I never understood why people complained about rabbit holes in TS3 because previous to that, it was one huge rabbit hole - disappearing off the side of the screen. At least going to the building and being able to have them leave before the work shift was over was a step up from what we had.
I would like to have actually shopped at the grocery and book stores, but I could only imagine how much harder it would have run PCs to open anything else in the neighborhood. I would rather have a playable game than screech about fading into a building for a short duration.