Honestly? That's just bullshit to try pushing people against A/C.
Cities are hotter than outside because:
- they absorb more heat :: concrete, asphalt absorb much more than grass or trees and disperse far more slowly. Just go walking in a bush, measure temperature at 1.5 m from soil, do the same in grass covered area and the same over a road. You'll see and feel the difference;
- in cities there are MANY ICE vehicles whose engine produce much heat, much more than any electrical motor;
- in cities there is less air circulation than in the open nature due to the high and heat-absorbing buildings;
- in many cities glass coated skyscraper works like any other glass keeping much of Sun IR radiation inside.
These are the reason why cities are hotter. Another proof? They are ALSO hotter in winter, not just in summer. In winter you can count extra heat from badly insulated heated buildings, little cold pushed outside by the so far limited percentage of people heating with some heat pumps that have air on their exterior side, but look at the numbers and you'll see they are more hotter than mere heats spread outside by badly insulated heated buildings.
People should learn two things:
- cities WAS a necessity to evolve in the past, but with the '80 logistic revolution they lost one of their last reasons to exists, manufacturing became cheaper to do far from customers, so far from cities. With the remote work the last remaining reasons vanish as well. As a result dense cities and high rise buildings have NO REASONS TO EXISTS anymore. Try to keep them and sell them as green, good for the future etc is just a push toward intensive human farming to keep people dependent on service they don't own, living to operate them so they can pay them. Since in the modern era cities can't be sustained the push needs to makes people accept bad living condition as a new normal;
- we need to switch from a high density model, too dense for today state of tech and society, climate etc to a new less dense one, that's hard and that's means MANY will be simply "overflowing humans" to be put somewhere, since no one like that role, if told in such a crude way, some try to advertise such role with various "bells and whistles" but that's simply BULLSHIT.
If you try reasoning about the above you'll understand a thing: such move to put aside a significant percentage of humans can't really work, never worked in history. It does work if the set aside cohort is very limited, the poorest, very isolated and very dependent, but at modern scale can't work.
> we need to switch from a high density model, too dense for today state of tech and society, climate etc
The populations of dense cities use fewer resources than the same population spread out in low-density settlements, especially when those cities are laid out to be properly walkable. It's just basic economy of scale.
> in cities there are MANY ICE vehicles whose engine produce much heat, much more than any electrical motor;
In cities, not having a vehicle is an option. Outside of them, it's basically required in most places.
Economies of scale aren't a goal on their own. Scaling something up will always have side effects... in the case of too dense urban areas, it's for example the sheer amount of traffic. For example, a quarter full of high-rises, no way you can get away without expensive high-capacity subterranian trains to handle commuters, and surface traffic is going to be a hot mess even with just shuttling the basic supplies for supermarkets, restaurants and the likes in one direction and waste on the other direction. In contrast, even a standard European mid-sized city can get away with cheap bus and tram lines. And it's harder to provide other essentials to meaningful life in a city as well, particularly where children are involved - land is too valuable to leave it as a park, and children can't have outdoor places to play either in kindergarten because it's too expensive, so you have even more traffic just from parents bringing their kids to kindergarten/school/playgrounds/whatnot.
Another effect of urban over-density that's often neglected is human health, both physical (we've seen that with COVID, just how fast pathogens can spread in urban areas) and mental. I mean, even here in Munich or Berlin we're not at the US levels of mental health and housing issues with people defecating on the sidewalk, but still it's noticeable how cities tend to have more anti-social behavior, as poverty and boredom are definitely contagious especially when not backed by the implicit social control that life even in smaller cities brings.
> Economies of scale aren't a goal on their own. Scaling something up will always have side effects... in the case of too dense urban areas, it's for example the sheer amount of traffic. For example, a quarter full of high-rises, no way you can get away without expensive high-capacity subterranian trains to handle commuters, and surface traffic is going to be a hot mess even with just shuttling the basic supplies for supermarkets, restaurants and the likes in one direction and waste on the other direction. In contrast, even a standard European mid-sized city can get away with cheap bus and tram lines.
