It's because the standard way we develop neighborhoods does not lend itself to people being able to leave their homes. My parents just bought a condo in a newer development in a rapidly growing metro, and while they can walk around their complex, there's no sidewalks to anywhere else, and even if there were, the city zoning laws means there's no corner cafe, bakery, or small-scale store like there really ought to be. It's so stupid and such an easy thing to fix: just require that each adjacent complex have a right of way and sidewalks and zone for cottage businesses every few blocks. Makes everything more pleasant, and people have something to do when they leave their house without having to get into the car.
EDIT:
This [1] is the kind of neighborhood i'm talking about. Growing rapidly, cheap housing -- great, but they're setting themselves up for real heartbreak because the complexes don't connect. To walk to the park that's not even a mile away requires walking on a huge, busy road. All they need to have to make it not feel dangerous is a dirt path and a required gate between complexes. That's it. [2]
I'm honestly not sure why we think this kind of development is even normal. Roads really ought to connect. It also makes the traffic so much worse. I live two miles from downtown Portland and my street outside my house gets significantly less traffic than my parents.
I fully expect to move my parents somewhere near us as they age. It's just not possible for them to leave the house when they get older without having to drive, whereas older people in my grid-based, sidewalk neighborhood can walk for miles and achieve their entire life.
[2] Meanwhile, our park is technically farther away (about a mile) and we walk there almost everyday and know all the neighbors down the street. We just went to a party at one of the neighbor's homes and the only relation we have is that we wave at each other as their kids play in the yard and mine ride their bikes to the park. I want to leave the house half the time because I have friends outside. That's all you need.
Indeed, this is a saddening development. Especially as people get older and need to interact with people they know socially on a frequent basis.
This reminds me of one of the best cities I’ve ever been on, Brasília. Literally every block is build to be walkable as a small condo and have its own cottage businesses like the so-called “padarias” (Brazilian bakeries), grocers, etc. And all condos/blocks have some amenities like multi-sports court. A unique feature in Brazil (perhaps in all of Latin America) is that all buildings are walkable in the ground floor, meaning that it’s all open spaces and you can actually see kids playing in their building or region. Very lovely.
This matches a number of the new apartment complexes in my area - no walking trails, amenities, or anything else accessible from the complex itself. Often you can't actually go to _anywhere_ from the complex, as the roads from it don't even have sidewalks.
> the city zoning laws means there's no corner cafe, bakery, or small-scale store like there really ought to be
So basically we actively reject the lifestyle of European towns, or the life style of early 20th century of the US. I wonder why that is good for the city in any way.
How long are people really supposed to hang out at a corner cafe, bakery, or store? Don't these businesses want turnover? Libraries, rec centers, churches, parks, dance halls, and bars are where people are expected to spend time. Also, although I see little direct of screen time in the full report, large TVs, huge customizable option set, everything streaming on-demand, online shopping, immersive games, addictive internet behavior, etc., it does suggest these are at play, and could account for the hour and forty minutes lost.
I mentioned it elsewhere, but I wonder if these trends in staying home are also true in more walkable areas. Of course the ability to go out is a factor, but suburban sprawl is not a new trend in the US either.
That's what happens when thanks to Henry Ford every middle class American could afford a car by 1940. It took Europeans another 30 years.
(My brother lives in a 1926 apartment that is 10 minute walk from the beach. Although that privilege does come with a 460k price tag. Nobody had a car back then unless they were millionaires so the entire area was built with trams, bicycles and walking in mind).
I was born and raised in Chicago, still live here, easily one of the most walkable places in the country. Most of the people I know spend most of their time at home. I think the two biggest causes are the loss of third places/religion and the ever expanding amount of content available on the internet. Theres just less and less reason to go outside every year.
I grew up in Vancouver, WA, and while I had the same complaint that youre sharing here, it's possible that clark county is on the far end of the bell curve. I've lived in various cities and towns across king county for the last 15 years, and I've yet to come across a city with homes that are anywhere near as isolated as the ones in clark county.
The article has nothing to do with that. It's looking at the development over the past 19 years. This "car centric cities" criticism is beginning to get really old here on HN.
I think people are adopting a bunker mentality with a constant advertising and propaganda assault that the modern Brain is subjected to.
Especially on the right, but also on the left, every fringe issue is framed as a grave threat to your existence. News media's long stoked the paranoia of whites as they enter a majority minority country of catastrophic fear of minorities.
And the mobile phone was probably the tipping point of a typical human being's tolerance for digital intrusion and ubiquitous advertising.
