In a story about the housing downturn, BusinessWeek had some numbers crunched ^[1] to see where home prices have remained most stable and where they have declined most precipitously:

The results are fascinating. Annual price changes in most of the largest metro areas, including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, San Francisco, Seattle, Baltimore, Washington D.C., and Philadelphia, followed a similar pattern: Values were most stable within a 10-mile radius of the center of the city, but generally worsened with each successive radius ring as far as 50 miles from the center of the city.

"There's a pretty clear pattern of neighborhoods close to the urban core holding their values better than neighborhoods in suburban and exurban communities," said Stan Humphries, Zillow's vice-president of data and analytics. "Where there is a lot of supply and demand changes, there's a quicker effect on housing prices." 

It may seem obvious by now that rising gas prices are affecting ^[2] decisions ^[3] about where to live, but don't tell that to the editors at Money. As Greater Greater Washington blogger David Alpert points out ^[4], the magazine's latest list of America's best places to live ^[5] skews heavily toward the sprawling, suburban side. Of course, Money's readers can probably absorb a spike in transportation costs without too much hardship, which may explain why they don't factor it into their rankings.

A completely different picture emerges from Money's own online series about how people are adapting to more expensive gas ^[6]. The short profiles read like a public service campaign for living arrangements where cars are not required to make even the most basic trips. Here's what Carrie Zukoski, 41, a PR director living in St. Louis, has to say ^[7]:

I ride my bike as much as I can. Rising gas prices hurt much less at the pump for me. Last fill up was 22 days in between. This year I'll try to bike even more.

In 2007 I commuted by bike about 1,400 miles. Compared to many people, it's not that much, but for a fair-weather commuter who lives less than five miles from work, it's not too bad.