When I think back on locations that I have been that have just “felt good”, I often think about what the inherent reason for that was. Looking back, they all seem to share one common characteristic: that they all lack the presence of cars. Just to name a few examples:
The Grove, Los Angeles
An outdoor mall in car-busy Los Angeles. Almost like a little town. There are cars, but they go in a parking lot outside of the mall, and the rest of the area feels nice when you’re on foot.
Taos Plaza, New Mexico
Cars don’t disappear here either, but stretches of the plaza are on-foot only, and those have left an impression on me.
Streets of Heidelberg, Germany
In a lot of Europe and Germany, there are tons of old streets that are just a pain for cars to go in, and are predominantly people on foot or bike.
I can go on and on. Nature is an easy one, too. All of these places feel really nice and I often wonder why am I not surrounded by this? Why do cities only have small pockets of “niceness” ?
Perhaps I am just a certain type of person who appeals to these types of locations, and many aren’t like this. I still bet though, that if our modern infrastructure and cities revolved more around human and walkable spaces rather than cars, that as society we would see a drastic improvement in mental health.
Men (and women and non-binary too) just want to see one thing and its disgusting:
