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Comment by fountainofage | Hacker News Reader

> But cities have enduring appeal - proximity to people and culture and things to do

I think this is key right here. For the foreseeable future, those things won't be any more available in an expensive city compared to an inexpensive rural area. So why buy a 1 bedroom for $2 million or rent one for $3500 a month if I can do the exact same amount of networking and see the exact same amount of museums while paying significantly less?

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Culture and things to do include a lot more than just networking and museums.

One example for instance is the vast amount of unique natural beauty surrounding the Bay Area.

Even rural places that have that are also expensive- though admittedly not nearly as much so. This is generally reflected in salary though.

Those activities are also restricted and limited during COVID - either explicitly via state and local ordinances or via social pressures to not spread the virus.

Basically, the optimal solution right now is to not go anywhere or see anyone unless you absolutely have to. Which if all someone should be doing is sitting at home or getting groceries, they could do that for a lot less than SF prices.

Hiking/cycling/camping can be crazy socially distant and probably one of the best things you can do for your own mental and physical health right now. A ride up Tam isn’t going to be any more or less dangerous than it was before.

Outside of a few extremely popular spots it is not restricted in Washington, at least to my knowledge. If it is in the Bay/CA then it is news to me.

In any case, that stuff will still be there when the pandemic is over. It won’t be anywhere east of the Rockies.

Hiking in the Bay Area is extremely difficult right now. You have to wear a mask EVERYWHERE outside where you are near people.

On trails with 90+F weather you have to put your mask on every 30 seconds with how many people there are, it's a mess.

My mental health is not improving when there are a million people all trying to do outdoor activities in the limited space we have nearby.

Try a hiking loop in the Oakland hills parking at Redwood Bowl. The redwood canopy preserves a pleasant climate. It’s a popular spot but not bad like you’re describing. Yes you need to wear a mask much of the time, but you can get a comfortable mask that’s easy to flip on and off, it’s not a big deal.

I can't believe California is making people where masks outdoors.

I think the order is for masks outdoors when distance cannot be maintained. So almost never outdoors.

That’s what I thought also, but there is a lot of pressure to wear a mask where I am if you even walk out the door.

Only other people can apply pressure. If you're not near anyone, take the mask off. If someone is pressuring you to put on your mask, that person is probably close enough that you should have a mask on.

The stink eye can travel from distances way beyond 6 feet.

Well, it used to be a free country. I guess it was nice while personal liberty lasted. I for one, welcome our technocratic overlords.

On most maintained trails in Washington this is all the time, practically. The little trails nestled in canyons in my area are so packed I don’t go near them anymore.

I highly doubt this is actually the case. I don’t doubt it is packed in the i90 corridor and Stevens pass, etc. that was always the case though.

There's 3 or 4 really big hikes that everyone does when they first get into hiking, or that people do multiple times per day when they're training for something bigger. Those are usually packed. And anything with mild elevation gain that leads to a lake before Snoqualmie Pass on I90 is packed. But once you get past Snoqualmie Pass the masses tend to thin out. And there are a lot of lesser-known peaks and destinations before the pass that a lot of people have never heard of and that I don't talk about.

What's strange about now is that the little neighborhood walks that lead down to beaches and other "hikes" like that are completely packed with people at all times, especially on weekends. It's actually to the point where people are parking multiple blocks away and then walking to the trailhead. It didn't used to be that way.

Yeah right on I don’t doubt that is the case. I was mostly refuting the “most” aspect of the post. Maybe I should just keep my mouth shut though ;)

This really doesn't reflect my experience. I live in the Bay Area and have gone hiking every weekend since quarantine started, both in local spots in and around the Bay and excursions to relatively-nearby Californian parks like Sequoia National Forest.

In my experience, you bring a mask with you when you hike, and occasionally put it on for maybe twenty seconds out of every five or ten minutes (or even rarer intervals when hiking in the more remote areas like the national parks) when you pass by someone on a trail and can't maintain distance. You hardly ever have to wear it.

And aside from this past weekend, it hasn't cracked 90 in the Bay Area pretty much all summer IIRC, and rarely even gets over 80.

Er, there's plenty of natural beauty, hiking/cycling/camping, & peaks higher than Mt. Tam east of Rockies, and even east of the Mississippi.

Otherwise, your point about there still being plenty of healthy ways to get out of the home, both practically and in accordance with official guidelines, is well-made.

I’m aware that there is but heavily biased towards the diversity and depth of the natural beauty of the West Coast.

Plus the humidity east of the Rockies makes outdoor anything unappealing, at least if you’re used to low humidity.

Yes, the crowds and the humidity are killing me. House is on the market and we’re moving back out as soon as we can.

