We need to make our cities and towns more family friendly. This is called the “missing middle” in housing, and it’s why in north america all we see are either large condo towers or single family homes, which also drives our urban sprawl problems. Which exacerbate out dependency on cars.
Almost all new large towers/buildings in north america prioritize bachelor’s units 1 and 2 bedroom units. Trying to find a well priced 3 or 4 bedroom in a “lively” downtown center, close to transit and work, with plenty of schooling in the area is almost impossible. It’s also a factor in why cities became so empty during the pandemic, ie. Not to many families living permanently in cities.
Here’s a good article that also talks about the same issue with some different apparment layouts, and why developers don’t provide adequate family units.
https://www.centerforbuilding.org/blog/we-we-cant-build-family-sized-apartments-in-north-america
This together with zoning requirements in north america is pushing most cities and developers to only cater towards large towers or single family housing.
The problem is that everything is large. Couches, appliances, wardrobes. Microwaves and dishwashers and washer and dryer and then how am I supposed to have a table big enough to do a puzzle on? What if I want to do a puzzle and my partner wants to take out the sewing machine and start a project at the same time?
I had a 45m^2 single bedroom apartment which had a lot of wasted space (like, there was room in the bathroom for another bath, amongst other things), we had a full compliment of white goods, and there was enough space that when my then girlfriend/* could rebuild a motorbike in the living room without having to move any furniture or even park either of the bicycles outside.
/* Now wife, for obvious reasons.
I think there is a cultural tendency for larger spaces, but ultimately these lead to a lot of unused room or arbitrary stuff collecting. People can have a very fulfilling life on much less junk than they assume. The sheer volume of storage units in the US should tell us all we need to know about our lives of excess.
Very well put!