{"id":171,"date":"2026-03-19T23:34:42","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T23:34:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossin.wpenginepowered.com\/?p=171"},"modified":"2026-03-19T23:34:42","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T23:34:42","slug":"coronavirus-is-making-some-people-rethink-where-they-want-to-live","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/?p=171","title":{"rendered":"Coronavirus is making some people rethink where they want to live"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"et_pb_module et_pb_text et_pb_text_0  et_pb_text_align_left et_pb_bg_layout_light\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_text_inner\">\n<p>A moving truck came to Rebecca Stevens-Walter\u2019s New York apartment this week.<\/p>\n<p>But she wasn\u2019t there to help pack boxes or supervise the crew.<\/p>\n<p>In mid-March, the 39-year-old pastor flew to New Mexico with her husband and two kids. They left so suddenly they barely had time to prepare for the trip.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe fled,\u201d she says. \u201cOur apartment looked like the rapture had come. \u2026 And we definitely had the conversation, \u2018What if we don\u2019t go back?&#8217;\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The streets of the city she loves \u2014 and many major cities across the US \u2014 are hauntingly empty as the pandemic leaves most of the country on lockdown.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s a chilling sign of the times, and one that brings to mind a big question: After the pandemic passes, will some people choose to leave big-city life behind?<\/p>\n<p>That trend was already starting to emerge in some parts of the country, even before coronavirus hit.<\/p>\n<p>Now the pandemic is changing the way we talk about life in big cities. And some experts say it could change who opts to live in them.<\/p>\n<p>Stevens-Walter says her family does plan to return to New York. But others who recently left the city told CNN they aren\u2019t so sure.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s hard to think about living in New York when we don\u2019t have our existence and our careers there,\u201d says Ashley Arcement, a dancer, singer and actor who headed to a friend\u2019s house in Florida with her boyfriend, a pianist, after Broadway shut down in March.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBefore this,\u201d Arcement says, \u201cwe weren\u2019t the kind of people who wanted to live outside the city and commute in. \u2026 Now it\u2019s like, will it ever be the same?\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>\u2026continues on cnn.com<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"et_pb_module et_pb_text et_pb_text_1  et_pb_text_align_left et_pb_bg_layout_light\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_text_inner\">\n<p>This Article was initially published on May 2, 2020 at cnn.com<\/p>\n<p>Read the original article:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2020\/05\/02\/us\/cities-population-coronavirus\/index.html\">Read Article<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A moving truck came to Rebecca Stevens-Walter\u2019s New York apartment this week. But she wasn\u2019t there to help pack boxes or supervise the crew. In mid-March, the 39-year-old pastor flew to New Mexico with her husband and two kids. They left so suddenly they barely had time to prepare for the trip. \u201cWe fled,\u201d she [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":172,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-171","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/city-dwellers-1080x619-1-600x400.jpg","featured_image_src_square":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/city-dwellers-1080x619-1-600x600.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"ephraimcrossin","author_link":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/?author=1"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=171"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ephraimcrossing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}