Ask Lemmy

It varies wildly depending on where you go. I think the worst-case scenario in terms of car-built cities would be someplace like Phoenix, Arizona. Visiting that city, I gained an appreciation for what it must be like to have a physical handicap that affects your mobility, because being in Phoenix without a car is comparable to having a disability. You cannot go anywhere on your own two feet in any reasonable length of time. It's the kind of place where you need to find a Walmart to buy a loaf of bread. The closest thing to a corner store is going to be a gas station.

Depends heavily where you live. Rural places can be an hour drive to the closest grocery store. For me, I live about 5 minute drive from stores and my work. But I cannot feasibly walk to where I want to go, there is zero sidewalks in my area and cars go at least 35 mph on the slow neighborhood roads and 50 mph on the busier main roads (less than 3 minute drive to get to either one). Bus and train infrastructure is basically non-existent so not an option. My only option is risk my life on a bike on the shoulder of the main road (since theres no bike lanes) and hope the weather isn't bad or I have to drive a car .

Things around me aren't that far per se, but you have to cross a 45mph road (where people regularly drive 55-60 because it's designed like a highway) along several sections of unconnected sidewalk if you want to get there without a car. The sidewalks are 4ft wide at most and have no separation from the car lanes so you have to walk with cars whizzing by just a couple feet from you. There's also no shade.

For reference - it takes 5 minutes to drive to the nearest grocery store 1 mile away, but walking it's 31 minutes with the unpleasant conditions I mentioned. So I've never walked there. I could bike and it would take 10 minutes, but biking along cars at 50mph doesn't sound fun. I also live on a bike path, but it doesn't go to the nearest grocery store so the nearest one along the bike path would take the same amount of time as if I walked to the nearest one (25 minutes). That one is 3.5 miles (11min) by car or a 1hr walk.

My refrigerator is annoyingly far from my desk chair.

In my home town getting to most basic necessities took 20min driving. Mind you that was the capital city of my state

Depends on the place like everyone else has said.

• To the nearest convenience store: .3 mi
• To the nearest chain supermarket: 1.1 mi
• To the bus stop: .3 mi
• To the nearest park: .5 mi
• To the nearest big supermarket: 1.1 mi
• To the nearest library: .5 mi
• To the nearest train station: 30 mi

I live in a newly developed area. The nearest convenience store to me is a ~10 minute drive. Also, since people only started living here a few years ago, the city has only just started paying attention to quality of life things like shade trees, so you'd be walking a good 45 minutes there and back in direct sunlight.

I fucking hate this country 🙃

Where my friend lives, in a typical American suburb:

• To the nearest convenience store: 1.5km
• To the nearest chain supermarket: 1.5km
• To the bus stop: >1km
• To the nearest park: 400m
• To the nearest big supermarket: 1.5km (they're all the same thing lol)
• To the nearest library: 1.4km
• To the nearest train station: 1.7km

(These feel like clues to Jet Lag: the Game - Hide and Seek...)

Same figures for me:

• Convenience store: 2.7km
• Supermarket: 2.5km
• Bus stop: 4.2km (this may be incorrect I think there was a closer one that didn't show on the map)
• Park: 6.2km
• Big Supermarket: 3.5km
• Library: 6km
• Train station: 7.9km
• Hart Plaza(nowhere really analogous to big Ben around me): 46km

Small town in Oregon here (all measured along the routes walked, not 'as the crow flies'):

• Convenience Store: ~150 meters, right down the road
• Supermarket: Will get back to later
• Bus Stop: The local bus company runs a loop around town so there's technically one closer to my house than the convenience store, but the busses that can take you to another town stop at the one ~400 meters away.
• Park: Three parks, which are ~400, ~500, and ~580 meters away respectively, though there's not much of anything at the 400 meter one but some sports fields.
• Big Supermarket: Will get back to later
• Library: ~500 meters (the 500 meter park is right across from it)
• Train Station: 29 kilometers by car to the nearest passenger rail station I can find. Without a car I'd need to walk ~400 m to the bus stop, take a $1 bus ride with the local company to Town B, then take another bus ran by this town's company, and then walk another ~480 meters because they don't have a stop at the station. Google Maps predicts that trip will take about 1 hour 20 minutes one-way, and it would cost $2 (or $4 round trip).

Now, I'm not entirely sure what separates a supermarket from a "big supermarket" in your mind, because to me all supermarkets are quite big by definition, so I'm going to explore three different trip options: one each to two supermarkets in or near my town, and one to the nearest Walmart, which I'm 100% sure should count as a "big supermarket", but which is a couple towns away.

