What is essential for you to have nearby? I can think of groceries, fresh produce, haircut/salon, a couple restaurants, schools, etc. Those are the obvious ones. What else are you looking for, such as a flower shop?
Pharmacy - both for prescriptions and for general over-the-counter stuff. Being able to walk to ours has been great.
Hardware store - our closest is a drive or train ride away.
Library, there’s a ton of good resources available even beyond book and movie rentals.
In an ideal world, some kind of makerspace would be awesome - if just to access tools I don’t have and talk over my projects with someone. Even better if we could set up some kind of lumber swap shed - a lot of usable wood from people’s projects, construction seconds etc, gets thrown away around here, and I can only store so much. I think this one is big if we want to encourage people to fix things rather than throw it out and buy new.
When we were walking distance to a local movie theater, that turned out to be a highlight of living there but it’s definitely more of a luxury.
I actually live in this already. In 15 minutes I can get to: groceries, pharmacies, school, daycare, after-school club, library, postal services, train station, bus routes, mechanic, restaurants, public pool, hairdresser, hardware store, our general practitioner. The hospital is also within 15 minutes but that’s kind of random. Just a little outside that range is a shopping center.
Unfortunately i work further away but my husband walks to work.
Same here. I’ve been living here for a year, I feel so happy compared to previously.
Taking a look at most city maps I’m surprised how many areas, even older suburbs, fit the definition of 15 min cities already.
The issue is breaking the monopoly of the car on planning and actually making them bike and pedestrian friendly.
I encourage everyone to figure out the 15 minute bike radius around themselves and marvel at just how complete a life one can live in it.
Within 15 minutes’ biking distance:
A gym
A dedicated ‘third place’ - like a community center or something else dedicated to socializing outside work and the home.
Bakery, Gym, post office
Actual good mental health services PLEASE?
A grocery store would be nice, though, yeah.
To me that’d be a hardware store, a pharmacy, some kind of a public park/garden, a library and shops for groceries/postal services, and access to basic health care. Luckily I already live in such a neighbourhood; as this applies to most european towns (I grew up in a small town and now I’m living at one with 70k inhabitants).
I would wish for a public swimming pool / public indoor swimming pool closer by, but I have everything else mentioned in this thread already in my neighborhood, so that’s the one thing I have not in reach of 15 minutes, but need 45 minutes with public transport and as long by car (which I don’t have).
