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  • @fpslem
    2•11 months ago

    I dropped four random pins on streets in Köln or surrounding areas. In the fourth I landed on a street with separate houses, so I moved one street over to the apartments there.

    Screenshot_20240101-172319 Looks alright. Walkable, bike parking is good. Buildings look okay, not fancy, but pleasant enough. I don’t love that cars are allowed to park on the sidewalks, though, that’s foolish.

    Screenshot_20240101-172501 More separated, basically sets of row houses. Nice enough. The trash bins should be in the street and not on the sidewalk, but this is okay.

    Screenshot_20240101-172739 Obviously still pretty car-focused, but a pleasant enough street with the tree canopy. The apartments are not flashy or new, but seem to be solid.

    Screenshot_20240101-174127 Again, not a flashy set of buildings, but the materials seem solid, the courtyards in between the neighboring buildings are nice. The patios on the top floor are nice features.

    In general, these units appear better than the thrown-together rental units they spew out in my city to be flipped and sold in 2-3 years before the worst of the leaks or deferred maintenance are revealed.

    • Herding Llamas
      2•11 months ago

      Hey, thanks for the pictures! Cologne is certainly a more bike and walking friendly city than America. Although nearly everywhere is better than America (as a whole) for that. This issue is still there though. It’s a classic “the grass is greener on the other side of the fence” problem. That and using absolutes (and only a sith deals in absolutes). For example go to the load screen of the video. The picture on the left (America) - this apartment complex is what is shown in the majority of your photos in cologne. Boring building, economically built. The picture on the right “the rest of the world” is beautiful historical buildings and not representing “the rest of the world” but simply an older style of building.