This is a generalization based on what is common. I obviously have not been in every American suburb. But I have lived in a number of them. Traveled through a lot of them and can see a lot of them in movies, news etc.

But I am definitely interested in learning more about the new urban trends in the US. If you have some examples of these mixed development neighbourhoods from the last 20 years to show me, I would love to have a look.

Just give me enough information to locate them on Google Maps. Others have already written to me with some suggestions.

I would be fun to write a follow up article looking at what these new American suburbs look like.

And just to be clear, what I writing is not a contrasting of American suburbs and American cities. It is comparing suburbs in Norway and the US. I was trying to give an example of a thing I like about living in a Nordic country. It is hard to do that without contrasting with something.

American cities themselves do IMHO have many of the same problems as American suburbs. They are too strictly zoned. They are not made for walking, biking or public transport.

There are of course some great exeptions. I remember quite liking Seattle and Boston. New York is also quite nice.

But places like say Houston, is I think to a European lover of urban spaces, kind of a horror show. And Houston represent what has been a trend in a lot of American cities: massive urban spraw, enormous highways, and a very car oriented focus for the city layout.