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Comment by atombender | Hacker News Reader

I don't know the West coast very well, so I'm curious -- are there any (smaller) cities there where you can actually get by without a car to do grocery shopping, commute to one's office (assuming it's in the same town/city), etc.? I'm thinking something comparable to Amsterdam, Copenhagen or Berlin, where you can get by with a bike and/or subway, or often just walking. Portland? Seattle?

I've visited Silicon Valley and SF, and I remember it as being really pedestrian-unfriendly. A friend of mine has a story about visiting San Jose without a car, and not being able to go to a bookstore because, while the map showed it as being a block away and he could clearly see it, there was no way to reach it on foot from where he was.

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Even within the Larger Bay Area there is plenty of smaller cities with a well developed and prolific downtowns that have startups, retail, supermarkets, bars and restaurants all within walking distance of a rail system connecting you to SF: Mountain View, Oakland, Redwood City or where I live - San Mateo. My family and I have been a 1-car household for more than a decade and mostly walk everywhere including a train station for a 25min ride to SF

I've only visited Silicon Valley once, so my impression may be skewed, but to me it came across as this incredibly bland, entangled sprawl of anonymous strip malls, with each "city" indistinguishable from the next.

To some extent these cities seemed walkable, but in practice everyone has a car, and most endeavours have you end up on the highway. Everyone seems to complain about either traffic or about the awfulness of BART, but maybe that's HN.

I did love SF itself, though it seems to be in a similar situation as NYC, nestled deep within this huge web of urban sprawl that you have to punch through in order to get out into the wilderness.

Bay Area is a large metropolitan area, so yes, there are places like what you described.

There are also great cities with walkable downtowns often right next to a train station. You can choose to live close to these areas and enjoy walkability, or live a bit further and drive everywhere. There are definitely choices

I have lived in San Francisco since 2000 and have never owned a car. Transit varies a lot by neighborhood, but I think there are plenty of places to live and get by with just transit and/or a bicycle.

Yep - Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver BC all fit into this "don't need a car, just take the subway or walk" camp. According to a friend that lives there, Bellingham "almost kinda counts" for this category, too, but I haven't been to confirm/deny.

There's cases where Car2Go/etc. are useful out this way, but generally I don't use a car often (having lived in Seattle and Vancouver BC since coming to the PNW).

Edit: I should clarify. You can't just plop down anywhere - if you live up at the top of Queen Anne Hill in Seattle, you're gonna have a rougher commute to downtown than someone who lives in, say, Columbia City near the light rail line. Much like Chicago or NYC, your proximity to high-frequency transit corridors will greatly decrease your stress levels.

Hundreds of thousands of San Franciscans shop from local markets and commute to work downtown every day. A single bus line has over 50K riders every day. I would guess 10’s of thousands commute to work by bike within sf.

This place is not Dallas.

Vancouver, BC is probably the easiest city on the West Coast to manage without a car. The downtown core is very walkable, and there is reasonable public transit through most of the greater metro area. There's a high proportion of residential buildings downtown, and many have pretty empty parking lots as cars aren't necessary for a lot of people most of the time, and there are a number of competing car share services the rest of the time.

Vancouver ticks a lot of boxes, but it's a bit cold, unfortunately.

Those of us living in the frozen wasteland that is winter in the rest of Canada can definitely not relate!

It's possible on the West Coast, and actually probably easier to do in bigger cities. However you need to be particular about where you live and work, which usually involves paying more money. It also becomes much harder if you have a significant other and kids.

Sure. Looking for specific examples, though!

Currently residing in NYC and pretty unhappy about the difficulty of getting out in nature. My ideal town is on the water; not too big; good public transportation; flat enough for biking; forests, mountains and lakes easily reachable by bike/walking/subway; dense urban core for apartment living or small house; decent downtown with some brand name shopping; temperate climate. Plus points for abundant access to public EV charges.

My home town is Oslo, Norway, which ticks all the boxes except the climate one, which always bugged me when I was living there. The lack of daylight and sun is something of a dealbreaker.

Curious what the situation is elsewhere. I've heard good things about Denver and Raleigh, for example, though those aren't so temperate either.

Raleigh has a small downtown area that is walkable. I’m there a number of times a year and my hotel is a few blocks from my office. There are some downtown condos. I doubt any professionals live downtown without a car.

I know ~one. It’s not common, and in general not very feasible.

You are looking for San Francisco

Isn't SF/Bay Area notorious for its terrible traffic? My impression is that while it's easier, distance-wise, to get out of SF into nature than NYC, it's in a similar spot in terms of rush-hour traffic.

Getting out into nature from SF without a car is a little tricky. I still miss being able to take a train out into the countryside, walk in the hills finishing at a pub before taking a train home...

There is a ton of incredible nature within SF itself. Like Presidio and Crissy Field and whole Golden Gate recreational area and Ocean beach

Raleigh’s a pretty nice area, but not remotely reasonable for public transit except on very specific (and limited) corridors.

How is San Jose "pedestrian-unfriendly"? You can walk anywhere but on freeways. You just have to dodge assholes on scooters now and then.

As to your first question, you can live without a car anywhere if you choose to live near work and other frequent destinations.

I have lived in San Francisco for 15 years with no car, both at the bottom of the nation's income brackets and near the top.

Some people just don't want to mix with "normal" people and a lot of San Franciscans wish they would fucking leave.

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