As a kid in the early '90s the corner market, grocery store, schools from elementary to high, both jobs I had, and park were all within a 10 minute walk -- and that was in the suburbs. Cars don't need to be a requirement for daily life even in the suburbs it just requires good planning or planning at all.
When people ask me why I like living in Mexico, this is one of the main reasons:
The other week I walked around my neighborhood in Guadalajara to do some errands. I got my knives sharpened, picked up my repaired shoes from the cobbler, some fried pumpkin seeds from the seed guy, some meat from the butcher, and then some tacos of course. All within two blocks.
I moved to a center (pedestrian zona) of a small town in central Europe, from a country's capital, same experience here.
In a capital, I didn't do a detour on my way home to get a good bread, as it would add 15 minutes to a way home. Here it's a pleasant walk behind a corner.
European grocery stores are so wonderful. I love how everyone's just stopping by to pick up a few things for dinner and tomorrow's breakfast, not pushing their yacht of a shopping cart around. The produce is always super fresh and cheap compared to American, and I always like getting a nice carbonated mineral water.
For the past 50 years or so, the literal books on good design (according to the govt of the US) have specified cul-de-sacs, which offer the promise of less vehicle traffic but actually guarantee MORE traffic, because you can't have good walking paths. From a plane you can get an idea of how old an area is - old ones will have cul-de-sacs, middle-aged ones will have a fern-like structure with dead end streets that have only lines of cul-de-sacs coming off of them, and recent ones will have this fractal-like shape of cul-de-sacs of cul-de-sacs of cul-de-sacs. In those environments, nothing is walking distance (and walking paths start to become labyrinthine swirls if you actually wanted to walk them) so vehicle traffic increases.
I think that problem can be avoided to some extent with paths/cycleways. Many cul-de-sacs in parts of Christchurch, New Zealand, are only cul-de-sacs for cars, and pedestrians and cyclists have a through-route. This can lead to situations where driving means covering a much greater distance, and is one of the enablers of the city's current focus on increasing bike-friendliness (the other being that it's very flat, unlike much of other NZ cities). It's still a pretty car-centric place, however.
It’s expected that suburbs are walkable for children and maybe even stay-at-home parents, but working members of the household usually drive to work and take the family to activities (restaurants, youth sports, shopping, other adventures) outside the walkable bubble.