• Supermarket A is close enough that walking to it is a viable option, which would be ~730 meters to the edge of the parking lot or ~875 meters to the front of the store. Alternatively, if I can plan the scheduling of my trip around it or I'm not picky about the timing I can walk ~100 meters to the nearest stop in the city bus loop, wait a while, and walk of right at the front.

• Supermarket B is 2.6 kilometers by foot, but a large part of that trip is walking along the side of a lightly-developed highway with no sidewalks, so I don't consider walking here a viable option. By bus it's the same 100 meters to the bus stop, wait, then directly to the storefront.

• The nearest Walmart is ~25 kilometers away by car, but the local bus company doesn't offer a direct route to that town so I have to take a bus to Town C, take the Town C Bus Company's bus to the east edge of Town D, then take Town D's bus to the Walmart on the western edge. Google Maps says this would take just over 2 hours one-way, and it would cost $2 ($4 round trip) because Town D's busses are all free to ride at the moment.

I live in a small shithole town in Pennsylvania about an hour drive outside a major city and 15 minutes outside of a smaller city.

The liquor store a dollar store and a few tiny shops are within ~4k Big Macs(top to bottom length) away, but everywhere else needs a car. There is nothing in town other than a few small shops, everything else was closed long before my time.

It's about a 15 minute drive to get to the next town over since all the stores are there. There is no other non car transportation infrastructure near by other than county buses that you shouldn't use unarmed.

The nearest landmark of any cultural significance (outside of going into the city) is the empty field in Somerset county a few hours away.

Basically if I want something other than whiskey or bread, it's a 15 minute drive. Still better than when I was still living with my parents because they were even further out from civilization.

Getting to the next closest state is about a 3 hours trip and I'm close to the border.

It's a two-hour round trip walk to the nearest convenience store, and its also through rough terrain and lawns that people don't cut

Wow. I thought I lived in a pretty walkable part of Atlanta. I really only use my car for the grocery or a 'big' shopping trip.

• Convenience store 2 km
• Chain supermarket 1.5 km
• Bus stop 1.3 km
• Park 300m
• Big supermarket 2.5 km
• Library 2.7 km
• Train (subway) station 1.3 km
• Downtown Atlanta 13 km

I love in a suburb of a Midwestern state capital.

Here are my walking distances: (I'll do my best to convert distances)

• To the nearest convenience store: 3.2km
• To the nearest chain supermarket: 4km
• To the bus stop: 2.75km
• To the nearest park: 1.5km (it's a pretty decent park with a swimming/fishing pond)
• To the nearest big supermarket: 12km
• To the nearest library: 2.4km
• To the nearest train station: 10km (this isn't a commuter line, but a long distance city to city line). This is also where intracity buses are boarded.
• To State Capitol: 13 km

Of all of these, only the walk to the Capitol is shorter than the drive (by about 1.5km) due to walking paths. I've never walked it all in one go, but I have walked both halves of the trail.

Highest annual average miles driven per driver is Wyoming with 24,069 mi per year or about 65.898 mi a day.

Lowest is Rhode Island with 9,961 mi per year or 27.272 per day

The top 10 populous cities have the average physical distance between as 1241.3, 1070.5, and 1073.7 miles for places, urban areas, and core-based statistical areas, respectively.

The longest driveable stretch between two populations of any type is over 5,000, but the USA also has several pacific territories.

Btw I know you people tend to get confused so to prevent you from crashing and dying:

1 mi = 1.609344 km

1 km = 0.6213712 mi

Example:

1241.3 mi * 1.609344 km/m = 1,997.6787072 km

As far as walking is considered, theres a ton of grid plans as well as cul de sac plans in the USA which are frankly inferior for walkability compared to our European Neighbors.

Bank: 24 miles / 38.6km Grocery store: 4 miles / 6.4 km Work: 50 miles / 70km Parents house: 703 miles / 1131 km

I need to move closer for work, but couldn't afford it do to dumb choices for a bit there.

Convenience store - 700m Grocery store -1,2km Bus stop - 150m Park - 400m Big supermarket - 1,2km Library - 2,5km Train station - 79km

Phoenix suburbs

We don't really have public transportation at all

Nearest convenience store 1.5 miles

Nearest chain grocery store 4.2 miles

Nearest big grocery store (Costco)2.8 miles

Nearest library 1.9 miles

Nearest park 0.6 miles(there's a playground closer but it's tiny)

Straight line to big Ben 5285 miles