Interesting article on the urban/rural divide from New York Magazine. Cities always faced formidable challenges including deindustrialization well before rural areas, but their concentration of activists and ability to share solutions allows them to overcome setbacks and tackle problems effectively. I know I felt a strong pull to rejoin our fair Northeastern city when we bought our home in the NW end in ’05.
“For most of us, living in cities means living close to those who are both like us and not. Even just walking down a city block means having no idea who will cross your path, what they believe, or how they will behave. Strolling is a succession of chance meetings, the vast majority of them superficial. At times, a dense neighborhood can feel like a village, where you bump into friends or revive dormant acquaintances. At other times, it means confronting a vast and entrenched homeless population. Urbanites take this haphazardness for granted. We have the ingrained habit of sharing space, of encountering difference, of swimming in the collective soup.”