[aesclepius]

Jesus it's objectively worse. NY/Chicago/London/Paris/Tokyo you can conceivably and easily nip out to a grocer's, bodega, cafe or pub within 10 minutes of where you are. LA? Outside of certain certain pockets like DTLA, KTown, WeHo or similar walking is tough and if your friend is across town you're SoL without a car.

[sershe]

But I don't want to! I literally just walked to the store and it was in absoute perfect conditions - we wanted to go for a walk anyway, the weather is perfect (sunny but not hot), the store is 10min walk from my house, the neighborhood is nice and not drive-thru so there is ~0 non-local traffic. The plan was we go for a walk, and pop by a store and get one item. But as usual it never ends up being that way, so we had one paper bag of items - 6 pack of beer, some cheese, box of blueberries, nothing very heavy.

I am pretty fit, like I deadlift 280lbs :) and still walking with this stupid bag ruined the whole walk back. And it wasn't even much - if I replaced beer with food it would be like, 2-3 days worth.

I would have rather just finished the walk, then drove 3mins to the same store. In the most perfect conditions imaginable, with minimal amount of groceries. And what if it was 100F, or 32F, or raining, or I didn't want to go for a walk, or I needed to get some large items like sugar or rice or a gallon of milk or a lot of beer for a party?

Walking to a store is simply not an advantage at all. And if you go to even a poor country you can see most people agree - as soon as they can they start driving to big box stores, and small local stores die.

And regardless, even if (which I wouldn't grant) the majority would prefer to walk rather than drive, it's still SUBJECTIVE, not OBJECTIVE. A ton of people prefer to drive.

[SamoyedFurFluff]

Not gonna lie, having a 10 minute walk ruined by carrying a bag home sounds like you maybe need to deadlift less and cardio more or something. Or maybe get better bags?

Walking to stores is an advantage because it allows for a density of services unavailable if parking lots are a serious consideration for businesses. I can go to my local convenience store, and my barber, and a no-waste shop, and my local bar, all in one pleasant morning… plus I don’t have to worry about a dui!

[mtalantikite]

> And what if it was 100F, or 32F, or raining, or I didn't want to go for a walk, or I needed to get some large items like sugar or rice or a gallon of milk or a lot of beer for a party?

As a New Yorker, you just described daily life here? It’s really not a big deal — things are so close you can take multiple trips if you need to. Get some canvas bags. Plus since everything is so close you end up just doing smaller trips every day or so. If the shop is longer than 10-15 minutes and I’ve got more than, say, 40 pounds of groceries I might get a car back home, but that’s a rare trip. And honestly I’ll probably just walk it back anyway.

Maybe we just have a higher tolerance for pain here — I’ve certainly had people visit who think of themselves as fit and they get gassed out by regular New York walking life.

[LampDrewNear]

You can still drive perfectly well in walkable cities.

And maybe it's just a TV trope, but do your paper bags lack handles? In Europe essentially all grocery bags have handles and are easy to carry. The amount of food you bought sounds easy to me to carry home, and I don't even lift.

[foooorsyth]

I agree with your general point about the romanticization of no-car life. I grew up without a car in a walkable city. It was nice but there are legitimate trade offs.

My mom used a wheelie cart to do our shopping growing up. As a kid I thought it was embarrassing but now I get it. Cargo bikes are another good option. Having to carry home groceries without some sort of cargo apparatus like that does suck, even in nice weather.

[spixy]

Then go there with some backpack.

I have a store in same building than my flat (but other side), and it is the best. Dont need to have car, dont need to worry about DUI...

100F (38C) is here twice maybe per year? Cannot you survive 38C for a few minutes?

If it is 32F (0C). I just put warm clothes on? 32F is not very cold temperature anyway.

Raining = umbrella (but I go without it, 2 minutes of rain wont kill me).

How many times a year do you host a party? For me its just once a year (birthday), I just go to store multiple times.

But I understand that your store is 10 min walk which sucks. I guess your city is not dense enough.

[webkike]

When you live closer to grocery stores, you buy less food more often. I live two blocks away from the grocery store, I go fairly frequently, and I never have an issue with the weight I’m carrying. And I deadlift the same as you

[EarthMephit]

That's because 10 minutes away is too far, that's almost a mile, and it becomes a chore.

