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AZriverfan is correct. I honestly do believe it's the lack of skyscrapers and that dense, tall, urban core. A lot of people just can't get past that no matter how many millions more people flock to the Valley. It's a myopic viewpoint but I am convinced it's a common one.
When a lot of people think of a "city" they seem to think of "the downtown core of a city" ... when they think of Chicago they don't think of the many millions of people living in low-density, endlessly sprawling, freeway-traffic-choked suburbs, they think of the Loop and the lakefront and all the historic museums and the epic skyline. The reality that the Chicago metro as a whole is tremendously sprawling and in many ways more far-flung that Phoenix's suburbs and exurbs is irrelevant to them.
Similarly, most New York metro residents don't live in Manhattan but that seems to be what everyone thinks of, not the lower-rise homes and apartment blocks in Queens, the Bronx, or especially Staten Island or Long Island.
It's all about perception I guess...what can you put on a postcard and what do tourists do or see on a weekend visit?
Our postcard has a cactus or Camelback Mountain, not a famous skyscraper skyline, so for a lot of people that's as far as they choose to contemplate our reality.
Most of this is true ... the majority of the population lives outside the dense urban cores, even in places like New York & Chicago. However, I think you're missing the point about the lack of skyscrapers, and how that tends to hurt Phoenix's image. What do people usually see when they fly into a large city? The downtown skyline. Even when driving into a large city on a freeway, the skyline is often visible even from the distant suburbs. A prominent skyline enhances a city's image, and it implies success. And for those who say that many world class European cities don't have tall skylines, I say "so what"? That's Europe, and this is America. Almost all large American cities that are globally recognized have majestic skylines, and the only exception to this is Washington, DC.
Sorry, but I don't see a cactus or a mountain as a good image for the nation's sixth largest city. If people prefer cactus & mountains over growth & development or tall skylines, they should live somewhere outside the Phoenix metro area ... and there are hundreds of miles of open desert remaining in Arizona where a person can have his/her fill of all the cactus, snakes, and coyotes. Maybe this kind if image worked well for Phoenix 40 or 50 years ago, but it's high time that we grow up and start acting our size.
Is it the existence of 4 pro sports teams, NASCAR stops, hosting multiple super bowls, the final 4, our regular big concerts, major performing arts centers?
Is it the existence of 16 fortune 1,000 companies within the metro region?
Perhaps having the 10th busiest airport in the US makes us a small town?
Is the exploding residential boom in downtown Phoenix and Tempe? That's a small town thing right?
Is it our 2.2M person labor force? That sounds small right?
Is it our $220B metro GDP, ranking above the likes of Denver, Pittsburgh, and San Jose?
Maybe it's being the 13th largest media market that does it?
Is it the 10,000 or so residential units under construction in downtown and central Phoenix?
Perhaps it's the presence of the largest university in the nation?
Is it our museums and cultural attractions that make us a small town? The Heard, Desert Botanical Garden(the world's largest collection of desert plants), Taliesin West, the Phoenix Art Museum (the Southwest's largest art museum), the Fleischer Museum, the Science Center, the Hall of Flame (featuring the world's largest collection of fire-fighting equipment), Pueblo Grande, SMOCA, MIM??
The old argument that Phoenix is a small town has gotten pretty tired. It's well past time to retire it and Reno loves the saying so much they even built signage proclaiming it's theirs, so lets let them own it huh? Plus it takes all but 5 minutes to realize there is nothing about the amount of opportunity, both economically and among personal interests, that is small about the Phoenix area.
People making this argument usually mean that Phoenix doesn't look like traditional cities, "wait a minute, where's the giant skyline like New York, Chicago, Boston, etc.????" We grew up different here, you left those places because you didn't like it. Try it out!
There's a lot of reasons why we grew how we did and there's some great perks to it, one being that horrendous traffic jams normally associated with a 5 million person region don't really exist here! I'm delighted not to spend 61 hours a year stuck in traffic jams like people do in Chicago, how about you?
But alas, it's easier to judge things based on what you've known, instead of taking the time to view things from a different perspective. Some people get it, others never will.
I didn't say it WAS, or IS, a small town. But I understand what 60 Minutes was talking about back then. It has changed a lot since then, but there's still some things about it that distinguish it from many other large American cities. Some of that has to do with the neighborhoods that don't feel like you are in the fifth or sixth largest city in America. Most of those differences are big positives for a lot of people. The continued flow of people coming here, and leaving those other places for somewhere else, bear that out.
I've lived here almost all my life, (58 years this past summer) so I'm not looking at Phoenix based on having lived long term in any other metro area or small town, or wanting to. Didn't come here to argue, so I'm out.
It comes down to sky scrapers. Some only associated a big city with that. So that being said, the development of downtown will cause many to feel like we are a big city. Downtown Phoenix is so much more developed than it was even 5 years ago. In 5 years, it will be even bigger
What is the new high-rise going up in the mid-town area?
This is not meant to be sarcastic at all, but a real question: If it is so gawdawful hot there--and I really have never been there but am interested--why do so many move there? It seems folks there are stuck in the air conditioning for 4-5 months of the year. Can someone clarify this for me?
I'm seriously looking to move there because there are so many baby boomers there, but people in the Midwest keep telling me how hot it is there and that I will not like it.