I honestly think the mental stability of the entire nation has started to go downhill since the introduction of social networking enhanced by mobiles. The statistics of adolescence and depression certainly back that up, and I think we'd be fools to think that adults are immune to it as well.
In modern convenience-based shopping and services, coming from silicon valleys era of shut-in programmers producing apps that enable their shut-in lifestyle are the final aspect
You know it really is amazing how Japan seems to be about 10 years ahead of the US in social responses to technology. The socially withdrawn otaku is the archetype of the end digital capitalism's ideal consumer.
> Preliminary analysis indicates that time at home is associated with lower levels of happiness and less meaning
I wonder if this is something that needs a closer look. I enjoy spending time at home. I'd rather be at home than pretty much anywhere else. Even before the pandemic I felt this way. The pandemic itself was like a vacation.
I think it depends a lot on both the individual and how the time is spent at home. For folks who have engaging hobbies and other activities that lend themselves to home-based practice, it's entirely different than those for whom time at home is basically being shut-in and reclusive with little mental & emotional stimulation.
For me, staying at home during the pandemic did feel like a vacation, but it doesn't feel like that anymore. I've reasoned that the difference between spending lots of time at home now vs. the pandemic is that during the pandemic the standards for socializing and doing anything were so low, it was like a weight off. With things being closed and social distancing, it was not expected of you to really do anything. You could excuse poor social habits.
Now that things are back to normal, staying at home too much and not socializing as much as pre-pandemic, feels like wasted potential, and I can't chalk it up to everything being shut down and people not being able to get together.
HN is full of people with a) probably decently good homes and b) a high level of self-motivation on work and hobbies. I suspect sentiment here doesn't generalize well to the population at large.
Haha, just like vitamin D. Everything is associated with going outside, but where is the causality? Almost any negative event, from financial to relational setbacks to a global pandemic make people spend more time indoors and will also have other negative effects, but you can't always cure it with vitamin D.
Many people mention the loss of third places as a contributing factor in these threads. Lower church attendance, the death of shopping malls, difficulties in accessing nice parks, etc. I am sympathetic to this idea. However, it is a very US-centric point of view as well. Many countries don’t have car-centric suburban sprawl that North America has. So I’m wondering if places seen as more walkable have the same trends of time spent at home, and if those trends are as strongly tied to quality of life problems.
The thing is the study covers 2003 to today. People talking about dramatic changes in suburban life but neighborhoods haven't changed much at all since 2003.
What has changed is home entertainment has gotten more diverse. People stream movies more often than they go to the theater. People download the latest video games instead of going to game store. People stream instead of going to Blockbuster video. There is also a greater variety of food delivery options (Uber Eats, etc). You can have groceries delivered. People buy more of their purchases online like on Amazon and have it overnighted to their door.
All these conveniences remove reasons to be out and about. In 2003 you still had to leave the house for most of these things.
I am European, lived in a few cities across a few countries. I have to say that it's very convenient to blame car-centric design for everything bad, but in reality, there is some deeper decay spreading through all developed societies. In my opinion there are two reasons for this. First, we form friendships of need: there are people to whom we're nice because we know we'll need their help one day. For a farmer it's better not to have an argument with the only guy in the village who owns a combine harvester, and especially not during the harvesting season. But nowadays literally the easiest way to live is to be a shut-in and just eat microwave food. We don't need friendships anymore, as in "having friends doesn't raise material standard of life". Second, we form friendships of pleasure: we talk to people that are essentially useless, but spending time with them just feels good for one reason or another. Recently we turned up individualism to the maximum which means that it's pretty much impossible to meet a person who has similar lifestyle, hobbies, and experiences, therefore could be a pleasant conversation partner. As a result, we just don't talk one to another because we don't enjoy it anymore.
I really don't know what could be done here. I'm starting to think that this is simply a new form of environmental pressure that homo sapiens needs to adapt to. Don't fight the change, find ways to thrive in it.
It's not about walkable or not. It's about cost. It's just that people started wanting (or were forced to) save their money on more important things at home while also working much more (two person income households are the norm now).
I'm not sure why people keep harking on about walkable this and walkable that. It doesn't matter. What matters is that people can't find value in what these places offer. It doesn't make sense to spend an hours wage on a single movie ticket anymore. Or buy a round of beers for a weeks groceries.
Yes, walkable cities have more people spending time at home.
The cities where people seem to do the most are ones where costs of staying at home approach going out, such as HK, SG, KR, JP, CN, etc. These places have huge pressure on staying at home and home-body cultures and yet their third places are some of the best in the world.