I live a block from a store, and its much, much easier and more plesant than going to the effort of getting the car out, driving somewhere, having to find a parking spot, etc... Driving's a pain in the arse.

A decently walkable suburb/city would have a store within a block or two, maybe a five minute walk.

[scrollaway]

The US is too far gone for this to make sense. “Walking to get groceries”, I mean jeez this means something utterly different in the US vs Europe.

Here, walking to get groceries means depending on what I need, I walk down the road to get some daily fresh produce, or a few minutes more to get more variety of non perishables, cleaning products etc. It’s a lovely walk, it’s relaxing, and I come back with at most 3-4kg. I do this regularly, and I can do it on my way home when I take the metro for whatever.

In the US, it’s literally something you have to plan for. No kidding you don’t want to walk; one of the goals is to minimise time spent especially if it’s not relaxing time.

[rdtsc]

Grew up in the city and yeah you get used to it. We had our own bags my mom sewed or mesh bags. If we bought something like beer it wasn’t in 6 packs but one or two bottles at a time. Also we had decent public transportation, we’d hop on a trolleybus (electric buses) even for a few stops if the bags got heavy.

At the same time I agree that it wasn’t fun and I didn’t enjoy it as a kid. If we could have an option to have a car, drive it and fill the trunk with groceries and drive back we would have.

[kiliantics]

It's tragically hilarious to me that the car brain imagination can only consider moving a multi tonne large dangerous vehicle around in order to simply ease the discomfort of the small bag of groceries. Most people use little wheeled carts that are light and foldable and easy to push or pull around.

[escapedmoose]

Walking to the store is great when it’s a habit to do so every day, so you’re just picking up some fresh meat and produce for whatever dinner you’re making that night. It’s a very pleasant (and healthy) lifestyle. For trips where you need to make larger and heavier purchases, it’s also very enjoyable to bike.

[slifin]

Sounds like you need a walking trolley for groceries

It's like a bag with wheels you can drag, that was my immediate thought anyway

There's tons of micro mobility that could have also helped

[jjav]

> NY/Chicago/London/Paris/Tokyo you can conceivably and easily nip out to a grocer's, bodega, cafe or pub within 10 minutes of where you are.

This keeps coming up on HN but it's not as absolutist as it's made to be.

There are lots and lots of suburban places in the US where you can walk to things as you describe. NY/Chicago/London/Paris/Tokyo do not have a monopoly on walkability.

I live in very suburban (approaching on rural, but still suburban) area in the outskirts of silicon valley. Within 10 minutes I can walk to two supermarkets, several cafes and two pubs. Also to movie theaters, library, two drug stores, many restaurants, child care, a department store and many other businesses.

But unlike Manhattan, within 10 minutes (ok maybe 12) I can also walk to an open space forest where I can hike, mountain bike and go camping. Unlike in Manhattan, I can road bike many tens of miles of rural low-to-no-traffic roads out of my front door. We have many open soccer fields within easy walk (kid loves soccer so this is great).

Suburbs can be very walkable and have more variety of amenities within easy reach than a dense city.

[Karrot_Kream]

I think people are criticizing "American suburbia", not a a truly suburban form which is more urban than a rural form and less urban than an urban form. I live in what I call a "bike suburb". While the grocery and a couple other businesses are a 7-8 min walk away on a multi use path, the rest of the town opens up in a 5 min bike. Likewise I'm a 15-20 min drive away from tons of nature, and if we do need to drive around it's not as convenient as it is in suburbia but not too difficult either.

But a lot of suburbia is completely inaccessible or hostile by foot and unbikeable. Since you're in Silicon Valley, you can probably think of tons of places like that. Mixed use zoning and infill developmental priorities are what create this urban form. This is the important bit, not squabbling over which city is better than the other.

[lisper]

Also, when grocery shopping using a car, I can carry a shit-ton more than I can on foot, so I don't have to go shopping nearly as often. In a pedestrian-centric town, grocery shopping is a daily chore. Using my car, I only have to go once a week or so.

[ulfw]

This is exactly why I lived in Santa Monica when I lived in LA. One of the few walkables cities in the area (not all of SaMo mind you. Just talking about the area between Ocean and say 7th or 8th)