I grew up in a city of mostly rowhomes and I love them. Plan on buying one one day.
You still get walk-ability, sense of community and good population density (not as good as a high-rise but still good), but also more privacy, and the space is more conducive to raising a family than an apartment. Also they’re cute as fuck and people can paint them different colors and have cool little gardens on their porches and stuff.
If they’re soundproofed well enough, it’s totally fine. Yeah, most new construction has paper thin walls, so sharing walls with neighbors sucks absolute asshole currently, no arguments there. But having lived in an old brick apartment building with super thick walls one time, I couldn’t hear my neighbors ever. It rocked. That, in my mind, is absolutely the goal: high density housing (with very soundproof walls) and tons of green space surrounding the housing, with convenient stores, transit, and entertainment options, all in easy walking distance. That sounds so utopic, and yet if we changed our civilization’s priorities, it could absolutely happen, we have the technology. I want it so badly
Meanwhile in Germany you have noise standards that constructions have to keep.
sounds nice