I am happy this worked out for you and the intention was not to attack someone else's parental decisions - although I could have worded my response better. I like Wemberley and have spent plenty of time there as my parents live nearby. Surely you can see the difference between Wemberley - a 1 hour drive from the #7 and #11 most populous cities in the US and the generic small town close to nothing.
As far a any sense of community, I think you make your own community. Much like UT was large at first. Once you started getting into smaller and more focused classes, everything starts to shrink. By the time you are at the end, you have been studying with the same people in the same study room/computer lab for two years and everybody is helping everybody. The same goes for a larger city. The nice thing about a bigger city is the fact that if you are a little different or into different things, the odds of you finding someone else that is into the same things is much higher.
My high school graduating class had +1000 people. My community was probably 30 kids from different backgrounds. Our parents all knew each other and were actively involved in helping out/supplemental parenting. Everybody thinks larger cities are impersonal until something big happens. Just look at the neighborhoods in Houston during Harvey. If that wasn't communities showing unity, then I don't know what was?
I think the lack of sense of community many feel really stems more from a general lack of empathy. But that is for a different discussion.