Looking at the paper, page 564 [0] has the component graph. Looks like the key contributors are (in order of contribution):
- Work-Related Activities (~35 minutes more at home)
- Sleeping - Assumed at Home (~25 minutes more at home)
- Leisure - Not On Computer (~22 minutes more at home)
What I find interesting, is the key differences in total time spent. There seems to be generally more time spent sleeping actually (~25 more minutes), and that time comes from a decrease in socializing (-~15 minutes), and transportation (commuting, -~20 minutes).
Overall, less commuting and more sleep seems good, but a decrease in socialization is not great, a full 1 3/4 hours a week decrease.
Further down they mention that a dominant factor here seems to be the shifting of many activities, including spending time with family and friends, to a home setting.
This certainly reflects my experience. Nowadays watching a movie doesn't mean going to a movie theater; it means watching a movie at a friend's house. Similar for gaming &c.
Lately I've seen a lot of lamenting the lack of third spaces, but I haven't personally felt too sad about this? When I was younger my friends and I would regularly meet for coffee and pie at a diner that was open late, or shoot darts at a cozy neighborhood bar. Nowadays those kinds of places seem to be all but gone. They've been replaced by Dining and Entertainment Concepts™ that cost too much to frequent with any regularity, and crank the music way too loud to permit real socialization. So we just get together to play Mario Kart instead.
How is fewer hours of socializing bad? Maybe if you're the kind of person that things you have to always be in a social setting but there's lots of us that just want alone time. If I could get even an hour less a day around anyone else that would be massive for my mental health.
I saw a lot of friendships fracture over COVID. One side was considered grandma murderers and the other side authoritarian who wanted to violently smash down people's non-essential jobs with the state,etc.
Was really hard to look at some people ever the same way again.
I’m spending too much time at home. Getting a lot done but serendipitous meetings and network building is definitely impacted. Time with my daughter is way up, before and after school.
We continue to lose our third spaces and a cohesive weekly ritual.
Even places that flourished because they were third spaces, like Starbucks, are dropping their seating to lower numbers to “get rid of the riff raff” or whatever.
The US is hilariously car-centric and when you’re not driving to go to work, there’s less of an urge to drive at any time; and, without walkability too, there’s even more loss in socializing.
If I understand correctly, the article looks at data from 2003 to 2022. I’m not sure if I would call that long-term. What about 1922 to 2022 for example? Or even longer.
From what I understand from my parents and grandparents (I’m Gen X), they did quite a lot of stuff at home (i.e. meet friends, make music etc.)
Since removing the office from my life, I think I spend more time at home and more time in social spaces. Meaning, obviously I spend an extra eight hours a day at home, but I also go out more than I used to. When I worked in an office and commuted every day, I was so exhausted after work that I didn't want to do anything at night, and weekends were for recharging my battery for week to come. Now that I don't have to deal with that, I have a lot more motivation to go out and do fun stuff. The last five years have been the most active and happy time of my adult life. Probably not true for everyone, but true for me.
It would help if being outside your house didn't mean spending a bunch of money...but in so many towns, that's all there is to find: Stores and restaurants, or a small yucky space on a bench between unsavory individuals with a drug habit.
I've seen the EU pubs, yes beer, but also coffee, some money is spent, but it's also open to prolonged conversations with neighbors without looks at you to leave right away.
Pet Peeve Time: Suburban neighborhoods these days typically only have a few entrances and exits... The effect of this is that unless you live in that neighborhood you won't enter it... This makes the streets quieter because you don't have any traffic passing through.. but it means that the major arteries have to have higher speeds... which I think isolates those neighborhoods.
This is 100% true in the US because nearly everything is commercialized and built to create profit for someone. Third spaces resolves this, but there aren't many of those around if you exclude local parks.
In one essay, Christopher Alexander calls suburb design schizophrenic, in reference to how suburb dwellers are forced more and more inward.
It's certainly an appropriate description. I've lived in the suburbs for thirty something years and have never made a single friend there. Travel requires a car, and there's no place interesting you can get to without a car. The optimal strategy for life is therefore to pass the threshold of depression and insanity and become a computer-addicted robot who derives pleasure only from typing on the comments section of the internet.
I've been thinking of ways to fix the problem but there's no bandage for removing the cars and redesigning the whole thing. I've thought of structures a clever person might be able to build to attract socialization, and I'm sure almost all of them are against zoning laws.
It's hard for me to emphasize with loneliness, as I've honestly never felt lonely a day in my life. It initially surprised me that people were bothered by working from home due to loneliness.
I really recommend the book Hanging Out: The Radical Power of Killing Time
by Sheila Liming if you want to explore this issue more. Lots of interesting exploration about spending time in person.
it's almost like western society, particularly in the united states, has spent the last 70 years intentionally stripping away community and easy access to a third place.
