Another factor is that people are living separately from their extended families and change what type of building they live in at different points in their lives, for example:
Single adult - rented flat or small house.
Couple - rented larger flat, bought small house.
Couple with kids - trying not to rent, buying larger house
Couple with adult children - no longer need the space, buy smaller house
People also like to have gardens and pets, which is easier in a house than a flat. Ownership is also a factor, owning a flat doesn’t make much sense when you have to pay ground rent and a mortgage.
One reason is that people want houses and it’s not sustainable.
Well, it’s been sustainable for centuries. It’s not sustainable if we require constant and explosive population growth for the economy, but I’m not sure I want that. I agree it’s more efficient for people to live in tiny apartments in tall buildings. I just think there is more to life than efficiency. I question the economic imperative to have such massive population growth. I don’t think we would need to cram into ever smaller spaces with ever diminishing green areas if we restructured our economies.
For centuries before, living in a single house with children of all ages and grandparents was a norm. American boomers is an outlier, not a norm.
Apartments don’t have to be small. It’s more efficient to stack apartments vertically if you want to build a city. And in the recent years people want to move to the cities cause of socio-economic changes.
Want to live in the house? Move to the village. Want a house in the city? Pay a premium.
I don’t care about the global population. I care about how busy my neighbourhood is. I would prefer it to be less crowded and expensive. So fewer than the current number. Improvements would be a linear function.
Like, that’s kinda a typical NIMBY way to think. You’re saying “I don’t care about other people, what about my life?”, essentially.
If you ask for fewer people than now, everyone else could say “you go first”. Right? It only happens if somebody dies, and you’re failing on empathy a bit again if you don’t recognise that.
I don’t control the governments of other countries and cities. Every person is entitled to self determination. Your attitude is typical Western colonialist hubris.
I think it’s fair to say my quality of life has declined as my city has increased in population size. We might disagree about the solutions but I don’t think it’s fair to argue that I should never care about the quality of life of people already living in my city. Even just on a pragmatic level, that’s not a vote winner. I also think it’s fundamentally anti-human.
I don’t control the governments of other countries and cities.
Presumably you’re in a country with cities. What does that have to do with anything?
Like, the only thing I can think is a “the Irish should stop breeding” argument, which would be pretty ironic if you’re trying to paint me as the colonialist.
We might disagree about the solutions but I don’t think it’s fair to argue that I should never care about the quality of life of people already living in my city.
Great. That includes all of them, even ones that couldn’t afford a larger space, right? And all the ones that do still want to live in your city? That would imply it’s going to be just as big and just as dense.
Even if you redistribute the space available, you just put everyone in medium-sized spaces instead of a mix of big and small, and the total density is the same. We don’t have a magic genie that builds low-density but sufficiently interconnected cities for free; it’s not done because there’s not enough labour and wealth to do it.
One reason is that people want houses and it’s not sustainable. Large cities need to go up and living in apartment in a high rise should be a norm.
The problem in the word itself even - housing.
Another factor is that people are living separately from their extended families and change what type of building they live in at different points in their lives, for example:
People also like to have gardens and pets, which is easier in a house than a flat. Ownership is also a factor, owning a flat doesn’t make much sense when you have to pay ground rent and a mortgage.
Well, it’s been sustainable for centuries. It’s not sustainable if we require constant and explosive population growth for the economy, but I’m not sure I want that. I agree it’s more efficient for people to live in tiny apartments in tall buildings. I just think there is more to life than efficiency. I question the economic imperative to have such massive population growth. I don’t think we would need to cram into ever smaller spaces with ever diminishing green areas if we restructured our economies.
For centuries before, living in a single house with children of all ages and grandparents was a norm. American boomers is an outlier, not a norm.
Apartments don’t have to be small. It’s more efficient to stack apartments vertically if you want to build a city. And in the recent years people want to move to the cities cause of socio-economic changes.
Want to live in the house? Move to the village. Want a house in the city? Pay a premium.
TBH maybe our culture took a wrong turn there. Everyone is lonely, parents are stressed with no support network to help them and we can’t afford shit.
Don’t get me wrong, some families are shit, but then there’s also a concept of found family now that could fill that gap.
That’s fair: we used to live in smaller dwellings. I kind of like that we have more space now.
Apartments don’t have to be smaller than homes, but that’s exactly what happens everywhere that becomes more dense.
So what’s the right global population, in your opinion?
I don’t care about the global population. I care about how busy my neighbourhood is. I would prefer it to be less crowded and expensive. So fewer than the current number. Improvements would be a linear function.
Like, that’s kinda a typical NIMBY way to think. You’re saying “I don’t care about other people, what about my life?”, essentially.
If you ask for fewer people than now, everyone else could say “you go first”. Right? It only happens if somebody dies, and you’re failing on empathy a bit again if you don’t recognise that.
I don’t control the governments of other countries and cities. Every person is entitled to self determination. Your attitude is typical Western colonialist hubris.
I think it’s fair to say my quality of life has declined as my city has increased in population size. We might disagree about the solutions but I don’t think it’s fair to argue that I should never care about the quality of life of people already living in my city. Even just on a pragmatic level, that’s not a vote winner. I also think it’s fundamentally anti-human.
Presumably you’re in a country with cities. What does that have to do with anything?
Like, the only thing I can think is a “the Irish should stop breeding” argument, which would be pretty ironic if you’re trying to paint me as the colonialist.
Great. That includes all of them, even ones that couldn’t afford a larger space, right? And all the ones that do still want to live in your city? That would imply it’s going to be just as big and just as dense.
Even if you redistribute the space available, you just put everyone in medium-sized spaces instead of a mix of big and small, and the total density is the same. We don’t have a magic genie that builds low-density but sufficiently interconnected cities for free; it’s not done because there’s not enough labour and wealth to do it.