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Sounds like my experience living in Houston. Of course I'd hate living here without a car, I did it for a few months and it's ridiculous. But compared to Montreal, Sydney, Toronto, or even Philadelphia (my points of reference), this is far and away the worst living experience. My commute to work is 15 minutes, which isn't too bad. It used to be a 10-minute bike ride or 20-minute walk, which was both healthier and more enjoyable, not to mention more environmentally friendly and free. I enjoyed getting groceries every few days: picking up some produce and bread on the way home from one of the dozens of businesses on the way was delightful, and meant I could always have fresh food.

Living in suburban America (it's hard to call Houston a city in the same sense as the ones I mentioned above) is emotionally draining. Yes, there are positives: good food, good beer, cheap cost of living. However, I don't feel like I'm part of a community. I feel like I live on a small island in an archipelago of disconnected islands. It feels like everybody here who hasn't lived in a walkable dense urban city doesn't know what they're missing, there are intangible psychological benefits. Of course, these are just the thoughts of an east-coaster.

Different strokes for different folks. My suburban neighborhood is very socially active, we all know each other very well. I know their kids and vice versa, etc. What I find draining is all the noise when I go downtown, and being around so many strangers. I visit friends who live in condos downtown and they don't know their shared-wall neighbors as well as I know mine in the next house over. Everyone just retreats back to their personal cave once they're done dealing with the crowds.

I'm sure my experience is partly due to my own learned preferences, as well as the specifics of my neighborhood. I know there are nice suburban and rural areas to live, and I hope that with time I develop a greater appreciation for what's here.

I lived on a college campus for two years, which I think was like a microsm of walkable city. Food, academic clubs, classes, everything in walking distance of the dorm. The social aspect didn't work out for me that great, walking was tiresome. I didn't mind eating out all the time with the meal plan but groceries would've been healthier. I really enjoyed the setting with the nice streams/ponds/wildlife but that's where it deviates from the standard city experience unless you go to a park. It was great being able to sit in the grass and watch a great blue heron catch a fish after slowly staking out the area for a while.

In comparison to my experience walking 10 minutes to my farthest class some days, I much prefer driving for 10 or even 15 minutes. I just really prefer living in a setting like the house being surrounded by forest on at least 3 sides and having enjoyable countryside drives to stores. Can't speak for everyone but I'd only tolerate living in a city for a job ot something if I didn't have to do a lot of walking/NYC-style transit (I've used the MTA subways a few times and they are efficient, but too crowded/jerky/it's stressful running around between connections)

On the flip side,

I love walking. I get groceries every week. It feels good to move my body, one day I will not be able to walk, either through death or disability. I would like to enjoy it while I can. When I walk places, I have less to worry about than when I am driving. There is significantly less chance of me accidentally murdering someone or being accidentally murdered.

A 2 minute drive feels so lazy to me.

I still enjoy going out to eat. I take the dog with me, on a leash, we both get moving. Grab the food, sit outside and enjoy the people watching.

It isn't easy if you don't walk a lot but eventually you feel a sense a pride in your walking gains. Feeling comfortable enough to go on long walks is a pretty basic human desire I feel. Even if exercise for weight loss is ineffective, it is not ineffective for mood change.

moderation in all things, including moderation.

To correct some misinformation:

Medium-intensity exercise (e.g., jogging) for weight loss has been debunked. Long-duration, low-intensity exercise (e.g., walking) or high-intensity exercise (e.g., interval sprints) will both lead to weight loss. Most people don't have time for the former (unless it's part of their lives, i.e. they walk a lot in a city), so if your goal is weight loss, skip the jogging and look at HIIT.

Personally, I live a 3 min walk from a grocery store and it's great. I stop by on my 8 min walk back from the train station (after a 17 min ride to work) a couple times a week. Many things I buy wouldn't last 2 weeks (though for things that do, I still take the occasional trip to Costco). If I lived in an area not designed for walking (like 95% of America), I'm sure I'd feel similarly to you, but I much prefer living here in Seattle (and walking) than I did living in a car-oriented city.

Do you have a source for the exercise claims? That article pocket recommended me seemed to imply the contrary for walking.

I don't mind walking my dog for a while or going on trails, but walking all the time for practical reasons doesn't register as fun for me. Additionally it seems like walking on concrete/asphalt strains my feet a lot faster than dirt/grass.

I'd hate waking to Safeway every other day, but I loved doing tiny regular grocery shopping in Europe. It made it easy to always have fresh produce and spontaneously plan interesting meals.

A lot of it comes down to how the cities and grocery stores are designed.

In the US you drive to a shopping mall, navigate through a sea of parking, walk maybe 1000ft of aisles, then spend 5 minutes in the checkout process waiting, scanning, bagging, and paying.

In the European cities I've lived in and visited, mixed zoning means you're likely to have a supermarket near your house or work so doesn't take any extra time to travel to, there's no parking so you just walk in of the street, the stores are about the size of a 7-Eleven so it's fast to find what you want, then the whole checkout process is crazy efficient.

Why are you assuming that a removal of cars means there will be no mechnism that would replace its functions? Many people benefit from a car's cargo potential and their need for this function wouldn't disappear with the cars. I can't say what the particular method could be, maybe medium-sized autonmous vehicles, but I would be surprised of nothing was created.

Let me guess, you can't possibly be in shape !

Not really, but I do try to use the gym at work sometimes since something is probably better than nothing. I made notable gains in cardio endurance that way.

It's not real, is it?

What?