neighbors means you can have an expectation of privacy doing whatever you want in the back yard and have no potential for noise complaints if you wanted to do something like an event with music or shoot guns, and on the flip side not hear any noise from neighbors. You'd also have more room to do home improvements if you wanted and have a much easier time getting zoned to build something like a fallout shelter if that kind of thing interests you or dig a pond.

As a parent, I've realized that all the things I used to love about cities are things I have no time or interest for now. Cities seem best suited for teens and young adults, but that's a minority of the population at any given time.

I'm sure there's a notable group of people who want to live in a city all their lives, but I also don't think it's a coincidence that as people start to have kids, they seem to start wanting to move out of cities.

People typically max out their housing budgets on urban apartments for themselves/their partners, but want kids to have their own rooms. To get the additional bedroom(s) for no more money, you have to compromise on something else, like location.

Also, suburban housing has the price of a decent school district built in, while in the city you need to pay private tuition for access to an institution which isn't completely non-functional (i.e. overwhelming majority of students are far below the extremely unambitious academic standards).

If urban schools were high quality and middle class families could afford family-sized apartments, things would be different.

It sounds like a lot of the issues here are very different depending on the country you live in.

Edit: No need to be so cryptic, right? Urban public schools are the top tier in my country. Affordability of housing in city centres is becoming more of an issue, but given the availability of jobs, I don't think it's a major driver of relocation.

In general, the situation here seems to be that a lot of families would prefer to live in a less urban environment, but cities make more economic sense still.

>in a safer environment

Cities are safer than rural areas or suburbs.

How? This seems to say otherwise. https://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=812

You're more likely to be in a car crash than the victim of a crime...

People aren't going to want to stop living near other people any time soon. Not everybody likes living in big urban areas (as you demonstrate), for the same reasons that some people really like social events and others don't. But the people who like dense social networks really like them and don't want to live in the suburbs.

You're extrapolating too far from your own preferences. I don't like watermelon, but I don't generalize from that to a future where something replaces watermelon. I assume people are eating watermelon because they do like it.

> You're extrapolating too far from your own preferences.

Aren't you doing the same, but in the other direction?

Then don't build everywhere. Only build in places that have ground suitable for the foundations taller buildings need. If we're building new cities, we can make some wise decisions on where to do that beforehand.

Not everyone has to live in one of my cities. If you don't like population density, then you can live somewhere else. But the problem we have now is that there are a lot of people who want to live in densely populated places, but can't because the cost of living is too high.

Are you sure people "want to live in densely populated places" and don't just want to live somewhere with jobs in their field, and wouldn't live somewhere else if the jobs were there?

Yes, I'm sure. You're projecting. People with the capacity to live anywhere in the world still pay crazy amounts of money to live in densely populated cities like New York, London, Paris, and Hong Kong. There are many books out there about why, but I think the most compelling reason is the social opportunities they provide.

Humans are generally social beings, they enjoy spending time with other humans. Life out in the suburbs is often (but not always) much more solitary. For most people, being alone in a big house with a lot of stuff doesn't make them happy. Having real experiences with those they're close with makes them happy.

People walk out of their flat, take the lift to the garage (avoiding eye contact), sit alone in their car, spend 30 minutes grumbling at the traffic and other drivers' behaviour, park on the company lot, walk out of the office 10 hours later, sit alone in their car, spend 40 minutes (dammit!) bitching about the traffic and other drivers' behaviour, stop at the supermarket, say hello-thanks-goodbye to the cashier, spend 10 minutes in their car, park into their garage, take the lift to their flat (avoiding eye contact), open and lock the door. Repeat on the next day.

You can replace the garage and the car by the fastest possible walk to the underground station, grumbling at slower people, and 30 minutes in the tube, avoiding any eye contact by looking at their smartphone/newspaper/book and avoiding any other interaction with headphone.

And on Friday afternoon or evening, they get out of the city as fast as possible, until Sunday evening.

That's "social beings enjoying spending time with other humans in cities". You don't even know 2 people in your own building, when you live in a city. You can lay on the side-walk having a cardiac arrest and people will walk by you, if not over you.

People want to live in dense regions because they want to have good restaurants and good public services and things to do on the weekend outside of their homes, other than hunting and fishing.

So this:

> And on Friday afternoon or evening, they get out of the city as fast as possible, until Sunday evening.

This isn't universal. Not even close.

Plus, you can't ignore the political aspect: Someone with progressive politics will be happier in a city than the country, at least in America, and that's been true a very long time.

Absolutely certain. I, for one, turned down the opportunity to move to Northern California (I got a H-1B visa) in large part because it lacked diversity in ways that interested me, even though it would have been the best move for my career. I stayed in London instead.

Don't forget that people have or want families - people also want to be able to find a job for their partner, or find a partner if they're single.

The higher your degree of professional specialisation the more acute this problem is.

Cities come in a wide variety of sizes.