I often think I must be some kind of freak. I like things no one else likes. I dislike things everyone else likes. I have a lifestyle that most people would consider sad (single, living alone), but I prefer it.
One of the things in which I differ from most people is my preference for living in apartment buildings. This winter has been a perfect example of why I like living in an apartment. This winter it started snowing in early December, and has hardly stopped all month. Last Sunday we had a snowstorm that lasted almost 24 hours. 35-40 cm all told. The only good thing about it was that it happened on a Sunday and we could all stay home and drink hot chocolate and watch old movies on TV. Less than a week before that, we'd had another storm -- 20-25 cm. On a Monday. It snowed almost every day in between, and it snowed almost every day since. So far this winter we've accumulated 120 centimetres of snow. Compare that to the 12 centimetres we'd had by this time last winter, and which hadn't even stuck to the ground yet.
So why does living in an apartment have anything to do with this? No shovelling! Not a single shovelful. And underground parking to boot. And I don't need to worry about snow accumulating on the roof, or melting and leaking into my attic, or dangerous icicles. Someone else is in charge of making sure the walkways are safely cleared and salted and that I have no trouble getting in and out.
Today is another good example of why apartment living is so great. The temperatures have gone from an average minus 8 or 9 with snow every day for the past few weeks, to plus 6 at the moment, and it has been pissing down rain since this morning. The city has switched from snow removal mode to flood control mode, and you just know that there will be hundreds of basements flooding right about now. And here's me, all snug and dry on the fourth floor without a worry in the world.
In the summertime, I don't have to mow the lawn or water the lawn or weed the garden. I don't have to do repairs on this place, and any repairs that do need doing don't cost me anything. My heat and hydro are free. I don't have to pay taxes. I've never seen a single Jehovah's witness at my door in the year that I've lived here. I'm off the ground and don't have to worry about burglars sneaking in the windows on hot summer nights -- I feel SO much safer in an apartment than I ever do in a house. The fire hazard is much, much lower, and even if there is a fire, it's usually confined to one unit. When's the last time you heard of a highrise apartment building going up in flames in north America? My garbage doesn't have to accumulate in green garbage bags for a week in the garage -- I simply fill up plastic grocery bags with refuse and take them to the garbage chute on my way out every day or two. Easy as pie. And I don't have a one-bag limit either.
There's one more reason why apartment living is a good thing -- the environment. There are 112 apartments in my building alone. There are two buildings in my complex, so that's 224 apartments. The two buildings take up approximately the same amount of space as a typical suburban block. Let's say a typical block can accommodate...what...16 homes? Let's be generous and say 24. So that's 24 families living in houses taking up the same amount of land as 224 families living in my apartment complex. Most of the parking is underground, out of sight. The plumbing, heating, and electrical facilities are all combined into two big thrifty packages. There's no wood-burning fireplaces sending smoke into the air, the garbage is compacted in giant dumpsters and hauled off regularly, making a smaller impact on the landfills. We don't have a dozen or more swimming pools using up electricity and chemicals, and hardly anyone wastes their effort on extravagantly wasteful christmas lighting. It wouldn't surprise me if it takes a lot less material to build two apartment buildings than it does to build 224 fully detached homes. I'm sure there are lots more reasons why apartment living is more environmentally friendly than living in single-family dwellings.
Then again...it's not really fair of me to bring that up, because I'm not the most environmentally conscious person in the world.
There are very few things that I don't like about apartment living. The main one being that every now and then the supers insist upon coming into my unit to "check the plumbing" or whatever. I'm not convinced that's really what they're doing. I've long suspected they're just making sure no one has a grow operation going on, or piles and piles of old newspapers accumulating creating a fire hazard, or dead bodies in the bathroom or something. It pisses me off every time they do it, but it's a small price to pay for all the other conveniences I enjoy living here.
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