But that high-capacity transit more than pays for itself (just the land value increase alone is more than the cost of building it). Yes there are costs to building densely (obviously to build a skyscraper at all costs more per square metre of floor space than building on the flat), but the end result is that more people can live (and more productively) for less total cost.
> Another effect of urban over-density that's often neglected is human health, both physical (we've seen that with COVID, just how fast pathogens can spread in urban areas) and mental. I mean, even here in Munich or Berlin we're not at the US levels of mental health and housing issues with people defecating on the sidewalk, but still it's noticeable how cities tend to have more anti-social behavior, as poverty and boredom are definitely contagious especially when not backed by the implicit social control that life even in smaller cities brings.
Do you have any evidence for that? The last results I've seen are that suburban living is significantly worse for mental health than dense urban cores (and I wouldn't be surprised if that was true for physical health as well), and frankly that fits with my experiences.
> but the end result is that more people can live (and more productively) for less total cost.
Another classic scam: metros are very energy efficient in travel time, when loaded enough. But you need to move at any time of the day, differently by many others needs and desire, as a result OR you make the service run 24/7 nearly empty most of the time or you can't satisfy personal traveling needs most of the time. Beside that the mere cost of a metro respect of "glorified electric golf cart" for a less dense are is ENORMOUS and no, it does not pay up. Not only why keep moving in a city? Most activities there are doable from remote, just cutting such commuting to move only for pleasure and the reaming needs is FAR cheaper.
> Do you have any evidence for that?
In most of the world life expectancy in cities is LESS than outside by few years, gut microbes are far less in people living in dense area not to count pollution effects.
> Beside that the mere cost of a metro respect of "glorified electric golf cart" for a less dense are is ENORMOUS and no, it does not pay up.
I think you missed or added some words there, so it's not very clear what you were trying to say. The cost/benefit of metros stacks up, that's why cities build them - not necessarily in terms of value that can be captured by charging fares, but certainly in terms of overall benefit.
> Not only why keep moving in a city?
Because the agglomeration effect still works; the more people within a 30 minute commute range, the more useful stuff they can do in less time. Again people wouldn't pay what it costs to live in a megacity if it wasn't worth it.
> Most activities there are doable from remote, just cutting such commuting to move only for pleasure and the reaming needs is FAR cheaper.
If there's less need for commuting then surely by your own argument that makes the case for living in a big city stronger, since there'll be less need for underground metros.
> In most of the world life expectancy in cities is LESS than outside by few years
Is that after controlling for wealth?
> gut microbes are far less in people living in dense area
Is that good or bad?
> not to count pollution effects.
Pollution is important though. The more you can walk or cycle, and more generally the lower the per capita energy use, the less pollution and the better for human health.
- cities material costs (meaning raw materials, energy etc) is enormous compared to the same people of any city living a far less dense area with single families homes AND commerce around intermixed. In such scenario moving with light electrical vehicles, mostly recharged from local p.v. since it's effective in most of the inhabited word is FAR cheaper (again in resources) than collective transports in a dense city;
- WFH in a dense city is a nightmare, because you miss nature and social contacts together. I came from a large EU city, now living in the Alps, WFH. In the city I have had a FAR LESS social life, simply because it's limited to a small number of selected friends doing service-based activities, like eating together in a restaurant, going to some events etc. Here being less dense anyone (almost) interact with almost any other, normally, and that's completely change the social paradigm compensating the "alienation" of working at home, distant from your peers. As a result I can WFH and remain a social animal in a not so dense area, where I can goes around, find people etc WITHOUT services, and the anonymity of the crowd. I probably can't in cities. Doing so means also I travel LESS (no commute) and longer trips are almost meaningless since I mostly recharge from my p.v. I keep more stuff at home, so I have less "impromptu trip" to buy something and so on. I'm more in nature, more social, more resilient (for instance no long series of stairs if there is a blackout and still have my home powered).
About health:
> Is that after controlling for wealth?
I do not know if most studies have taken family economy into account BUT so far people in cities are normally a bit more wealthy than outside, and still, they tend to live less.
> [gut microbe] Is that good or bad?
