I absolutely agree that the US cities built in the automobile era are generally laid out horribly. As far as AC goes, I partly agree. Humidity is a major factor in much of the US which makes things feel much worse. And in the Southwest, it may be dry heat, but it is really, really high - that French summer would be considered cool down there.  But one can believe that some AC is a good idea while also thinking that the US goes way overboard. Someday perhaps all those American businesses will decide that keeping the temperature lower in the summer than in the winter doesn't make sense (I routinely pack a sweatshirt when I'm out in summertime heatwaves). And that excess of AC does make many of us less resistant (though again that deadly heatwave isn't unusual for us).  I've also occasionally wondered if window design has something to do with the prevalence of US residential AC - it's much easier and cheaper to install AC in an old (1860's) building like mine than in the equivalent one in Europe. In remember that during that summer my parents were saying that if they had US style windows they would have happily shelled out the couple hundred bucks for a window unit. I suspect they weren't the only ones.