Well, the USA is only ~250 years old and most of its planning was done in the past ~150 years, whereas most European cities date back to the middle ages or even before that, growing much more organically, often around a castle, wall, church, or all of the above. It's only in the past 100 years or so that cars are a thing.

But the other is just different approach to planning. I live in a relatively new, so-called "vinex" suburb [1], a neighbourhood built according to certain specifications - relatively small gardens, bike- and pedestrian safe, the only cars you see are the ones heading to- and from their house, the rest is redirected to a ring road. And, very low uniformity in housing designs; common themes, but a lot of diversity.

That said, at the moment we have a massive housing crisis - we need 100K houses in the next decade, probably more - and I feel like the only way to solve it is to build boring houses, big apartment complexes, that kinda thing. The alternative is population reduction, but nobody wants that.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinex-location

> the USA is only ~250 years old and most of its planning was done in the past ~150 years, whereas most European cities date back to the middle ages or even before that, growing much more organically

Agree. This is key. To be sure, Europeans are busy making plenty of wasteful American-style car-based future ghost towns around the edges and satellites of their beautiful (or at least walkable) dense old urban cores. Places tourists don't usually see, what I recall travel writer Rick Steves referred to as "Dullsdorf or Nothington".

Dresden was leveled by bombings in WW2, and rebuilt. There was an attempt to preserve its architectural heritage - red tiled roofs, cobble stone streets, large piazza at the center. There's a burnt church somewhere that's preserved but everything else is new. I remember it being nice, but not as charming as similar places which had preserved its centuries of haphazard, worn, old buildings and alleys. In the main square there's plenty of swank shops, Wempe, Chanel; the bricks were new, so were the unstained roof tiles, the avenues were wider, the water drain quickly, but I remember it as a Epcot version of a European city; there was a tram service, not sure if that qualifies as walkable but it was easy to get from one end of town to another.

Düsseldorf is similar. There is an “old town” which is mostly similar to what you describe and the rest is with some exceptions a fairly generic modern city along a pretty river. Nothing wrong with it but not exceptional.

> we need 100K houses in the next decade

That's a lot for a country with 17M inhabitants. Is that mostly driven by urban flight (not enough flats where people want to be) or is it more about population increase or less people living together (no enough flats anywhere)?

The UK has the same issue. One cause is the house builders have permission to build a lot, but only do so slowly to not affect the price. Another cause is the market and government’s mess with mortgages. The southeast has it worse but it exists everywhere that employs enough people densely (ie multi storey offices often reached by public transport).

There are currently 720k unsold houses in the US alone[0]. How is building 100k more going to help anyone but builders?

There are probably other factors in play here rather than simple availability. Perhaps we should stop treating housing as an investiment?

Edit: not sure if I misunderstood your comment to mean that 100k more houses should be built in the US or elsewhere. My point still stands I believe.

- [0]: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/ESALEUSQ176N

This is selective bias. Many European cities were devastated by bombing in the 1940s, forcing rebuilding of terrible building stock. Various dictatorships, of both the right and the left, have blighted cities around the continent with monstrous buildings. Past generations of urbanists rammed highways through cities or built ugly social experimental housing projects.

European towns and cities are mixed.

North American cities were destroyed, and we did it to ourselves. I can't find the link atm but NotJustBikes did a video on youtube showing how current car-dependent sprawling London, Ontario used to actually have a nice downtown. Or for a graphic example check out

https://citymonitor.ai/transport/parking/what-bombs-did-rott...

Just acres and acres and acres of asphalt hellscape where there was once life.

I'd guarantee it is. Every American city is slowly homogenizing to a soulless mash of 5 story apartment buildings separated by strip malls of Chipotles and Jamba Juices. Local businesses are virtually extinct.

Maybe don't try this experiment with an ex-communist-state cities full of dreadful concrete blocks of flats.

Probably only the old parts, turn of the century apartment buildings. Construction from the 50-70s looks like communist dystopia even in western europe, and newly constructed buildings are also not at all ornamented or colorful