Perhaps not definitively clear, but typically healthy people have a significant set of gut microbes...
> Pollution is important though. The more you can walk or cycle, and more generally the lower the per capita energy use, the less pollution and the better for human health.
In toxicology pollution is measured in density, too little oxygen and we die, too much and we die as well. Similarly a poison below a certain threshold it's harmless. Try looking at ANY city, there are some more polluted than some others, but all are more polluted than far enough surroundings. People activities do pollute. You can walk, but the truck bringing you food does not.
> cities material costs (meaning raw materials, energy etc) is enormous compared to the same people of any city living a far less dense area with single families homes AND commerce around intermixed.
How do you figure that? Single family homes are inherently enormously costly - more concrete, more energy to heat or cool, and more roads to access them. A couple of subways don't outweigh that.
> In such scenario moving with light electrical vehicles, mostly recharged from local p.v. since it's effective in most of the inhabited word is FAR cheaper (again in resources) than collective transports in a dense city
A dense city is the place where ebikes or golf carts are most practical - people are more able to live close to work (or leisure activities). Just look at the mode share numbers. Electrical transmission is extremely efficient, worrying about "local" electricity makes little sense. Metros in a city don't displace walking/cycling, they're displacing car use.
> In the city I have had a FAR LESS social life, simply because it's limited to a small number of selected friends doing service-based activities, like eating together in a restaurant, going to some events etc. Here being less dense anyone (almost) interact with almost any other, normally, and that's completely change the social paradigm compensating the "alienation" of working at home, distant from your peers.
Low density cities/suburbs are the worst of both worlds for social life, IME. The apartment complex I live in (in a dense megacity) has a similar population to the village I grew up in, and has the feel of a village too; I say hi to my neighbours and get some everyday social interaction despite WFH. But we're also close enough to meet and eat together without any fuss, whereas back in the village people would drive from one end to another. I don't think cities are inherently less social, they just enable people to be pickier about their socialisation - a village or small town is great if you fit in, but not so much if you don't ("the only gay in the village" may be a comedy sketch, but there's truth behind it).
> Doing so means also I travel LESS (no commute) and longer trips are almost meaningless since I mostly recharge from my p.v. I keep more stuff at home, so I have less "impromptu trip" to buy something and so on.
On average people in your position travel more, and in more environmentally damaging ways. And keeping a bunch of stuff ends up being pretty wasteful; I know I can walk to the shops to buy something whenever I want (hell, for basic stuff I only have to go downstairs), so I wait until I actually need the thing rather than pre-emptively stocking up on something that ends up going to waste.
> How do you figure that? Single family homes are inherently enormously costly - more concrete, more energy to heat or cool, and more roads to access them.
Single family homes can be wooden frame on light foundations, tall buildings can't. Single family homes can be demolished and rebuild every passage (meaning 50-80 years) so they can be as efficient as "relatively recent" tech allow, tall buildings are a nightmare to evolve. I'm Italian, having left years ago a typical large enough apartments in the north-west of the country for a home in Sweden of similar size. The some in Linköping use LESS energy than the old apartment. Now I'm living in the french Alps, a new wooden frame home, about twice the size of the old one and I consume FAR LESS. Evolvability matter, much.
Here I have an EV and domestic p.v. in an apartment I've had a garage, but no p.v. possible, also consuming space for a heat-pump water heater and for main heating is not that easy, in a home no issues.
Not only, in term of mere raw materials just grab a project of any high rise buildings and compare that with any single-family home project multiplied by the number of apartments: you'll easily see that the high rise building demand MUCH MORE materials than many homes.
> A dense city is the place where ebikes or golf carts are most practical
And they demand large supply chain as well, witch means highways, railways of a significant size, because people need to eat as well and they are many in a restricted area, enlarging even more the infra costs... Roads in a spread areas are lighter, do not demand much complex infra. Moving with light personal vehicles instead of moving heavy trucks, even if in smaller numbers, is FAR less consuming. The hard part is organize the logistics but with IT we can.
> Electrical transmission is extremely efficient, worrying about "local" electricity makes little sense. Metros in a city don't displace walking/cycling, they're displacing car use.
