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If you are going to try islands, it would make sense to start with the largest populated island in the US, Long Island. Long island by itself has a population of 7.8 million. For example, the whole Hawaiian archipelago is only 1.4 million people.
LA doesn't have as much to gain since its hinterland is already in Calif. Same with Chicago except I suspect 'Chicagoland' does a lot to support central and southern Illinois so let that go and be on its own.
I suppose some are answering it more as "which cities could" as opposed to "which cities should".
Los Angeles County certainly could, though I agree it definitely should not.
I think the Bay Area could. In fact, that insane plan to split CA into 7 states was proposed by a businessman in the Bay Area. It essentially created a state of "Silicon Valley," in other words the Bay Area CSA. I don't think the idea of that state being viable is why the plan is so crazy - it's the Mississippi of the west that would be created by the interior areas.
If you are going to try islands, it would make sense to start with the largest populated island in the US, Long Island. Long island by itself has a population of 7.8 million. For example, the whole Hawaiian archipelago is only 1.4 million people.
I was sarcastically referring to Staten Island's desire to succeed from NYC.
I'd say there are already cities which would be better off. Particularly major cities in states which have more than one major city. IE: to my understanding Philly's public transport could seriously use another underground line or faster suburban rail but it's too busy paying for the roads for the rest of the state.
A couple of things, small cities aren't apart of this thread but it is okay to mention them here (obviously) but understand that small City-States (or microstates) across the world are a result of constitutional-monarchies. As the purely City-State examples of them are Andorra and Monaco and both are Principalities, meaning they are Constitutional-Monarchy, meaning Prince Albert II is the head of state in Monaco. The United States doesn't have a "Royal Family" so we have no need for small City-States such as Andorra and Monaco.
Also, Vatican City is a religiously autonomic, it was designed to serve as the head of the Roman Catholic order. The United States does not have any religious cities like it for us to warrant a Vatican City type of City-State.
That leaves Hong Kong and Singapore and they are both big cities. I notice some people talking about suburbs and commuter rail, understand Singapore and Hong Kong don't have suburbs, the city is the country and it is linked together and the neighborhoods are strewn together by a mass transit link that serves as much of the city as possible. Now both cities have bedroom communities outside their borders, the Singapore ones are Riau Islands of Indonesia and Johor Bahru across the strait from Singapore. People from these areas commute into Singapore for work or business or just site seeing or shopping among the like.
Think of it this way, if New York (just the city) were a City-State, it would similarly draw people from across the Hudson River for shopping, work, site-seeing, or the like. So commuter rail (or metropolitan areas in general) are not a factor in this thread, save for maybe the San Francisco Bay Area which is a geographic ring around the San Francisco Bay.
So the question is, which city, as it stands now, has the resources, infrastructure, and is generally well off enough to thrive as a City-State if it were one? The way I see it, New Yorkers already import their food and water and everything from other states and other countries as it is, they already have an extensive mass transit network, are built up densely, and have the financial resources to pull it off. I would also give it to Los Angeles, the District of Columbia, and the Distrito Federal (Mexico City) too. How about other cities?
I would agree that a deep sea port is important but Toronto does qualify that way as well. It doesn't have a large port but is on the Seaway........an international waterway.
I would say NYC, SF, Toronto, L,A, and maybe Chicago.
Are we including suburbs? We would have to, most city states have hinterlands.
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