A LOT of people want to live in such places. However, most of the problems you mention are a result of car dependency and not dense housing itself. Kids have nowhere to play because cars make it unsafe for them to roam. You have no hobbies because you have no places to go to do them. You have no backyard because the roads prevent you from going to the park.

Instead we have to build our houses into huge compounds to do things that we would normally do at community centers, pubs and other public buildings.

Shared spaces and parks are not a replacement for your own land. I’ve done that while I lived in Manhattan and never enjoyed it.

That's great! But we need places for people to live too. Not everyone wants to own acreage. Some people just want a place to lay their head that's close to where they work and a nice school for their kids. It also doesn't have to be Manhattan density either. It can even just be as simple as building houses closer together and allowing for corner markets in residential areas.

I get that but I dislike when this is spoken about like it’s a panacea that applies to everyone. Atleast qualify those comments.