I’ve heard the legends of having to drive to literally everywhere (e.g. drive thru banks), but I have no clue how far apart things are.
I live in suburban London where you can get to a big supermarket in 10 minutes of walking, a train station in 20 minutes and convenience stores are everywhere. You can get anywhere with bus and train in a few hours.
Can someone help a clueless British lemmyposter know how far things are in the US?
EDIT
Here are my walking distances:
- To the nearest convenience store: 250m
- To the nearest chain supermarket: 350m
- To the bus stop: 310m
- To the nearest park: 400m
- To the nearest big supermarket: 1.3km
- To the nearest library: 1.2km
- To the nearest train station: 1km
Straight-line distance to Big Ben: 16km
I can probably offer some insight, as my in-laws live in Wimbledon, some of my family live both near and far from DC/Baltimore, and I live in the Netherlands.
My London experience is on par to yours. Everything is walking distance and the things that aren’t are accessible by public transit fairly easily.
The Netherlands imo is even better planned and connected than the UK. The convenience store is around the corner from my townhouse. Two large chain supermarkets are just a 3 or 7 minute walk depending on which is preferred (the 7-min one is pricier but better selection) and there are more a few more minutes walking. The bus stop is 3 min away, train is a 10 minute walk. Parks and bike lanes all around.
DC is also very walkable and similar to London. Bike lanes. Everything is accessible and public transit is pretty good. Lots of convenience stores, small grocers, and even some larger chains. A few metro lines even go far out to the suburbs. I like the building height limit, which makes the city feel more open. Rock Creek Park is massive and you feel like you’re in the forest.
Once you get to the suburbs there may be a convenience store a 10-20 minute walk away, or a grocer if you’re lucky, but generally this is when you’ll be needing a car, as public transit becomes scant. Many Americans are walking averse; my husband and I are the odd couple that parks at the back of the lot when visiting Costco instead of spending half an hour hoping to get a spot by the doors. Most stores will be in plazas or strip malls.
My father lives out in the country. He loves having acres and acres of no one around. His house is an island. There’s one 7-11 in his tiny village. He’s lucky it’s a 5 minute walk from his house. If I want to get groceries when visiting, the nearest store is 8 miles away (a leisurely 4 hour walk; 10 minute drive). Oftentimes there are no sidewalks; mostly long stretches of road with big shoulders. I don’t think there’s public transit there; I’ve never seen a bus. There are farms everywhere so parks need to be driven to, however, they are pretty big with lots of room for activities.
It’s likely not too different from comparing London to Dartmoor. Much of it depends on where you are (population density). Some areas have great public transit and access to services, others don’t.
Hard disagree on DC. The public transit is bad, the train only goes a few places, and the majority of the city is not easily walkable, only the touristy parts. I’d also call it a depressing shithole, but that borders on opinion.
Depends on the part of dc- big chunks of it have $5 million homes for miles. Every major city has slummy areas, but dc for the most part is expensive as shit and gentrified combined with endless government buildings. Also has one of the best museums in the world with over a dozen massive buildings, all free.
You might be thinking of Baltimore :P
WMATA busses need serious work and there aren’t enough bike lanes for last mile connectivity, but by US standards it’s about as good as it gets outside of NYC.
The busses are the main differentiation between European and US cities in my experience. Only Seattle and SF get close to running a decent bus service.
Fair enough, not everyone will have the same experience. The busses can suck; at least the metro is tidy and runs well. My cousin in Georgetown doesn’t have a car, and he manages to travel to and access everything he needs, including going out to Potomac or Silver Spring. Going east/west is tricker, but on the flip side DC is rather small for a major city, and they’re building the purple line. Public bikes and scooters are also everywhere which is nice for visitors. Additional bike lanes and connectivity is needed for sure.
Compare to Baltimore, where they have the one metro line, which is broken half the time.
I live in a suburb in the U.S.
- To the nearest convenience store: 322m
- To the nearest chain supermarket: 2.4km
- To the bus stop: 2.6km
- To the nearest park: 5.5km
- To the nearest big supermarket: 6.1km
- To the nearest library: 7.7km
- To the nearest train station: N/A
Notes:
- The “convenience store” in my example is a gas station, technically you can buy lottery tickets, candy, cigarettes, beer, and a few things like that - but very limited inventory, it’s mostly for people buying gas. It’s also very unusual to have a gas station like this located basically in a suburban area, most places you would have to go much further to find one.
