Living in the city and living in the burbs are two different things. A good city neighborhood is like a small town, except that it's likely to be more walkable and has major urban assets a short hop away. The burbs, however .... I'll just say that I can't imagine spending three hours a day in my car.
Neither can I. I work in the next town over, which is even smaller than my town. While the city commuters from my town are on their hour long white knuckle drive I'm on a leisurely 20-25 minute drive with nary a car on the road.