Comment by hattmall

I've lived in most every manner of setting the US has to offer. The best by far is the micro-urban settings. Where as opposed to a small town with strip malls and neighborhoods, there is high density around an urban center that pretty much immediately transitions to rural. That way you can still have walkability and the mix of bars / restaurants / activities that urban settings inspire without all the overhead of actual large cities. Even when I lived in large cities I spent most of my time in just a few blocks. So a few blocks of city and then all the recreational activities of rural areas is pretty great.

There's still issues with people not caring, but it seems like those are more so outliers than anywhere near the norm and it's a lot more expedient to get in contact with someone that does care and can take actionable measures where there is a problem.

Just as an example there was a water leak from the municipal system in the right of way in front of my house. It was repaired quickly but they had to dig up a lot of the yard, which they filled back in. But after a few heavy rains it washed out a fair amount. It was a little annoying but I just said "Oh well". A few years ago in Atlanta my neighbors had reported a sinkhole FOR YEARS, and nothing was done about it until it finally caved in and swallowed an entire intersection.

I had a friend come over though and this had been like 3 months and he asked about the hole. I told him the situation and he just said "Call the city and tell them you need dirt." So I did, and told someone that took a message. A couple hours later they called me back and confirmed my address and that I needed dirt. He said they were busy but would do it tomorrow, and sure enough the next day they came with a dump truck, a trailer of equipment and filled in the hole, compacted the area, smoothed it all out and planted grass. All in 24 hours for a problem that impacted no one but me.