Which City looks most impressive from an airplane? (best, airport, beach)
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BTW all skylines look unimpressive from the air for the most part, so eventhough Chicago does have an impressive skyline from a helicopter or on foot, by plane is really not that impressive because you never get all that close to the skyline, only city I've ever been wowed by its skyline while flying in is Sao Paulo. This is the reason why flying in to Chicago to me is unimpressive and boring, cities like Seattle, SF, and even Boston have more impressive approaches IMO because there's texture and variety, Chicago is flat the whole way through, a downtown surrounded by a sea of low density suburbia leading to farms.
Not everyone flies in from the west though. CA has mountains outside of LAX, I agree that's better to look at, but nobody in their right mind is going to fly over Lake Michigan and passing downtown Chicago along with the high rises going along the lake and think "Hmm well..WHATEVER. Not impressed." Sorry but even my hardcore Manhattan friends love flying in from that way.
For me, definitely top 5 in the US - NYC, Chicago, LA, Honolulu, SF
Well you may have a point there, every time I've ever flown in to Chicago has been from the West unfortunately.
During the day landing at LAX is ho hum. The downtown skyline is disappointing for a city that size. All you see surrounding downtown is endless sprawl, mountains at a distance, the flat LA Basin below, & smog.
Nope.
As an ex-pilot myself, flying anywhere in California is pretty stunning, especially compared to the flat, hazy and completely indistinct expanses of Texas (I currently live in Houston). If you are going to throw out the "smog" card, you should also throw out the cloudy and rainy card, because Houston has far greater annual cloud cover and visual obstructions year round than anywhere in California.
What catches most people's eyes about flying into Los Angeles is the often snow covered mountains that funnel you towards the blue pacific ocean. Like any of these moronic "skyline" conversations, people in California often view tall buildings as a forgotten afterthought in the context of far superior natural beauty. No place in America better encapsulates this from the air than LA. Certainly nowhere in Texas.
Well you may have a point there, every time I've ever flown in to Chicago has been from the West unfortunately.
Yes - I agree flying in from the west is nothing special. Flying in from the east however is a completely different ballgame and one of the tops in the country. Watch the videos I posted on the page before or whatever and tell me if you saw that in real life you would just think "whatever." Until then, you don't have much room to speak about that portion of it over the skyline. Rising out of nowhere when you're coming in from a massive lake is pretty cool, and especially if there's a little bit of fog which definitely happens. You also are fairly close to the skyline. I live downtown and I can see planes on approach from my place and they are only a few thousand feet up to the north of downtown by a few miles. I have a lot of planes that fly directly over my building after take off actually and they are usually no more than 2000-2500 feet up or so it seems - they're pretty close surprisingly.
Not related 100% to it but one of the coolest things here related to airplanes is when the Air & Water show is going on and the pilots are practicing - they are buzzing the buildings downtown and along the lake shore. My first year here I had no idea there was a show and I was confused why fighter jets were flying pretty close to the ground
Last edited by marothisu; 04-16-2014 at 01:21 AM..
Lots of back and forth, but from what I gather if large skylines from the air impress you then you may like Chicago. If a vast urban expanse surrounded by perhaps snowcovered mountains impresses you, then you might like LA. Yet if you've seen NYC and Istanbul then they're both whatever.
During the day landing at LAX is ho hum. The downtown skyline is disappointing for a city that size. All you see surrounding downtown is endless sprawl, mountains at a distance, the flat LA Basin below, & smog.
Exactly. My impression of LA from the air can be contained in two words: "brown" and "sprawl". Ugggh.
Boston is a pretty great landing because you come in right over the city and downtown, at least the times I have flown in (which is about 10). Maybe not the most impressive, but certainly an attractive and visually-appealing landing.
Los Angeles makes your neck sore because you think you are getting close to the airport once you hit development, and then spend the next 30 minutes with your neck craned looking out the window at the IE, Orange County and finally the LA Basin.
Chicago was really impressive too, you can definitely see the skyline as you descend. Also at this point Chicagoland sprawls just as much as Southern California, so you get a bit of that "endless lights" appearance landing in Chicago too.
I still say downtown is not impressive from the air. It looked like landing at Vegas to me.
That's on you then, considering DTLA is many times larger than downtown Las Vegas + the Strip combined. Not to mention there are half a dozen other skylines visible throughout descent, completely unlike Las Vegas.
Honestly I have a hard time believing you have ever even been to Los Angeles, much less flown into LAX (in fact I have a hard time believing you've ever left Texas).
I flew over Manhattan on a DC to Boston flight. I enjoyed that view.
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