Electricity grids all over the world are LESS and LESS reliable due to growing demands, generation issues and climate change, there is NO WAY to keep them up reliably in a changing world, so the same for roads, rails, water supply and so on, that's why we talk about "resiliency", because modern countries, cities are damn fragile and inflexible.
> Low density cities/suburbs are the worst of both worlds for social life, IME.
beware US-style suburbs are horrific because they are residential only, you can't do anything else than stay at home or have a trip with a car. Mixed low density areas are another beast. Where I am now we are few homes spread in a dead-end road, but with a small park aside, few activities a 10' walking, a small lake a 12', a small river with enough water in the spring to canoe a bit on the north side and so on. It's far different than a big lot of homes and nothing else. So it's different the social life part: in large cities I normally not even know many if not most of my neighbors, here's families pass kids one to another normally, (almost) anyone cheers (almost) anyone else and casual parties in the garden are far common from spring to autumn. Something never seen in cities. At maximum there we go to a restaurant or a shopping center and so on.
> On average people in your position travel more, and in more environmentally damaging ways
In mere km-terms yes. In impacting terms no. I mean WFH I can recharge my EV almost on PV most of the time except winter. When I was in city I goes every weekends around, almost reaching the same kilometer range of now, but in more stressful way between traffic inside, highways and so on. Here I go calmly for beautiful roads. Roads that can be (some are, many are not) also full of small passages underneath to drain water and allow small animals to pass, having few small bridges to allow bigger animals to pass, cut the "forest" enough to obstacle eventual large fires to spread. No giant infra needed.
Keeping stuff to me means waste FAR LESS, well, because I'm attentive on what and how to keep. For instance means less packaging: I do not buy pre-cut cured meat under plastic, I buy entire hams, mortadella etc I cut in 2cm thick slices, freeze them, unfreeze one at a time, slicing them as thin as I wish. I do not buy bottles of wine but a couple of demijohns at a nearby producer, filling them with a pump, and i bottle them at home, with the same bottles every years. Similarly i buy olive oils in 10l batches filling the same bottles as needed. Of course I also eat salmon who happen to came from far away, so for shrimps, but some foods and beverage are local, and with far less packaging. Having more appliance if one breaks I'm not in a rush for another so potentially on scale the delivery of a new one and disposal of the old one can be scheduled for maximum efficiency. In case of a disaster the resulting emergency is far less "urgent" than in a city because most homes have a certain degree of autonomy and we are able to help ourselves and each others. So again, far less impacting.
It's not easy to dimension anything but try and i've no doubt you'll reach the same conclusions I've reached.
> Here I have an EV and domestic p.v. in an apartment I've had a garage, but no p.v. possible, also consuming space for a heat-pump water heater and for main heating is not that easy, in a home no issues.
That stuff is inherently a lot less efficient to do on individual scale. In a city you can have shared boilers, CHP plants piping steam to the neighbourhood and the like.
> Not only, in term of mere raw materials just grab a project of any high rise buildings and compare that with any single-family home project multiplied by the number of apartments: you'll easily see that the high rise building demand MUCH MORE materials than many homes.
I doubt that claim even for skyscrapers, and they're the exception rather than the rule even in a megacity. Terraces of 5 stories or thereabouts - the stereotypical Paris building or New York brownstone - very clearly use a whole lot less material per person than single family homes.
> And they demand large supply chain as well, witch means highways, railways of a significant size, because people need to eat as well and they are many in a restricted area, enlarging even more the infra costs... Roads in a spread areas are lighter, do not demand much complex infra.
You're forgetting to normalize by population! Low density areas need a lot more road per person and that all costs. If the same road is serving 1000x as many people, then even if they're getting their supplies from 100x as far (which is a pretty high estimate), that's still a huge reduction in infrastructure costs.
> Where I am now we are few homes spread in a dead-end road, but with a small park aside, few activities a 10' walking, a small lake a 12', a small river with enough water in the spring to canoe a bit on the north side and so on. It's far different than a big lot of homes and nothing else.