- no sidewalks or safe passage, you walk on a dangerous road with ditches on either side to get to the convenience store.
- the only public transit is a bus, it is used only by poor people, and it doesn’t cover the west half of the city (for example I was unable to use public transit to go to school)
I have run to the park before despite being far away, but I think most people would (rightfully) think I was suicidal for doing so. A lot of the way to the park requires walking on dangerous streets where people drive fast around blind curves and where there is little to no shoulders to squeeze by if there are cars, most of the way has no sidewalks, and I have to cross busy roads where drivers are going 80+kmh.
Owning a car here is considered a part of being an adult, people without a car are seen as childish or immature, and usually suspected of being drunks who have lost their license due to DUIs or felons who cannot have a driving license and aren’t allowed to leave the state. It is assumed everyone drives everywhere, alternatives are unthinkable to most people here.
Those distances would be perfect for a bicycle if you had save bicycle lanes
Well, those distances use a nearby highway, and there are no bike lanes anywhere (let alone sidewalks). As mentioned earlier, being suicidal means I did use a bicycle anyway, and after a couple years I had a brain injury, was hit by cars twice and ended up with permanent injuries. So… yeah, I don’t recommend cycling (if you feel like being alive and able-bodied, anyway).
What is also not mentioned is that the nearest supermarket is a shitty Walmart, the nearest park is very small and not really worth going to, and the bus is not a practical form of public transit here.
I have to drive 20 - 30 minutes to actually get to stores, parks, or other places I would actually go to. I think that’s pretty good relative to most people, I live in a centralized location and most places are equidistant. I used to live in a nearby more rural town and I had to drive 45 - 60 minutes to get most places, and that was much worse.
(That’s why I said if you had safe bicycle lanes. But are there no local politicians who’d be willing to do anything about that? A gravel road isn’t that expensive and would suffice.)
The county mayor describes himself as a Rothbardian, and the government here sometimes feels openly hostile to people, but especially to bicyclists. I received a lot of harassment for cycling, it is not supported culturally, and is even viewed as though I am a political enemy of the people. Huge, lifted emotional-support trucks are pretty common here.
Damn
Rothbard opposed egalitarianism and the civil rights movement, and blamed women’s voting and activism for the growth of the welfare state.[24][25][10][11] He promoted historical revisionism and befriended the Holocaust denier Harry Elmer Barnes.[26][27][28] Later in his career, Rothbard advocated a libertarian alliance with paleoconservatism (which he called paleolibertarianism), favoring right-wing populism and describing David Duke and Joseph McCarthy as models for political strategy.[29][30][24][31] In the 2010s, he received renewed attention as an influence on the alt-right.[32][10][33][34]
Oh and bicycling also wasn’t popular in Europe when my grandfather was young (50s/60s), when you were cycling people thought you were too poor to buy a motorcycle. But mindsets can change, now bicycling is hugely popular both for moving around (especially in cities) and for sports.
yeah, during COVID the mayor became famous for running attack ads against the health department, and as a result of his leadership the state legislature stripped the health department of their ability to implement any policies or directives
The East Coast can be as dense as Europe, because that built up quickly before cars were a rhing. People in cities can walk everywhere, and driving is slower due to traffic
The hills stayed rural and can take forever.
Midwest is the stereotypical America you have to drive everywhere. If you try to walk somewhere in a small town, everyone is going to stop to offer a ride assuming your car broke down
The “fly over” states are giant agricultural farms with nothing in between them. Walking is impossible but you can likely get on a freeway/highway quickly and drive times may be similar to the Midwest, just less options
The west Coast is also densely populated, but happened after the popularity of cars and most cities are designed for cars not pedestrians.
My work commute is minimum 40 minutes one way by car. Probably 2.5 hours by bus, with probably 20 minutes of walking, in Texas heat and humidity.
This is a map of the Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) area in Texas. Yes, we know it looks like a penis. I live near the blue dots at the top right. My husband works near the red heart at the bottom left. That’s about 45 miles and takes an hour most days because both are near highways. Public transit says over 4 hours with three bus/train changes and has a 15 minute walk at each end. Not great when it’s 100F outside.
