You sort of need to know the [scale of] grid in question.
In a similar vein, I find the Las Vegas Strip is incredibly disorienting with respect to distance. You're used to buildings being of size approximately X and in Vegas the casinos are 10X. So you think--oh, that's just a couple of buildings away. 30 minutes later you're still walking (in the sweltering heat).
Re:City street orientations around the world
by lotsofpulp on Friday July 13, 2018 @08:23AM
(#17522286)
I found this out the hard way before google maps walking time calculator when I decided to suggest walking a group from Mirage to Rio to watch Penn and Teller. I was not popular that night, especially for those in heels.
Re:City street orientations around the world
by iammiles on Friday July 13, 2018 @01:48PM
(#17525064)
Tip for your next visit: The monorail runs on the east side of the the strip and stops off every few buildings or so. There's also a separate free tram that runs between Bellagio, Vdara, and Aria.
I am (mostly sadly) pretty well aquainted with Vegas. Unfortunately, the monorail/tram systems are pretty disjoint. And even if it just involves walking through a casino can still be quite a hike.
And I, by no means mind walking, though there was the time I went to Vegas on a business trip and was on crutches with no weight on foot allowed. Though the high point was that a porter showed me how to use the crutches more effectively; he was an (aspiring?) ballet dancer who had apparently spent more than his share of time on crutches :-)
I also tend to find I underestimate distances in grid systems. I think it’s because in European cities I estimate distance by the number of distinct shapes I can remember on the way there. In a grid, I think my brain smushes all those identical block shapes into one. In a similar way to how time flies when doing a repetitive task.