tafda

“Walkable” and “grid” are orthogonal concerns.

London and Tokyo are two examples of very walkable non-grids, which I prefer to American grid-based city planning — the random connections fuel serendipity.

I think the problem in modern suburbs is really fortress-like unconnected developments, which also appear in urban form as overscaled block+ monoliths. The Metreon in San Francisco is a good example, or the ugly “italianate” Geoff Palmer apartment blocks around downtown Los Angeles.

The condenser unit on my Miele heat pump clothes dryer just went out after less than two and a half years. It's a $1500 out of warranty repair on a $2K dryer, and the part will take a month to arrive.

Could be bad luck, though I see a fair number of similar complaints online. I wouldn't buy again.

Sure, good example of that is r 3.4 out of 5 on the Japanese restaurant review site Tabelog is miles better as a signal of good food than any number of 5 star yelp reviews in the US.

My larger point was that LA and NYC (and specific communities in other cities —SF, Houston, etc) have a subculture that celebrates true renditions of various cuisines as cooked by an self-sustaining immigrant community large enough to not require external validation by Americans lacking in food culture to stay in business. You have to get lucky in most of the rest of the states.

You need a immigrant community large enough to be cooking for their own palate. Los Angeles, for example, has a population of ~30K Thai, ~180K Japanese, and ~5M Mexican origin (numbers from Pew).

Plenty of options in LA for northern, Isaan, central and southern Thai between Western Ave and Thai Town, and pretty good ramen, soba, and sushi in Sawtelle, Little Tokyo or Torrance. Perhaps not best in the world, but not at all catering to American tastes and could rank above average in the origin country.

Tokyo is the complete opposite of what you describe, “ugly” per the article but walkable and lively. No acres of parking lots either.