In many other cities, if you drive 10 miles out of downtown, you can be in the countryside. We can drive 50 miles and be in suburban areas with traffic the entire time. Most people here have a grocery store within 3-4 miles. There are less groceries as you go closer to downtown or in older or cheaper/poorer areas. Convenience stores are closer, but they’re usually gas stations and are pretty expensive for food items. We have several decent restaurants within 5 or 10 miles, but it’s not unusual to drive 20+ miles to go to a favorite restaurant or store or to meet a friend who lives in a different area of town.
In Europe, you can drive for five hours and cross through five cities in three countires. In the US, you can drive five hours and still be in LA.
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It’s not necessarily how far things are, it’s that you need a car to get to places in a sensible way.
I’m a fellow Brit, but have stayed in suburban US enough to have experienced how different it is. You might have a supermarket a couple of miles away, but if you want to attempt to walk there, you’ll often be going well out of your way trying to find safe crossing points or even roads with paved sidewalks.
Train stations are mostly used for cargo in most US cities. If you don’t have a car, you’re pretty much screwed.
Some cities are different. NYC being the obvious one. You can get about there by public transport pretty easily in most places there. San Francisco is another city that is more doable without a car, but more difficult than NYC.
I stayed near Orlando not too long ago and there it’s just endless surburban housing with shops and malls dotted about mostly along the sides of main roads. You definitely need a car there.
Denver isn’t great with public transport either. There’s at least a minimal light rain system and buses go pretty much everywhere, so that’s the good part, but the city is so sprawled out that unless your designation is a direct route you’re looking at an hour or more to exclusively use public transport. And that’s really the main city. Start getting out into the expanded metro area and there’s not many choices except for a handful of spur rail or bus lines.
It’s a lot more than many American cities, especially on paper, but in practice it’s pretty rough to use as a primary transport.
Most bus systems in American cities are for people to get to work and back home. Trying to take it to, for instance, a friend’s house, and you’re generally going to spend about 4x the time it’d take to drive there.
Where I grew up the closest neighbor was about 2km away, nearest town was 25k, nearest town with a decent grocery store was around 40km, and the nearest “city” was damn near 100km.
Where I grew up the closest neighbor was about 2km away, nearest town was 25k, nearest town with a decent grocery store was around 40km, and the nearest “city” was damn near 100km.
Wow, my London brain just melted (The beach is only 60km away)
The big thing to know is that things spread out as you go from East to West.
On the East Coast, New England area, everything is pretty tightly packed. On the West Coast? Not so much.
When I was living in Eugene, Oregon, I had family visit from Sweden, so we asked them what they wanted to do.
“We want to go to Disneyland!”
OK, not saying we CAN’T, but it’s 13 hours in the car assuming no traffic.
Living in a small town in central North Carolina (answering these questions in units of city blocks that are ~150 meters long or in statute miles:
To the nearest convenience store: 4 blocks
To the nearest chain supermarket: 2 miles
To the bus stop: ~35 miles (It’s a distance to the nearest town with a bus service)
To the nearest park: 8 or 9 blocks
To the nearest BIG supermarket: 2.5 miles. The “nearest chain supermarket” is a Food Lion; slightly farther down the road is a Wal-Mart and a Harris Teeter about the same distance away.
To the nearest library: 3 blocks
To the nearest train station: 4 blocks.
Straight-line distance to Big Ben: ~4000 miles. juuuust out of earshot. I don’t recommend walking.
Depends on the state. There are places where stores are 2+ hours away by car.
In my area, it falls into 2 categories-
- Things are 20-30 min by car and are 20-30 miles away (highway)
- Things are 20-30 min by car and are 3-5 miles away.
This is totally based on traffic and roads- I’m in the woods outside Washington DC, so while the density is high in the cities, I’m 15 min from literally everything minimum (by car). I couldn’t walk or bike to a store, I’m 30ish min from work combination highway and local roads.
If you live in a city, you might live literally on top of stores in the same building. Shopping centers with above condos and apartments are becoming a popular replacement for shopping malls in my area, but are very very expensive (often over $1million) for a townhouse in one of these shopping “communities”.
I buy nearly everything online and have it delivered, most stuff (groceries, goods, electronics, housewares, etc) come between 0-3 days.
