Ask Lemmy

For me it’s either 600m to a small corner shop or about 1.1km to a larger store.

I do 3km periodically for another store, but I wouldn’t do it in 30c weather. I’m barely willing to exercise in 25c weather.

That's cycling distance. A nice bike ride to pickup shopping.

400m, or 500 in the other direction.

BUT: no one around here would walk 3km. Hell, most people won't even walk the 500m.

My closest supermarket is 400m away, and the next supermarket over is 1.1km. I walk there daily, sometimes multiple times a day. 3km is quite far and I would not consider that walking distance.

It's certainly possible to walk that distance once every (couple of) months, if I did not have my bike available for whatever reason? But I would consider regularly walking 40 minutes one way every other day to be far too much. That distance is cycling distance, not walking distance.

On a side-note. Did you just say that the bus arrives only once every four hours? My lord.. It might as well basically not exist at that point.

500 meters. If the store were at 3km I'd bike there, not walk. I feel like 500m is still an okay walking distance, but at some point I regularly went to a store 800m away and I already preferred to bike there. Walking 3km is definitely a bit of a time investment

3 Km is what? A half hour walk? I've lived in multiple European countries in my life and never been that far from a supermarket.

I mean, I definitely have walked that much daily. My longest walk to work I can remember was maybe 40 minutes. In some places where I'd take public transportation for like 20-30 min I've walked for an hour when I felt like it instead.

For groceries I don't think I'd take that with me that far walking unless it could go in my backpack. But seriously, if you don't have a shop in that radius around you in Europe you need a car anyway because you're out in the middle of nowhere.

But also, in European supermarkets you can normally get big grocery hauls delivered that far away. Just go there, buy your stuff, pay, book a delivery. Lots of old people who can't carry heavy weights do it. They still go to the shop, though.

We have two supermarkets within five minutes walking distance, if you make it ten minutes, it's four.

Also within ten minutes walking distance are two middle schools, a primary school, and two kindergardens, several doctors and apothecaries, several shops, and the central bus station.

The latter is a bit of an disappointment, as not only the bus service is low frequency, and it takes an hour+ to the city.

3km is kinda far, even with a bicycle, I have a small shop down the stairs and a medium supermarket at 5 min walk

Europeans aren’t a homogeneous blob - we’re individuals. There’s no universal consensus among us about what counts as a reasonable distance to the grocery store.

In Norway. Technically in a city, but it's very rural. About 30 minutes of walking with a descent of ~150 meters. Carrying groceries back up that hill is a big test of stamina, so we very rarely do it. We mostly drive to the store.

Your friend is full of shit. 3km is a very long distance for walking to get groceries, and I can imagine that you have to deprioritize heavier groceries all the time due to that distance. I'd recommend getting a bike or electic scooter or something to cover that distance. Basically no one in Norway would have 3km to their nearest store with walking as their only option.

I'm in Vienna, Austria. I have 5 supermarkets and 3 pharmacys in a 10 minute walking radius.

I live in the pedestrian zone of a semi large German city. There's three grocery stores within pissing distance.

My last flat was a little more remote in comparison but still nowhere near 3km to the next store. I wouldn't be willing to walk that far for groceries tbh. I enjoy taking walks but not with a shitload of food I have to haul all the way home. That's a cycling or public transport route for me.

If I was you I'd take a large hiking backpack or rolling suitcase, walk to the store an hour ahead and then ride the bus back home.

I live out in the countryside. The nearest store is about 2.8km away. Put on some good music, get an ice cream for the second half of the trip, it's a lovely walk. I could catch a bus back, there's a stop right by the shop, but my timing is generally shite. If I'd be halfway home by the time the bus comes, I'd rather just walk.

Even fairly rural Europeans will consider that to be at least cycling distance.

I have four supermarkets in a radius of about 500 metres. Not only do I regularly walk, I pretty much buy only what I need for a few days, safe in the knowledge that if I need something now, I can be out & back in under half an hour, also knowing that most supermarkets here are reliably stocked with just what I need.

One more opinion: 3km is definitely too far for groceries, that's driving distance. It's half an hour walking each way, the return loaded with bags? Forget about it.

I live on the edge of a small-ish town and it takes me 15 min to the nearest supermarket, and that's quite a lot, everyone on this streets bikes there, in about 5 min. From there towards the center you don't need to walk more than 5 min to get groceries.

I'd say having to walk more than a 10 minutes for groceries already affects the apartment value.

If I walked 3km in any direction I would pass probably 8-10 grocery stores on the way. But I live in the middle of a small European city. I walk probably 300meters to the nearest one though.

When I was in a similar situation, I wish I thought of “one way”. I realized after the fact that many people were walking one way to the store but taking a taxi back with their load of groceries. However I have no idea whether it was actually affordable or if that was their only choice.

You should look into that. How affordable is a taxi if you only take it one direction?

Around 2.2km at the moment, according to google maps :3

Most places I lived before were significantly closer to the store tho.. 3km is still walking distance for groceries I'd say, but anything further than that and I'd definitely be considering a different transport method, just cause of the bags

I'm not really a European but I'm close enough I guess (Turkish). The closest supermarket to me is less than a hundred meters away, with 3 others available in a 250m radius around my home.

