lol that’s fair. But also, the there’s a cyclical relationship between suburbs and grocers. If you build suburbs, the grocers arrive. Where there are grocers, people might live and form suburbs. You really only have to “drive 40 minutes to get groceries” if you’re waaaaaaaaaaaaay out in the sticks. Or, and I’m sorry to say it, what’s more likely, is you live in a dense, urban area and are very near groceries, but can’t afford a vehicle to get there directly, and so you’ve got to walk to the bus stop and wait for the bus to come around. This could definitely total 40 minutes to go get some eggs and milk. It’s a fucking tragedy.
There a certain ironic cycle there. The cycle you describe of building the suburbs, stores moving in, and people moving in is one part of the cycle. This leads to over-development (in that fucked up car-centric way we have, which leads to traffic congestion etc), and people start moving further out to get away from it. They end up on the edges of it “in the country” with maybe a 40 minute drive for groceries. But then often, the sprawl follows them and their bit of “the country” gets more and more like what they fled.