Yeah, people living in a place like that are consuming and polluting a whole lot more on average, as well as producing less. Producing all the good stuff we rely on - not least that EV and PV you're going on about - requires large numbers of people working in the same place. And people like to be able to choose what they buy and who they spend time with.
> Electricity grids all over the world are LESS and LESS reliable due to growing demands, generation issues and climate change, there is NO WAY to keep them up reliably in a changing world, so the same for roads, rails, water supply and so on, that's why we talk about "resiliency", because modern countries, cities are damn fragile and inflexible.
Keeping a grid reliable is a lot easier than keeping a bunch of complex technology working in a spread out area. Who repairs your PV when it breaks? Who replaces the battery in your EV when it wears out, which they do pretty quickly? Where and how do they get the parts (and what do they do with the one they're disposing of)?
> So it's different the social life part: in large cities I normally not even know many if not most of my neighbors, here's families pass kids one to another normally, (almost) anyone cheers (almost) anyone else and casual parties in the garden are far common from spring to autumn. Something never seen in cities.
Seen in my city all the time. With the difference that those in minority groups also get a chance to socialise with people like them from time to time.
> Keeping stuff to me means waste FAR LESS, well, because I'm attentive on what and how to keep. For instance means less packaging: I do not buy pre-cut cured meat under plastic, I buy entire hams, mortadella etc I cut in 2cm thick slices, freeze them, unfreeze one at a time, slicing them as thin as I wish. I do not buy bottles of wine but a couple of demijohns at a nearby producer, filling them with a pump, and i bottle them at home, with the same bottles every years. Similarly i buy olive oils in 10l batches filling the same bottles as needed.
Bet that stuff ends up more environmentally damaging to produce that way. Overly stringent food safety rules are a separate issue, but generally that disposable packaging has won out because it's efficient.
> Having more appliance if one breaks I'm not in a rush for another so potentially on scale the delivery of a new one and disposal of the old one can be scheduled for maximum efficiency.
So you use extra appliances the whole time just for the sake of the rare case when one breaks?
> In case of a disaster the resulting emergency is far less "urgent" than in a city because most homes have a certain degree of autonomy and we are able to help ourselves and each others.
Depends. There are a lot more people in the city to help each other out, and there's a better mesh of connections. If someone falls down or gets lost, someone will likely find them (unless they're the kind of person who chooses to live very privately). If the local doctor is injured, there's another not too far away. If one road or rail line is blocked, there's a route around.
> It's not easy to dimension anything but try and i've no doubt you'll reach the same conclusions I've reached.
Nope. Like, maybe your personal lifestyle is more efficient than a city dweller, but the way you're talking about living is something only a tiny minority would ever do. Most people don't WFH, most people don't and can't set up or fix their own electrics, most people buy the biggest house they can and then fill it up with crap they don't use, most people won't put much intentionality into their shopping, most people want to socialize with particular people or particular kinds of activities that just won't exist in a small town. If you advocate for low density living, what you're going to get is endless car commuters who sleep out there but work and shop in the cities, not only consuming a bunch themselves but also bringing noise and pollution and demands for car infrastructure that mess up the cities for those of us who live there.
The part you are right about is that living in a real community where you know your neighbours is important, both for good living and for resilience. But that's got nothing to do with density; the west may have destroyed the community of its cities, but it doesn't have to be that way.
>For example, a quarter full of high-rises, no way you can get away without expensive high-capacity subterranian trains to handle commuters
Aren't trains much, much more efficient than individual transport? Compare the average urban train with everyone driving their own car and it starts to look pretty good.
> Aren't trains much, much more efficient than individual transport?
Only if well loaded and running most of the time well loaded. Meaning in practice they can't be more efficient than personal transports.
OR you make a service 24/7/365 (untenable, running nearly empty most of the time) or you can't satisfy personal moving needs most of the time. Beside that just look at single stations costs compared to people moving in less dense areas in glorified electric golf carts mostly recharged via local p.v.
It's an ancient scam to sell collective transportation as positive, actually it's positive only for the public-funded business owner.
