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Population density, when done right, is a great tool to make people happier, give them more opportunities (social, economic, cultural, etc) and reduce their environmental footprint. A big part of it is that you can reduce the amount of pollution caused by transportation and housing, the two biggest resource sinks, with walkable neighborhoods and mass transit, as well as smaller dwellings (but the city becomes your living room and playground, so the actual "living area" can be much larger than for those living in some exurb in a McMansion...).
Design makes all the difference. Central Park is designed such that tens of thousands of people can be in it at once, but you never see more than a score. Nanjing Road in Shanghai is, however, Blade Runner. Or are there only two kinds, Country Mouse and City Mouse?
Original Submission
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday July 10 2015, @01:27PM
NYC has lots of rats, but you don't see them that often unless you're up at 3am when they come out. Even then, you've got to be up at 3am on a less-travelled block. I've lived here since my late 20's, when I was up at those times and going to clubs, to my 40's now as a family man who goes to bed at 10 and wakes up at 5:30; I can count on two hands the number of times I've seen rats and have fingers left over.
NYC does produce a lot of sewage, as any large population of people would, but you don't see it or smell it. If such a thing were to occur, the city would instantly be deluged by about 20,000 calls from outraged citizens and about 1,000 lawsuits. So they tend to be right on top of that sort of thing, and in fact you do see construction crews around town constantly repairing such faults.
Same thing for pollution. All except for noise pollution, that is. According to data from the 311 information service Mayor Bloomberg set up 15 years ago, noise complaints are by far the most common call they get. In my experience the majority of background noise is engine noise from traffic; I cross my fingers and hope that as the ICE passes into history the city will grow measurably quieter. But then, that's because I grew up in a quiet town in the Rockies and it's my preferred level of noise; my wife grew up in Brooklyn and the kind of quiet you get in the country is scary, creepy to her--she half expects a crazed cannibal to jump her in the dark with no one to hear her screams.
It's also not a given that crisis in a big city means chaos. I've been in NYC through 9/11 and the Blackout of 2003 and Hurricane Sandy and after each event people became more cooperative and caring about each other, not less. In an earlier era, in the Blackout of 1977 there was chaos, so it suggests there are other factors that must be taken into consideration.
As to quality of life, I would say that depends a lot on your personal criteria. As I mentioned, I grew up in a small town a stone's throw from Glacier National Park. Lots of beautiful nature. I went skiing, hiking, camping, canoeing, and fly-fishing on a regular basis. That was great. But I was intellectually and culturally starved. There was no Internet, exactly one TV channel, and one radio station that played top 40's on a loop. There was no intellectual scene in the town, no ambition. The highest goal in most people's minds was to get a bigger pickup, a four-wheeler, and a really bitchin' stereo. When I told people I was going to go to college in Chicago, the reaction was, "That's far." When I told people later I had just gotten back from graduate study in China, they looked at me like I had three heads. They simply could not compute it.
Living in NYC, I can literally walk 50 yards around the corner of my block and have the finest Mexican, Turkish, Greek, Chinese, Japanese, Indian, or French cuisine in the world for about the same price as a Big Mac meal at McDonald's. In the summer I can walk 3 blocks up the hill to the bandshell in Prospect Park and watch world-class concerts for free (Celebrate Brooklyn! is the free concert series). The coffee shop on the top corner of my block hosts a ceilidh every 3rd Sunday and the musicians who play there for the hell of it are virtuosos. I have randomly happened upon acrobats in Washington Square Park who were good enough to be in Cirque de Soleil, performing for tips. Everywhere you look or go there are superb minds and talents in this place living out grand adventures. It's inspiring. Of course there are drawbacks, too, like the aforementioned noise factor. The traffic is no fun if you need to drive some place. But on balance the quality of life is high.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday July 10 2015, @07:05PM
Yeah, lets keep the comparisons in the same century ok?
And as a kid I read encyclopedias cover to cover, and rode my bike 3 miles to a library.
I lived 30 years in Alaska, had no problem being "Intellectually and culturally starved". If anything, the arrival of dial-up internet caused less cultural interaction.
You seem require a constant stream of people providing you entertainment or you can't survive. I don't have such requirements. I can cook, several different styles. I don't need a mexican resturant, or a greek one, but they are close by. (Walking distance, but not so close as to eliminate any exercise visiting them).
Lets face it. Some people need a village to take care of them. Others don't.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.