Houston tx, sprawling urban hell. in a swamp. I’ll only give a few
My most common doctors office: 16miles, 26 km My best friend: 30 miles, 50 km Bus stop: 2.5 km Grocery store: 6 miles, 10 km
Keep in mind this is a major metropolitan city with 4 million people, fairly hefty public transport, and is surrounded by other smaller cities. From center it’s like 15-17 miles to the next edge. There’s a smaller city inside of Houston called Bellaire lol.
Let’s just say I have an office job and still manage to drive 35,000 miles a year.
Fun fact: the circumference of the earth is 24,000 miles!
I used to work as a service technician so I’d also have to travel more than the circumference of the earth every year. I feel your pain lol
Depends.
If you live in a very rural area it can be more than an hour by car to some of these things, 50 miles or more, other items may not exist at all like public transportation. Inter-city public transportation is all but imposable for smaller locations, difficult and lengthy the greater the distance and size differential in locations.
I used to live in a metro area. Everything was within 10 minutes walk except medical care, but walking to the subway would get you to top tier medical facilities in about 15-20 minutes. Getting to nearby “bedroom” communities was also pretty easy thanks to a commuter rail.
I now live in a suburban area that has OK bus service but it’s not very convenient to where I live at all. Everything is within a 10 minute drive, and unfortunately a car is necessary due to the lack of sidewalks in many places. It does have light rail to a major metro area, about two hour’s ride, and then you can access the metro area major transportation network to all nearby areas and further away. Probably about as good as it gets in the US.
Nearest store of any kind - 1 mile
Full serve store - same
Library - .75 mile
Bus stop - 1.2 miles
Small park - .5 miles
Large park - 3 miles
Access to light rail - 4 miles
Knock off this “public transportation is only for big cities” propaganda bullshit. The US literally had a comprehensive rail network. The town of 1000 I used to live in had a train that connected to anywhere in the nation in the 1930s.
To piggy back off this comment, I’m surprised the streetcars in Kenosha, WI don’t get brought up much for what we could have:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetcars_in_Kenosha,_Wisconsin
It began in June 2000. It was done by doing the municipal equivalent of looking for deals on Craigslist; they bought old cars from larger cities and did a little conversion to get the track gauge right.
Can every small town do this? As it stands, probably not. It depends on larger cities having hand-me-down trolleys, and there just aren’t enough cities doing that for it to work on a widespread basis. But I think it does show that there’s a path to doing this in North American small cities if larger cities can get their shit together.
I really don’t know what you’re on about. I stated what we have today. Period. My comment has nothing to do with “propaganda” or rail history in the US. Did you even reply to the right comment?
Did you read your comment?
Inter-city public transportation is all but imposable for smaller locations
You took that out of context.
That was intended to mean, as I said, in a modern context. As in you cannot get there via public transportation today. This conversation has nothing to do implementing transportation, this has to do with what we have and how accessible smaller towns are.
So were you looking to be angry or something?
I live in the suburbs of a decently sized but not super large city in WI.
- Convenience store: 120 m
- Chain supermarket: 2.6 km
- Bus stop: 5 m
- Park: 450 m
- Big supermarket: 3.1km
- Library: 1.5 km
- Train station: 58.9 km :(
To the nearest convenience store: 2.3mi / 3.7 km
To the nearest chain supermarket: 9mi / 14km (not actually a chain store, it’s a small grocery in a small rural town)
To the bus stop: lol, I don’t think any of the cities near me bother with that, nor would they be useful to me
To the nearest park: 5mi / 8km (lake, about a 5 minute drive)
To the nearest big supermarket: 14mi / 22km
To the nearest library: 9mi / 14km
To the nearest train station: 51mi / 82km (and this station doesn’t service any location I couldn’t get to faster than driving, even across country. Because AMTRAK is shit. I know because I’ve done it before)
This is in central CA, not far at all from the Capitol, Sacramento. For being the 5th biggest economy in the world our capitol is pathetic
At my parents’ place, it’s about 9 miles (~14km) to the nearest gas station/convenience store, which has super limited hours, or roughly a 15 minute drive. It’s about 14 miles (~23km) to the nearest grocery store, or about a 20 minute drive.
I live in the suburbs of a major city, so the nearest stores from me are around a mile (1.6km) away. The nearest big supermarket is like 2 miles (3.2km) away.
