50 back! Thanks so much for your sharing your personal experience, which is aligned with the data. It's also illustrative that Mexico and Colombia are 'poorer' than the U.S., as are many other countries with happier, socially connected populations. Your situation makes me want to jump the U.S. ship, which I've been contemplating for several years (most likely to E.U./Germany where I can likely get citizenship).

I too am from a fucking awful midwestern area--south suburbs of Chicago. I later moved to Boulder, CO, but moved to NYC to get away from car-based living. I returned to Boulder and even though it's not the least walkable city, it's ain't great and I often find myself isolating and watching Youtube for hours because I don't have the energy to go out (I get around primarily on bike). I've lived in abject suburban sprawl, medium sprawl, and dense cities and definitely prefer the latter for all the reasons you describe.

I will say that suburbs may have a future. Big cities like NYC and Medellin have a major issue: they depend on external sources of food and water. It's pretty much impossible to grow the amount of food needed to feed the cities' population on the city's land, making them dependent on rural areas. If we used the big suburban lots for agriculture and the big suburban homes for communal living arrangements, they could be very sustainable. This could be variation on the 'village' overlaid on cul de sac-laden suburban subdivisions. Of course, America's intellectually-challenged, short-sighted, out-of-shape population won't do this until shit has totally hit the fan, but the possibility is there.