I was just in a USA town called Jacksonville, NC, and noticed a very large area called The Commons, with schools, sports fields, parks, wooded areas, walking paths, ponds, courts, the whole thing. Really well-designed area. Very active with walkers, runners, cyclists, etc.
But want a coffee? Check your phone, and see there's a coffee place maybe a half-mile away. Stop there after a run at The Commons, and it's a car-only place. (7-Brew)
A factor I haven't seen mentioned here is weather. It's become so hot now that people are hiding indoors during the hottest parts of the day. After a while gotta consider if it's even worth going outside.
Its interesting that they focus only on the last 20 years. I'd really be more curious to see how that compares to a much longer timeline. How much time did people spend at home a hundred years ago? Or a thousand years ago?
[+] [-] anon291|1 year ago|reply
EDIT: This [1] is the kind of neighborhood i'm talking about. Growing rapidly, cheap housing -- great, but they're setting themselves up for real heartbreak because the complexes don't connect. To walk to the park that's not even a mile away requires walking on a huge, busy road. All they need to have to make it not feel dangerous is a dirt path and a required gate between complexes. That's it. [2]
I'm honestly not sure why we think this kind of development is even normal. Roads really ought to connect. It also makes the traffic so much worse. I live two miles from downtown Portland and my street outside my house gets significantly less traffic than my parents.
I fully expect to move my parents somewhere near us as they age. It's just not possible for them to leave the house when they get older without having to drive, whereas older people in my grid-based, sidewalk neighborhood can walk for miles and achieve their entire life.
[1] https://www.google.com/maps/place/Clark+County+Fairgrounds/@...
[2] Meanwhile, our park is technically farther away (about a mile) and we walk there almost everyday and know all the neighbors down the street. We just went to a party at one of the neighbor's homes and the only relation we have is that we wave at each other as their kids play in the yard and mine ride their bikes to the park. I want to leave the house half the time because I have friends outside. That's all you need.
[+] [-] dkga|1 year ago|reply
This reminds me of one of the best cities I’ve ever been on, Brasília. Literally every block is build to be walkable as a small condo and have its own cottage businesses like the so-called “padarias” (Brazilian bakeries), grocers, etc. And all condos/blocks have some amenities like multi-sports court. A unique feature in Brazil (perhaps in all of Latin America) is that all buildings are walkable in the ground floor, meaning that it’s all open spaces and you can actually see kids playing in their building or region. Very lovely.
[+] [-] Varriount|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] hintymad|1 year ago|reply
So basically we actively reject the lifestyle of European towns, or the life style of early 20th century of the US. I wonder why that is good for the city in any way.
[+] [-] lr4444lr|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] janalsncm|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] carabiner|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] Yeul|1 year ago|reply
(My brother lives in a 1926 apartment that is 10 minute walk from the beach. Although that privilege does come with a 460k price tag. Nobody had a car back then unless they were millionaires so the entire area was built with trams, bicycles and walking in mind).
[+] [-] HDThoreaun|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] lazystar|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] somedude895|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] AtlasBarfed|1 year ago|reply
Especially on the right, but also on the left, every fringe issue is framed as a grave threat to your existence. News media's long stoked the paranoia of whites as they enter a majority minority country of catastrophic fear of minorities.
And the mobile phone was probably the tipping point of a typical human being's tolerance for digital intrusion and ubiquitous advertising.
I honestly think the mental stability of the entire nation has started to go downhill since the introduction of social networking enhanced by mobiles. The statistics of adolescence and depression certainly back that up, and I think we'd be fools to think that adults are immune to it as well.
In modern convenience-based shopping and services, coming from silicon valleys era of shut-in programmers producing apps that enable their shut-in lifestyle are the final aspect
You know it really is amazing how Japan seems to be about 10 years ahead of the US in social responses to technology. The socially withdrawn otaku is the archetype of the end digital capitalism's ideal consumer.
[+] [-] xnx|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] kalupa|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] SoftTalker|1 year ago|reply
I wonder if this is something that needs a closer look. I enjoy spending time at home. I'd rather be at home than pretty much anywhere else. Even before the pandemic I felt this way. The pandemic itself was like a vacation.
[+] [-] eitally|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] allenu|1 year ago|reply
Now that things are back to normal, staying at home too much and not socializing as much as pre-pandemic, feels like wasted potential, and I can't chalk it up to everything being shut down and people not being able to get together.
[+] [-] MattGaiser|1 year ago|reply
So I can see our relative smaller boost in happiness being outweighed by the utter misery of others.
