I grew up in Europe, and the major difference with Europe is that there is almost no scarcity of productive farmland almost anywhere in the US. Besides in desert areas, you’re always a reasonably drivable distance away from very cheap and vast farmland. It wouldn’t make sense to optimize for a resource that is so far from being scarce. Basically, we mostly build with low density, because, well, we can afford it in resources, and it’s nicer, so why not.

That includes the west, there is also a massive amount of productive farmland in the west. California is actually the number one US state in agricultural revenue.

Most cities developed in the desert are not particularly impressive, just because of the lack of resources indeed. Albuquerque is half a million people. Reno is half of that. That’s tiny as far as North American cities go. In general, it doesn’t make sense to build too ambitiously around there indeed.

… well, except Las Vegas. Las Vegas I can’t make sense of. That place just makes no sense to exist.