They are. The problem is they are vastly more expensive (to the tune of billions of euros) than building on-surface light rail/tram due to the cost and difficulty of boring tunnels.
> The populations of dense cities use fewer resources than the same population spread out in low-density settlements, especially when those cities are laid out to be properly walkable. It's just basic economy of scale.
No, that's just marketing try to convince people of that...
> In cities, not having a vehicle is an option. Outside of them, it's basically required in most places.
Again that's marketing
Did you try to think hoe many resources are needed just to build high rise buildings compared to an equivalent set of single family homes? Hint: their own structure need to be supported, just that and foundations impose MUCH MORE resources than light homes. Similarly for any implant inside, including elevators.
Sewage network? Metros and so on?
A city if you try to count raw material use MUCH more than an equivalent spread area.
Not only: single family homes can evolve, they can be wood based and rebuild every let's say 50 years. Meaning they remain aligned to contemporary needs and tech, while rebuild a high rise building is a nightmare.
If you have modern homes with EV in most part of inhabited world, WFH for eligible jobs, not suburb USA style but mixed spread are where your dentist is just a small building few km away, there is a small supermarket few km away and so on you can have small-battery EV mostly recharge via domestic p.v. in cities you can walk, sure, unfortunately groceries are not made there, they came from far away, as far as more dense is the area because anybody eat, but in dense area there is no local food production. As a result you consume less, comfortably ignoring the logistic behind anything you use locally.
Now enlarge yourself talking about soil sealing who kill humus, water cycle alteration due to the big impact of such large and concentrated usage and discharge and so on.
If you REALLY try to dimension a city you'll easy see that anything you believe is false, marketing pushed because dense cities means dependency on services, witch means big business for very few on the shoulders of many. Try just to imaging ready-to-eat food delivery in a spread are: there is no chance Uber Eat, Just Eat and so one model keep up. People have kitchen, stockpile of food and time to do whatever they like, far less waste, far less packaging. Oh BTW this was an ancient known scam in Europe: in the past schools have internal kitchen, then they was told to externalize to make anything more efficient. As a result food quality have dropped, costs ans waste and packaging use skyrocketed.
Cities are hotter than outside because:
- they absorb more heat :: concrete, asphalt absorb much more than grass or trees and disperse far more slowly. Just go walking in a bush, measure temperature at 1.5 m from soil, do the same in grass covered area and the same over a road. You'll see and feel the difference;
- in cities there are MANY ICE vehicles whose engine produce much heat, much more than any electrical motor;
- in cities there is less air circulation than in the open nature due to the high and heat-absorbing buildings;
- in many cities glass coated skyscraper works like any other glass keeping much of Sun IR radiation inside.
These are the reason why cities are hotter. Another proof? They are ALSO hotter in winter, not just in summer. In winter you can count extra heat from badly insulated heated buildings, little cold pushed outside by the so far limited percentage of people heating with some heat pumps that have air on their exterior side, but look at the numbers and you'll see they are more hotter than mere heats spread outside by badly insulated heated buildings.
People should learn two things:
- cities WAS a necessity to evolve in the past, but with the '80 logistic revolution they lost one of their last reasons to exists, manufacturing became cheaper to do far from customers, so far from cities. With the remote work the last remaining reasons vanish as well. As a result dense cities and high rise buildings have NO REASONS TO EXISTS anymore. Try to keep them and sell them as green, good for the future etc is just a push toward intensive human farming to keep people dependent on service they don't own, living to operate them so they can pay them. Since in the modern era cities can't be sustained the push needs to makes people accept bad living condition as a new normal;
- we need to switch from a high density model, too dense for today state of tech and society, climate etc to a new less dense one, that's hard and that's means MANY will be simply "overflowing humans" to be put somewhere, since no one like that role, if told in such a crude way, some try to advertise such role with various "bells and whistles" but that's simply BULLSHIT.
If you try reasoning about the above you'll understand a thing: such move to put aside a significant percentage of humans can't really work, never worked in history. It does work if the set aside cohort is very limited, the poorest, very isolated and very dependent, but at modern scale can't work.