It's actually pretty tough to camp these days. Everyone is doing it, so the familiar spots are packed with people eager to not wear a mask and rip through 24 beers in 24 hours.

If nature's your priority though, you don't live in SF or SV proper. You live in the Santa Cruz mountains, Marin, or further north along the coast or in the mountains (or in the Sierras). Those aren't cheap either in many cases of course until you really get out of Bay Area commuting range.

Yes I tried to call that out in my post. Even towns like Bend, Bellingham, etc(even somewhat places in Idaho and Montana by now) are by no means cheap and on top of that they don’t have a robust job market to justify the cost.

I wonder if the pandemic is going to decimate the housing markets even more in those remote mountain towns. I have two coworkers who just moved to Bozeman, MT to be closer to skiing and fishing. I would think places like Kalispell, Coeur d'Alene, Jackson Hole, Taos and Bend are all going to see a large influx of remote workers who like outdoor lifestyles.

I would suspect yes the pressure will be greater in areas like that. It is one of the reasons I prefer bigger cities on the west coast though; more houses, more jobs, and just as much nature.

I have worked 100% remotely for almost two years now and love it but now I live somewhere with a crappy job market. Yes I save money but I live in constant fear of having to take a 50% pay cut if I can’t find more remote work.

I love working remotely and I think it’s a great idea but I don’t think people realize how much of a leash it is when you choose to work in SV but live in the middle of nowhere.

In my case, I live well outside of Boston with quite a bit of land and only a few houses around me. No, it's not a mountain town in the Rockies or Sierras but it means I can go into the city for an evening if I want to, have lots of potential employers within (somewhat) reasonable driving distance, and could even commute into Boston by train if I wanted to--though it wouldn't really be sustainable long-term on a daily basis.

I don't know if this is true for many people who live here. There is a subgroup of my friends who live in the city and will drive almost every weekend for 30-60 minutes with their bikes and kayaks for recreation. If you avoid the popular trails and rec areas (e.g., Muir Woods), you can get somewhere very peaceful fairly quickly. I think the balance between city and access to nature works for a lot of people who live in the Bay Area.

I don't think this is generally true. You can bike right out of San Francisco over the Golden Gate Bridge and be away from the city in minutes. You can walk or bike out of the west side of silicon valley into a huge area of contiguous parkland. If you leave San Jose in the right direction you could hike for days without seeing anyone.

Certainly if you want both a city and nature, SF can be attractive in that regard. But the comment I was responding to was specifically about nature. If I don't care about easy access to the city and SV, I'd live elsewhere.

You can bike right out of Philly and Boise and get the same things. Maybe even more beauty. Why should we pay SF prices for the privilege?

I would say those two examples are incomparable to what is available in the Bay Area in terms of outdoor recreation access.

I don't live in California, though I've spent a lot of time there, and don't know much about Boise. But, having grown-up outside of Philadelphia, no there's nothing equivalent to Marin County a few miles away. Yes, there's a nice river and various parks but it's not the Bay Area.

Boise is converging with the coasts in terms of pricing and its infrastructure is depressingly inadequate.

The local paper ran a story saying that the median house price in the city proper went up $15K in one month[1] and wages are not budging. 84% of the city is zoned for single family homes. Downtown pre-lockdown had 80K cars fighting for 18K parking spots.

I live in a one bedroom penthouse Downtown for $2K a month. I don't have care. It's only the 7th floor though, and on a 5 lane highway that the city has asked the state to narrow (the state refused)[2]. It's very loud from the red state types driving through with big diesel trucks and obnoxious motorcycles.

Most of the metro treats Downtown Boise as a parking lot[3]. The largest private land owner downtown is the power company (for parking lots)[4]. And the nature outside the city requires driving hours in a place that desperately needs less traffic pollution and more transit.

I'm pretty set on decamping to Boston soon to be in real tower in a city with transit.

[1] https://boisedev.com/news/2020/08/12/boise-idaho-home-sales-...

[2] https://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/community/boise/ar...

[3] https://www.idahopress.com/news/local/eagle-narrows-where-ap...

[4] https://boisedev.com/news/2020/07/28/idaho-power-plans-to-co...

> One example for instance is the vast amount of unique natural beauty surrounding the Bay Area.

But that's not what you move to most cities for. SF may be exceptional in having that stuff as well, but for most cities, if you lock down the social/cultural aspects, then the natural beauty is elsewhere.

It’s a big reason why people move to the Bay Area over other cities.

It might not be why you suspect people move to cities for; but I suspect people pay a premium to live in a city that also happens to be surrounded by beauty.

It is actually harder to get to if you are in SF, getting in/out/through SF is the most difficult part of bay area travel. South SF/Marin if you want to be close to the coast, or east bay if you want to be closer to the Sierras.

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