3km walk in this weather sounds like hell to be honest. You could use a grocery delivery service though if you have one available in your country.

I bike (more carrying capacity) about 9km each direction. (Belgium to Germany, funnily enough.) That being said, not wanting to do so under the burning sun is absolutely valid.

800m by foot only.

Or about 50m and 2 tram stops.

edit: counting is hard.

Eastern part of Germany here. The closest grocery stores are about 2,5km away from my home, but we live a little more rural than most of the people in the thread. I don't walk that distance for groceries, because they don't allow dogs in, but one of the supermarkets has a DIY store right next to it, and I do walk there to get smaller items and have a nice walk with my doggo.

I live in a very small town, the closest one is 300m, it's a rather small grocery store good enough for daily stuff. Once a week or two I take the car to a bigger store 10km away for stuff that I can't find in the small store or is cheaper there.

I draw the line of the unladen (not for leisure) walking distance at 25 minutes. That can be reevaluated in case of necessity.

• 180m to the nearest small supermarket which has a satisfactory selection

• 450m-650m to three normal-sized supermarkets which have everything I need in daily life

• 1km to a mall which has everything I could ever ask for in life

Yes, I live in the city.

As a european, it takes me 8 minutes to walk to a supermarket, though i use a bicycle

Nearest grocery store is 100m away. Nearest supermarket is 850m (just cheched). I walked to the supermarket moments ago, bought grocery and brought it back all in less than 1 hour. I wouldn't do it with 30 degrees in the middle of the day though. If there were no sidewalks and I had to make a 6km round trip to get groceries, I would invest in the cheapest electric bike possible.

I don't have to walk more that 10 minutes to a "grocery store" where I live (which is kind of in between rural and urban) but occasionally I might walk 3+ km and back to somewhere with a better selection, take a backpack, that's not an unreasonable walk to me. If I had to do it every day I might complain.

About a 4 minute walk!

Got four different shops within ~500m.

I'd ask your friend if they walk 3k to the market, and if the answer is no, tell them to STFU.

the walk is good for your though. You can feel like a badass for doing it, but complaining kind of weakens that.

Not european but 2km to the nearest grocery store with fewer selection, 3.8km to the nearest town with better selection. The caveat here is i moved into a rather new residential area and it's in the middle of nowhere. Before this the grocery store is 3min walk, and the furthest part of the residential area is still 1km away from the nearest grocery store.

I wouldn't walk 3km though, that is still 30min to 40min walk one way. Cycling is better.

The closest supermarket is 6km away. I either walk or cycle 1k to the bus stop or all the way by ebike. The way home is super steep, otherwise i would probably take the normal bike. It's nice, because i can go all the way without touching an asphalt road.

American here... 3km is just under 2 miles, so you're looking at a 4 mile walk just to get to the grocery store and back?

I wouldn't walk that, mostly because bringing the groceries back is the problem. Maybe if you had a wagon or a cart or something.

Closest grocery to me is 1.77km, I wouldn't walk that either. No sidewalks all the way so you'd be feet away from vehicle traffic, and coming home with groceries would be up-hill. No thank you.

Depends on what I want (availability in the shop).
But anything is in a range of about 6km in every direction and reachable by bike.
Got a Lidl, Aldi, Edeka Center, Rewe, Kaufland in my range.
All of mid size.

Depending on the weight I am willing to carry the groceries (if they don't need cooling).
But that depends on how much time I have and if I am in the mood.

I recently moved somewhere a little further from the shops. I can take the bus part of the way but still need to walk around 1km each way, so I've invested in a Clax trolley to carry my groceries.

If I was in your situation, I would buy a light, foldable cart, take the bus to the shops, and walk home.

Aussie, but the strip with a butcher, grocer and IGA is about 60m away, if i want more supermarkety goods i'll hop on my pushbike or walk the 1.4km to Europa

Vilnius, Lithuania. 3 different shops 5 min walk from home. And its not even high density urban area. I shop almost every day

3 km sounds like too much to me. I don't think most people here would walk that far to do their shopping, especially in 30°C heat, mostly because we usually have small supermarkets all around.

I currently walk 500 m to my small neighbourhood supermarket when I just need to buy a few things and I don't recall ever living further away from some small supermaket. When I am running out of provisions, I take my car and go to a big hypermarket 7 km away. There are other hypermarkets closer by, even within walking distance (2.3 km), but that farther one is the one I like for doing a big shopping.

Of course, distance isn't the only factor. It's not the same 500 m in London or Amsterdam which are mostly flat than in the city where I live now, where the 500 m to my supermarket have gradients of up to 15 %.

Not European, but most people in my city would say "3 minutes" as they'd live directly above a mall. I live somewhere quieter, so it's about 12 minutes for me to the closest supermarket, and 4 more if I want to go for cheaper groceries, hella restaurants and food stalls, and boba.

When I was staying in Berlin, the closest Lidl was a 15-minute walk away.