[+] [-] unknown|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] steve1977|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] interiorchurch|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] wisty|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] janalsncm|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] chrisco255|1 year ago|reply
What has changed is home entertainment has gotten more diverse. People stream movies more often than they go to the theater. People download the latest video games instead of going to game store. People stream instead of going to Blockbuster video. There is also a greater variety of food delivery options (Uber Eats, etc). You can have groceries delivered. People buy more of their purchases online like on Amazon and have it overnighted to their door.
All these conveniences remove reasons to be out and about. In 2003 you still had to leave the house for most of these things.
[+] [-] anal_reactor|1 year ago|reply
I really don't know what could be done here. I'm starting to think that this is simply a new form of environmental pressure that homo sapiens needs to adapt to. Don't fight the change, find ways to thrive in it.
[+] [-] seoulmetro|1 year ago|reply
I'm not sure why people keep harking on about walkable this and walkable that. It doesn't matter. What matters is that people can't find value in what these places offer. It doesn't make sense to spend an hours wage on a single movie ticket anymore. Or buy a round of beers for a weeks groceries.
Yes, walkable cities have more people spending time at home.
The cities where people seem to do the most are ones where costs of staying at home approach going out, such as HK, SG, KR, JP, CN, etc. These places have huge pressure on staying at home and home-body cultures and yet their third places are some of the best in the world.
[+] [-] karaterobot|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] ethbr1|1 year ago|reply
[0] https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0684832836/
[+] [-] samschooler|1 year ago|reply
- Work-Related Activities (~35 minutes more at home)
- Sleeping - Assumed at Home (~25 minutes more at home)
- Leisure - Not On Computer (~22 minutes more at home)
What I find interesting, is the key differences in total time spent. There seems to be generally more time spent sleeping actually (~25 more minutes), and that time comes from a decrease in socializing (-~15 minutes), and transportation (commuting, -~20 minutes).
Overall, less commuting and more sleep seems good, but a decrease in socialization is not great, a full 1 3/4 hours a week decrease.
[0]: https://sociologicalscience.com/download/vol_11/august/SocSc...
[+] [-] bunderbunder|1 year ago|reply
This certainly reflects my experience. Nowadays watching a movie doesn't mean going to a movie theater; it means watching a movie at a friend's house. Similar for gaming &c.
Lately I've seen a lot of lamenting the lack of third spaces, but I haven't personally felt too sad about this? When I was younger my friends and I would regularly meet for coffee and pie at a diner that was open late, or shoot darts at a cozy neighborhood bar. Nowadays those kinds of places seem to be all but gone. They've been replaced by Dining and Entertainment Concepts™ that cost too much to frequent with any regularity, and crank the music way too loud to permit real socialization. So we just get together to play Mario Kart instead.
[+] [-] dawnerd|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] beaglesss|1 year ago|reply
Was really hard to look at some people ever the same way again.
[+] [-] richardw|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] t-writescode|1 year ago|reply
Even places that flourished because they were third spaces, like Starbucks, are dropping their seating to lower numbers to “get rid of the riff raff” or whatever.
The US is hilariously car-centric and when you’re not driving to go to work, there’s less of an urge to drive at any time; and, without walkability too, there’s even more loss in socializing.
It’s all a net loss.
[+] [-] steve1977|1 year ago|reply
From what I understand from my parents and grandparents (I’m Gen X), they did quite a lot of stuff at home (i.e. meet friends, make music etc.)
Going out was the exception, not the norm.
[+] [-] karaterobot|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] SubiculumCode|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] dicroce|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] janalsncm|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] shadowgovt|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] charlie0|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] hintymad|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] perihelion_zero|1 year ago|reply
It's certainly an appropriate description. I've lived in the suburbs for thirty something years and have never made a single friend there. Travel requires a car, and there's no place interesting you can get to without a car. The optimal strategy for life is therefore to pass the threshold of depression and insanity and become a computer-addicted robot who derives pleasure only from typing on the comments section of the internet.
I've been thinking of ways to fix the problem but there's no bandage for removing the cars and redesigning the whole thing. I've thought of structures a clever person might be able to build to attract socialization, and I'm sure almost all of them are against zoning laws.
[+] [-] cm2012|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] kpennell|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] francis_t_catte|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] smm11|1 year ago|reply
But want a coffee? Check your phone, and see there's a coffee place maybe a half-mile away. Stop there after a run at The Commons, and it's a car-only place. (7-Brew)
[+] [-] hasbot|1 year ago|reply
Related: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41294489
[+] [-] _heimdall|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] tinyhouse|1 year ago|reply