How often do you go to the pub?

It's a wise move. As people get older, being closer to a town or village makes life much easier. The problem is that the damage was done over decades as generations moved out into one off housing and became so car dependent. The rural villages and small towns have lost their critical mass. The heart has been hollowed out of rural communities and it's very difficult to reverse.

The reality is that the countryside hinterland was traditionally there to support farming and agriculture, while villages and towns were where people lived, worked, shopped and socialised. As housing became more dispersed, many of those functions moved away from the village centre, taking footfall, services and community life with them. Rebuilding that critical mass is far easier said than done.

I think one off housing is far more central to this than many people want to admit.

The decline of rural pubs, butchers, bakers, post offices, greengrocers and other village businesses didn't happen overnight. It was the result of decades of people moving out of towns and villages into dispersed housing across the countryside. Once people stopped living within walking distance of the village centre, the daily footfall that kept these businesses alive began to disappear.

The fact that pubs didn't immediately start closing in the 1970s doesn't mean one off housing wasn't a factor. These things take decades to work through. Rural Ireland had larger families, a younger population and a much stronger pub going culture back then, which masked the effects. Eventually the bill came due.

Drink driving laws, Covid and inflation have certainly accelerated the decline, but they hit communities that had already lost much of their critical mass. A pub, butcher or shop depends on a concentration of people living nearby and using it regularly. Spread those same people across miles of countryside and the economics become much harder. Getting caught drunk driving had nothing to do with their decline. 

If morning after drink driving concerns were really the main reason for pub closures, then urban pubs would be suffering the same fate. Many aren't. In fact, plenty are busy because customers can walk, cycle, get a taxi, take public transport or simply leave the car at home. The key difference is not the drink driving limit. It's that urban areas still have a local population within easy reach.

To me, one off housing sits right at the heart of this story. It changed how people live, shop and socialise, I've seen the change over the years in every rural town and village I know. It made the car essential for almost every journey and gradually hollowed out the customer base that sustained rural pubs, shops and services for generations. The drink driving laws may have been a blow, but the foundations had been weakening for decades, they were abandoned by the people to turn what was farmland in to badly designed housing estates with detached houses scattered everywhere.

You're actually making my point. Small businesses are thriving in many cities. Independent cafés, bakeries, delicatessens, speciality food shops, restaurants and niche retailers are opening all the time in urban areas because the footfall is there.

The difference is density. Cities have enough people living, working and walking around to support independent businesses. Many villages and small towns have lost that critical mass as development spread out into one off housing and people became increasingly dependent on the car. Once people stop living and spending money in the centre of a town or village, local businesses struggle.

That's why you can have thriving pedestrianised streets full of independent businesses in cities while at the same time seeing vacant shops and derelict properties in many rural towns and villages.

Very true, farmhouses and cottages have existed for centuries, but they were generally homes for people who worked the surrounding land. They walked, cycled, rode horses or used carts, and many were at least partly self sufficient.

The modern one off house is often something quite different. It's frequently occupied by people with little connection to the land who commute by car for work, school, shopping and leisure. They're more likely to buy their vegetables in an out of town Aldi than grow them in the soil around them.

It's also worth remembering that rural roads were once used by walkers, cyclists and horse riders. Today's traffic levels and speeds have made many of those roads far less pleasant and far less safe for anyone not travelling by car.

So yes, one off houses have existed for centuries. But comparing a traditional farmhouse to modern dispersed, car dependent housing is comparing two very different ways of living.