Are there any Big World Cities with a slow-paced lifestyle? (spring break, 2014)

[minibrings]

Originally Posted by Rwarky

Around a million inhabitants or more.

Then Adelaide definitely fits the bill.. nice slow paced Aussie capital city with a great lifestyle

[lrmsd]

Originally Posted by Thomas R.

I have no real experience, but at that size I would guess no. Although maybe Copenhagen. Hm let's see.

PopulationData.net : Palmarès - Les plus grandes villes du monde

I don't entirely trust that site on specifics, but for "metropolitan areas over a million" it might work okay. Perth is listed as having a metropolitan area of over a million and someone mentioned it. Maybe San Jose, Costa Rica. Costa Rica tops the "Happy Planet Index" which is largely about who's happy and relatively low-tech. (That's not exactly how they put it, but it's often the end result) Vientiane in Laos is said to be slow-paced, it's ran by somewhat isolationist Communists yet it's warmer and somewhat less crazy than North Korea, but it's not big enough to fit what you mean.

That's great,if one's 'goal' is happiness.
Don't forget: the happiness stuff is touted by the would-be socalists constantly comparing the US to europe,etc.

I am not saying happiness is not important,and I will certainly agree that quality of life is. But happiness is largely personal,not a stastical fx. And one can have a good quality of life and still be unhappy.

And,a big and,alot of amazing art,literature and thought has come out of humanity's dark periods and/or dark period of a single individual. Happy cannot exist without sad,by definition,anway.

And,anyway again,the OP was asking about 'laid back',which is certainly not the same as 'happiness'.

[lrmsd]

Well,just to add one city in the US,and of course it's relative to other US cities,since it's no longer *really* laid back (now that it's grown more...),but San Diego is pretty laid back.
Again,the traffic has really gotten worse in the last ten years,and the attitudes,too.
But overall it's still mellow,compared to visiting LA,SFO or of course NYC.

Sure,it's not Mexico 'manana' laid back,but it's mellow-ish.

[Trimac20]

Originally Posted by reneici

yea NY is crazy compared to Sydney.
I'm from Vancouver & it's fairly laid back (my boyfriend's from Toronto and when he first got relocated to Vancouver he was always complaining about how sloooow & "inefficient" the west-coasters are because it's toooo laid back for his taste.) , but when I was in Sydney I felt that the city is even slower & MORE chill than Vancouver.

Which parts of Sydney did you hang about?

The CBD if Sydney is always bustling, and people are constantly pushing their way into trains, up escalators (I was physically pushed and told to get out of the way on more than one occasion, while I was standing at the side of the escalator), and there's barely any room to breathe walking in the city at peak hour.

[gdw851024]

Do youthink Chengdu is a Big World City? If you do, I'll tell you Chengdu is the city which is absolutly exactly fit the description.I live in Chengdu China for 24 years from birth to now.Chengdu is known for people's leisure life style,also people pay muchattention on quality of life.[FONT=&#23435]In fact, we have to admit the fact that the quality of life is as important as life itself.[/FONT]

[elnina]

San Antonio, Texas.... soooooooooo laid back.....fast pace is a foreign concept !

[§AB]

Adelaide, Australia.....basically a country town with 1.5 million people. They don't even have a freeway!

[Maksud90]

Well OPs definition of Big World Cities is more then a million people. Amsterdam has almost 800,000 and is definitely slow paced. It's literally amazing, also all the people using bikes is great.

[Bjnson]

From my experience Barcelona, Milano, Montreal and some of the larger Scandinavian cities are pretty laid back.

[Ethereal]

Sydney and Melbourne, the largest in Australia, are still slow compared to major cities like NYC, London, Paris, etc.