Are Neighborhoods Often Defined by Where People Stop Rather Than Where They Live?
Movement creates geography. Pauses create places.
Thousands of people may live in a neighborhood without interacting. Yet many of them stop at the same bakery, market, park, or cafe.
The hidden mechanism is interaction concentration. Community identity often forms where people repeatedly encounter one another.
Urban researchers frequently study gathering places because they reveal how neighborhoods function socially.
People may live in a neighborhood. Communities often form where they pause.
