Jesus, there's no way to keep people happy, is there?

Mega-cities are the most nature-friendly way of living, because they pack most humans over the smallest possible area. I'd love for everyone to live on their little farm with a nice orchard in the back, but that's just not feasible.

Also, is strikes me as extremely elitist that you complain about people going on man-made green paths or private beach hotels. Is my appreciation of a forest lower because the path has been gravelled by someone, or my appreciation of a sunset over disappearing horizon not as important, because there's a 5 star hotel behind my back? It's just extremely bigoted to say how someone can enjoy something.

I am far from elitist. I enjoy both camping, and the 5star hotel. Each has its own benefits. I am discussing the people whose idea of "Nature" is a park.

Paved/defined paths rule (and keep us safe) and I wish more and more people would go for a hike instead of rotting away in front of a tv watching GoT ;)

Sunset: try Aigiali in Amorgos :)

I think there's an even bigger misconception of what "protecting nature" is. I grew up in New York and now live in LA, and I can guarantee you that I do more to "protect nature" than the average suburbanite/exurbanite/rural person/whatever:

1. I'm a vegetarian, potentially transitioning to veganism.

2. I don't own a car; I mostly take public transit.

3. I take recycling and composting very seriously.

4. I pay attention to my purchases (e.g. I don't buy nuts like pistachios and almonds due to California's drought).

I could go on, but you get the point.

I realize that I'm probably an outlier, but I would argue that many of us city-dwellers have a head start on "protecting the environment." As a sibling comment said, living in an urban area is more efficient by default, so I'm curious to know what lifestyle choices are made by non-city dwellers en masse that makes you think we are at a disadvantage? A public park might require tons of water to sustain, but so do golf courses, people's front lawns, and plenty of similar things typically found outside of cities. Aside from all of this, one chicken egg requires around 50 gallons of water to produce, so I'm sure that if you calculated the water needed to sustain non-vegan diets, the "cost" of upkeep for parks, golf courses, etc. would be negligible.

Not to mention that having low-density, sprawled-out communities literally inside forests (or deserts, or other biomes) is not good for the ecosystem either.

The competing chips on y'alls shoulders really illuminates how useless this discussion is.

"A public park might require tons of water to sustain"

Living large in the burbs east of the Mississippi causes less environmental damage than even the most ascetic life imaginable west of the Mississippi. More water falls from the skies, for free, without pumping, than we know what to do with... In theory public parks and front yards in the west could be xeriscape-d but in practice they seem to mostly try to emulate golf courses in Florida leading to massive water use in a desert.

Only if badly designed. Plants store water, shadow the soil and keep the water in the area. A park "creates" its own water.

And your point is? There should be no parks? We should not call them nature? We should not throw cans into bins? I grew in a nature. Now I live near a park. The tree is still a tree and I don't leave trash around no matter if I am in the forest or in the park. Actually littering is one of the things I just cannot understand. How a person should be brought up to think that leaving trash scattered behind is in any way normal thing to do.

My point is "city park != Nature"

A walk in Hyde park gets you closer to "nature" but not really. It is just a brief escape from the concrete & asphalt.

Even the park is nature. Biodiversity may be lower, but the small park here in Berlin that I pass through daily is home to a few foxes, tons of birds and even a pair of birds of prey nest here. It's not the wild cost countryside but it's a habitat of its own.

and then the mega city dwellers look down upon those of us that grew up in rural areas as "flyover states" and "rednecks." They might be surprised to see how environmentally conscious a lot of the "rednecks" and hunters/fisherman/etc actually are.

and then the flyover-state rednecks look down upon those who grew up in the mega-cities as "out of touch" and "liberal elites".

Everyone might be surprised at how similar others are if they stopped trying to find and label differences.