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Can the smaller cities hold their own in terms of amenities against the larger cities. My cut off for small to large is anything above or below the 5 million mark. Basically if it's below 5 million (CSA) then it's in the smaller camp, if it's larger then it's in the big city camp.
Amenities list:
- Parks
- Shopping (Yeah feel free to talk about Barney's, Nordstrom, so on, whatever floats your boat I suppose)
- Amphitheaters/concert venues
- Sports
- Sports venues
- Airports
- Restaurants (the variety, the total number, the atmosphere)
- Amusement parks/Water parks/boardwalks/piers
- Zoos
- Museums
- Colleges (Sports related only/sports stadiums)
- Art scene
- Hotels
- Casinos
- Outdoors stuff (hiking, biking, swimming)
- Festivals (film, music, cultural)
- Neighborhoods (high rise, mansion, quiet peaceful)
- Nightlife
- Alcohol scene
We're staying away from politics, weather/climate, cost of living, or any sort of discussion on economy. Just strictly on what the cities have or don't have.
Now you can compare them as a collective group against each other or split them up and match them with their counterparts, well I'll provide the counterpart list if anyone cares.
Some matches:
- Denver versus Dallas
- Minneapolis versus Philadelphia
- Tampa versus Houston
- Seattle versus Boston
- Cleveland versus Detroit
- San Diego versus Miami
- Phoenix versus Atlanta
Let's keep it 100 and keep it to only the stuff I'm asking for in this thread. No more and no less. If there are any other amenities I missed upon, feel free to add. Otherwise, the credentials of the thread are pretty straightforward.
PICTURES ARE WELCOME!
Last edited by Trafalgar Law; 09-26-2013 at 11:43 PM..
San Diego is considered small? Anyone from SoCal would know that separating SD from the LA/OC region is silly. It's basically connected with nearly continual urban development between the two. It's an hour drive from anywhere in OC to SD for crying out loud...
Seattle, I would argue, packs the strongest punch of all the small cities. Not long at all till it joins the ranks.
Outside the United States for some examples, our 3 millions feel like 1.5's, this entire country along with Australia and Canada are a mess on the world when it comes to lack of density aside from a small less than handful of cities. Then you have some cities that have okay densities (maybe like 11,000-15,000 citywide) but they're so crime ridden and filled with so much "undesirable" areas that border looking like Chernobyl post-nuclear disaster that it just makes one sad. You think "3 million" makes you feel 3 million? What a laugh to the Valencias and Lyons of the world. Megacities are big cities, hypercities are really big cities, supercities are in a class of their own. From 5-10 million, medium sized. Smaller than 5 million, pretty damn small, all in my opinion. San Diego feels like a resort for families more than it feels like a city, coming from someone that truly loves the living hell out of the place.
That's okay, cute places get all the love in the world anyway. LOL. People love cute, it sells postcards.
By the way, why don't you do more than just state Seattle packs the strongest punch. Maybe you didn't get the thread, I'm not talking GDP or climate or that nonsense. Just amenities. Tell me, does Seattle have an NBA or NHL? So, tell me again, how's it so far clear cut victory for Seattle? Let's also get into the quirks of each and every single one of these 14 cities. Let's take inventory of all the W's, Ritz Carlton's, Mandarin's, everything to debunk these preconceived declarations of victory.
Last edited by Trafalgar Law; 09-27-2013 at 05:02 AM..
If you take out Philadelphia and Boston the smaller metros could easily hold their own. None compare to the density, history, transit, and proximity to other great cities. That gives Boston and Philadelphia the edge. The other cities don't have much that seperate them from the smaller metros IMHO. Seattle, Phoenix, Minneapolis and Denver can easily hold their own against the likes of Miami, Atlanta, Houston, and Dallas.
If you take out Philadelphia and Boston the smaller metros could easily hold their own. None compare to the density, history, transit, and proximity to other great cities. That gives Boston and Philadelphia the edge. The other cities don't have much that seperate them from the smaller metros IMHO. Seattle, Phoenix, Minneapolis and Denver can easily hold their own against the likes of Miami, Atlanta, Houston, and Dallas.
This is my take as well. Boston and Philly are a SOLID tier above, and not just in terms of population, but amenities that you only start to see in the most global of U.S. cities. However, the amenities available in Dallas, Houston, Atlanta or Miami can mostly be found in places like Seattle, Minneapolis, Denver, Phoenix, etc. I won't say they're equal, on average (some places like Seattle might even have MORE amenities than those cities), but they're certainly not like twice as great as their smaller counterparts. In other words, at least with this list of cities, you start to see diminishing returns on quality or amenities once you get past the 2.0-2.5 million mark (depending on whether a city is the epicenter of a larger region, like the four smaller metros noted above are). If there were a chart you'd see a curve that was rising from left to right at slower and slower levels for each level of population.
If you take out Philadelphia and Boston the smaller metros could easily hold their own. None compare to the density, history, transit, and proximity to other great cities. That gives Boston and Philadelphia the edge. The other cities don't have much that seperate them from the smaller metros IMHO. Seattle, Phoenix, Minneapolis and Denver can easily hold their own against the likes of Miami, Atlanta, Houston, and Dallas.
^Couldn't have said it better myself. Boston and Philly are holding it down for the "larger" cities.
Outside the United States for some examples, our 3 millions feel like 1.5's, this entire country along with Australia and Canada are a mess on the world when it comes to lack of density aside from a small less than handful of cities. Then you have some cities that have okay densities (maybe like 11,000-15,000 citywide) but they're so crime ridden and filled with so much "undesirable" areas that border looking like Chernobyl post-nuclear disaster that it just makes one sad. You think "3 million" makes you feel 3 million? What a laugh to the Valencias and Lyons of the world. .
Haha, yes, if I want a rough feel of how big somewhere feels (the city parts) in the U.S. vs Europe I usually double or triple the European cities population against most American cities. Lyon easily feels bigger than all the cities on that list outside Philly and Boston, which are about even. Actually, Lyon might be a bit more developed infrastructure wise to tell the truth.
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