The Phoenix region surely has to be better for my allergies than Houston was where I had cold-like symptoms way more than I ever should have had.
But, if people are getting stuck living in their homes for 4-5 months of the year due to the heat, that's just like living in Chicago where folks get stuck in the house for 4-5 months of the year due to the chilling cold. Dang!
My family and I moved here from LA area when I was 8. I'm 30 now. Phoenix isn't the best city in the world but it's home to me. In some ways I wish I lived in LA but LA is so expensive and it has too many problems that Phoenix doesn't have yet.
Have you been to LA? Have you been to Chicago? Have you been to NYC? Tell me how big PHX feels in comparison again? I forget.
PHX is hardly "big" feeling, despite its population, I think most would agree. Its big, but feels like most big cities' suburbs. I mean, if one is coming from Billings, MT, yes, PHX would feel large. Coming from NYC? This place is a ghost town in comparison. Ive been caught in worse traffic jams in Chicago at 1AM than I have here at 5PM. PHX feels like a giant suburb, and I think that's the attraction for many people. You can walk down Central and not hear horns honking literally every few seconds, rubbing shoulders with endless crowds of business men or having to talk over the roar of passing trains. PHX is a slice of quiet heaven for us who escaped giant cities.
Giant suburbia isn’t attractive to everyone and Phoenix still has plenty of bad traffic and criminals and shootings regardless if it seems quieter or smaller compared to LA, NYC or Chicago.
Crowds of business men walking down the street on Central sounds just fine. It would be nice to have a downtown feel like a real city instead of a few dense blocks of tall buildings mixed in with a bunch of open parking lots and empty spaces.
Most of this is true ... the majority of the population lives outside the dense urban cores, even in places like New York & Chicago. However, I think you're missing the point about the lack of skyscrapers, and how that tends to hurt Phoenix's image. What do people usually see when they fly into a large city? The downtown skyline. Even when driving into a large city on a freeway, the skyline is often visible even from the distant suburbs. A prominent skyline enhances a city's image, and it implies success. And for those who say that many world class European cities don't have tall skylines, I say "so what"? That's Europe, and this is America. Almost all large American cities that are globally recognized have majestic skylines, and the only exception to this is Washington, DC.
Sorry, but I don't see a cactus or a mountain as a good image for the nation's sixth largest city. If people prefer cactus & mountains over growth & development or tall skylines, they should live somewhere outside the Phoenix metro area ... and there are hundreds of miles of open desert remaining in Arizona where a person can have his/her fill of all the cactus, snakes, and coyotes. Maybe this kind if image worked well for Phoenix 40 or 50 years ago, but it's high time that we grow up and start acting our size.
I agree wholeheartedly. And I will disagree with those who say most European cities don't have skylines. They are wrong. London, Prague, Paris, Frankfurt, Budapest, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Barcelona etc...nearly all large European cities have a dense urban core of tall buildings. They may not be large skylines like you see in New York, Chicago and Hong Kong but they have a "downtown"
What most Valley residents fail to understand is that tall buildings/skyline is marketing! You may think that it is trivial to define a city by its skyline but that perception does matter. When attracting companies, having an impressive skyline speaks well about the cosmopolitan nature of a city. The more we develop our downtown and build taller buildings, the more companies we will be able to attract.
You can't look at this from a parochial Phoenix perspective and say "Ah screw them, what do they know, I'm happy and they are idiots". You have to think bigger and realize that people outside of Arizona don't think like you. And in an era when we are trying to attract more high paying jobs, that impression matters.
Can't speak for all but visited Prague, Budapest, and Barcelona this summer and I never saw anything that resembled a downtown with tall buildings. They had a denser core than Phoenix but a skyline they did not.
Quote:
Originally Posted by azriverfan.
I agree wholeheartedly. And I will disagree with those who say most European cities don't have skylines. They are wrong. London, Prague, Paris, Frankfurt, Budapest, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Barcelona etc...nearly all large European cities have a dense urban core of tall buildings. They may not be large skylines like you see in New York, Chicago and Hong Kong but they have a "downtown"
What most Valley residents fail to understand is that tall buildings/skyline is marketing! You may think that it is trivial to define a city by its skyline but that perception does matter. When attracting companies, having an impressive skyline speaks well about the cosmopolitan nature of a city. The more we develop our downtown and build taller buildings, the more companies we will be able to attract.
You can't look at this from a parochial Phoenix perspective and say "Ah screw them, what do they know, I'm happy and they are idiots". You have to think bigger and realize that people outside of Arizona don't think like you. And in an era when we are trying to attract more high paying jobs, that impression matters.
Can't speak for all but visited Prague, Budapest, and Barcelona this summer and I never saw anything that resembled a downtownwith tall buildings. They had a denser core than Phoenix but a skyline they did not.
Interesting, these pictures seem to say otherwise. If these were located in Arizona, people would most definitely feel that we have a downtown. Again, I didn't say they had skyskrapers but they most definitely have a downtown
Barcelona
Prague
Budapest
Last edited by azriverfan.; 12-22-2016 at 05:05 PM..
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Most of those differences are big positives for a lot of people. The continued flow of people coming here, and leaving those other places for somewhere else, bear that out. 
It costs less to live here.
