People of lemmy, would you live in a rural area? Why or why not?
I’m torn between affordable land and going to ideological war with rural neighbors.
I grew up rural, lived in a few cities as an adult, and currently live in the biggest town near the area I grew up. I can get to most anything I need within 10 minutes, with more options an hour away, and three major cities within two hours.
I was able to buy a three story (7 bedroom) house for less than 100k.
The biggest downside is that most people in my area are racist homophobic Christian Republicans. I can blend in well enough as a white man, but I can definitely see why many people would not feel welcome here.
This weekend I’m going to PAX. Last week I saw Japanese Breakfast. Next week I’m seeing John Oliver do standup. Went to a Mariners game last week too. Got Sounders tix coming up, and hockey starts soon.
Rural is nice for a weekend. Urban is where the action is.
Sounds like urban is where the money’s spent 😋
Just to clarify, I’m from a European country
Nah, I’d rather just live in towns that are well connected to cities (like bus stops going to that city) while also having rural areas not too far from there
I grew up in what was a rural area that suburbanized as I got older. Even then, it would still be around 15-20 minutes to get anywhere by car, including the grocery store. There wasn’t much to do that didn’t involve church, so if I wanted to do something like go to the movies it would be about a 30 minute drive with good traffic. Where I’m at now is in the middle of a moderate size city, where I can walk to restaurants and bars, and I can get to several grocery stores or movies or the mall within 10 minutes. I like living in the city better, I don’t want to live far away from stuff anymore.
I live in a town of about 2000 people. It has a grocery, a liquor store, and a hardware store. It’s rural enough. I would never live anywhere I can’t walk to get a bag of chips. Rural sounds good until the power goes out in a snow storm and your lane way is 7 miles long and the plow guy ain’t coming.
Only if its in a blue state. I dont want desantis or some other nutbar trying to turn the state into a shithole.
There are a lot of aspects of it that really appeal to me, but I’d miss the shit out of using a bicycle as my primary means of transportation and having everything relatively close.
Hell no! I wouldn’t survive there.
I live in a small city (40k population). It’s the worst of both worlds. The grocery stores are shit, there’s nothing to do, and it’s built up just enough to be ugly as sin with no good nature access. As long as I can get reliable internet, I’m open to rural.
Give me good public transport and good internet on the country side and I’m all for it.
In a lot of places the internet is there, but realistically the public transport never will be. It would cost so much to provide a service in every rural area that 3 people use that its totally infeasible. I think this is the situation where cars make sense, for people where public transport isn’t a realistic option.
Cars make sense because the public transport hasn’t been built out. Trams could be used without the need to employ drivers until self-driving cars come around.
There’s a lot that can be done if the will were there.
Your mentioning of trams makes me wonder if your thinking the same kind of rural as everyone else like ah yes let’s build a tram track to this one random dudes house nevermind the animals and rocks that would damage them on top of how id probably just be going over already made roads because you can’t really put a track through someone’s field especially when it’s a graseing field and when it comes to mountains and cliffs the road is the only road you can make and at that point why not just let the guy drive a car they guys out there are already rich enough to live in the middle of a forest so they for sure can afford a car that goes wherever the hell they feel like
Where there’s an asphalt road, a tram can be put. Many places have a main road that’s asphalted. Public transport doesn’t mean “Build a stop in front of my house”. If I can walk of bike to the tram, train, or bus station in under 30 minutes, it’s accessible.
Also, in mountains there are gondolas. Trams are able to go up crazy inclinations too. Just go to Switzerland, Portugal, San Fransisco or other places with steep roads that have tramways.
It’s all possible, but the will is lacking.
good public transport
HA! Good one!
Rural public transport: Paved road[1] and two feet!
[1]: Paved road optional
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What does traffic have to do with living in the city? You don’t drive when you live in the city, the traffic is from people in the suburbs coming into the city - you’re already here there’s no reason to drive. 
Traffic has a lot to do with living in the city. I’m about 6 miles away from major destinations downtown. I mostly work remote, but when I go into the office, it’s about 7 miles away in one of the suburbs.
“What about the bus?” you might ask. Well, around here that’s kind of a sick joke. It works OK for commuting – but it turns my 15 minute drive into an hour on the bus with at least one transfer. And what if I’m trying to go to a party that a friend is hosting in the suburbs? In many cases, I’d have to arrange to stay overnight because bus service to that area just stops until morning.
I think it’s funny that someone downvoted this comment, it’s spot on.
That very much depends on the city. I live in Los Angeles. It’s giant, and most people have to do quite a bit of driving. My personal commute is only 15 minutes by surface streets, but almost everyone I know has to take the freeways. My doctor is 15 miles, and traffic can change that from 20 minutes into an hour and a half.
Contingent on fiber internet and having a four-wheeel-drive vehicle, yes.
Snow’s a bitch and so is DSL. Other than that, the solitude would be rad.
The DSL thing is a bit of a myth nowadays. The rural area around where I live has better internet than the city.
Then you live in a pretty recently upgraded area. https://www.npr.org/2023/06/28/1184726217/rural-states-likely-to-benefit-the-most-from-funds-to-improve-broadband-access
I have a feeling the reason the internet is so good in MS is because they are more concerned with doing literally anything else besides giving us drinkable tap water.
I have starlink. Better internet than I ever had in town. We should be getting fiber any day now too.
If I was a straight white men, married to a straight white woman with stra white children, I would definitely consider it.
You don’t know shit then, we have people of all walks of life in my rural area. Stop living your life based on what you hear on tv or social media.
Thanks, that means a lot, coming from the Poisoner of Doma!
Does this… does this include you, as well?
Nope. I won’t even live in suburbia, which I consider a rural area, let alone somewhere even more remote. 
