The Joys of Urban Life, Without the Pains

The Vacation Paradox

Many of us in the suburbs save all year to vacation in places like historic European cities, charming coastal villages, or bustling urban districts. We’re drawn to the vibrant energy of walkable streets, where cafes, shops, and parks are just a short stroll away.

Then, our vacation ends. We fly home, get in our cars, and drive to quiet subdivisions where the only thing we can walk to is a mailbox. This Vacation Paradox reveals a deep, unmet desire for the very qualities we’ve engineered out of our own communities, namely mixed-use and small apartments.

The False Choice

We’ve been sold a false choice. We believe the “joys” of urban life (vibrancy, convenience, social opportunity) are inseparably tied to the “pains” (noise, cost, crowds, traffic).

But these pains aren’t the price of vibrancy. They are the symptoms of bad design.

The “noise” and “traffic” we hate aren’t caused by people; they’re caused by wide, fast roads designed only for cars. The “cost” and “crowds” we fear are the result of zoning laws that, for decades, have banned “Missing Middle” housing from many suburban communities—like duplexes, townhomes, and small apartments—creating an artificial scarcity of desirable, affordable homes.

The Real Cost

This suburban experiment isn’t just isolating us; it’s financially unsustainable. Low-density sprawl costs our cities far more to maintain in roads and pipes than it ever generates in taxes. In contrast, traditional, walkable neighborhoods are financial powerhouses, generating immense community wealth.

How We Get the Best of Both Worlds

We can have the joys of urban life without the pains. The solution is not to build massive apartment or condo towers, but to re-legalize the pre-suburban city development patterns of our ancestors with two key steps:

1. Legalize Gentle Density: By ending single-family-exclusive zoning laws and incentivizing denser housing options, we can have more “Missing Middle” housing. This creates a diversity of living options, which helps with affordability. It also brings enough new people to support the very amenities we love on vacation—a local cafe, a corner store, or a neighbourhood restaurant.

2. Build Complete Streets: We must redesign our main roads—the ones that can’t decide whether they’re for local residents or for through traffic—to be safe and inviting for people, not just high-speed cars. This means wide sidewalks, protected bike lanes, street trees, and slower traffic. This calms noise, eliminates danger, and transforms a hostile road into a vibrant, walkable destination.

Complete streets should be part of complete communities, that is neighbourhoods where nearly everything the average person needs in a given week or even month can be found within their community. That means everything from restaurant options, cafés, medical offices, gyms, bakeries, grocery stores, all sorts of shops, and more. This shouldn’t be a radical proposal.

By taking these steps, we can incrementally evolve our suburbs from isolating and inefficient to prosperous, connected, and truly livable. We can build places we no longer feel the need to escape from.