Top tier, world class city: how do US cities know they have "arrived"?

[edsg25]

One of the things I hate most about the skyscraper forum (and probably have made others sick of hearing me gripe about it) is the ranking of US cities and the feeling that there is a cut-off point (or even that one has to go up for another to go down). And while I do believe there is some limitation to "world class cities", much of that thinking I just plain do not buy.

Quite simply, if London and Paris can exist as world class cities a stone throw away from each other, there is a lot to suggest that the greatness of one city does not depend on the vulnerability of another.

Therefore, I thought I would throw this question out to you:

How do you know that an American city has arrived, that it has truly created an envirnoment that is "world class", major, a player without question?

What are the factors: both physical (facts on the ground), population (size? and diversity), culturally, business, transportation....actually everything!

I'm not into censorship, and even if I were, I don't control what other posts. But as this was the initial post, please note that I

1. did not mention any American city (and included London and Paris only for comparitive purposes)

2. did not feel this thread was subject to "numbers"....that is, this is not a competitive thing, but an assumption that any number of US cities can achieve this status.

So I am trying here to totally eliminate any comparison (or mentioning) of US cities since I'm more interested in the generic things any of them would need to be great.

I'm really trying to come up with "If it walks like a world class city and it talks like a world class city, it is a world class city": so, what factors does it take to walk and talk that way?

[maxpowers20]

Dude you seem to have a massive inferiority complex! Chicago aint a world city and probably never will be!

To be a world class city it has to be the economic and everything else capital of an important country, i.e. New York, London, Paris, Tokyo. In terms of the USA, LA and Chicago could well be world cities if they were economic hubs in their own right, but they'll always play second fiddle to NY!

Secondary World cities i guess could include Sydney, Fankfurt, Hong Kong. Here, they are the showpiece city of their respective country, but aren't in the same league as the big 4!

[Justadude]

^ Oh... my ... god...

Did you not even READ the original post?!?

[Rockford]

What is this Big 4 crap? Did anybody think to ask Shanghai, Moscow, Sao Paulo, Mexico City, Seoul, Jakarta, Hong Kong, Singapore, Beijing, Cairo, Berlin, Rome, Bangkok, Sydney, Toronto, Istanbul, Lagos and yes, Chicago, LA, SF, and DC how they feel about their respective places on planet Earth.

Let's see....Moscow controls a swath of Earth twice the size of Europe, Beijing and New Delhi are the capital of one billion plus each.

How exactly does Paris come in above these places in the greater scheme of things?????

[Rockford]

Did Napoleon make a triumphant miraculous return while no one was watching???

[maxpowers20]

Good Napoleon joke there that took a while.

Just a question, are you guys all American?

[Justadude]

^ Troll.

[brooklynprospect]

To be a world class city it has to be the economic and everything else capital of an important country,

Not all "important" countries are equally important. America is FAR more economically, politically and culturally important than Germany, France, Japan, or the UK on their own.

So although France, the UK, and Japan seem to support one alpha, world-class, gobally top-tier city (or whatever you want to call it), that's not a reason why America must only have one city in that category as well.

But that being said, I do have a feeling America has a similar "problem" to Germany. Germany is bigger and economically more important than France or the UK, but unlike those two countries, doesn't have a dominant city. Instead it has maybe 4 more or less equally important ones to split it's arts, business, and media between. So none of those cities can aquire the critical mass of London or Paris, even though Germany as a whole is bigger. America is also very unconcentrated. And no city outside of NY really stands out on the global stage.

LA is already very visible and is a great long-term contender to be as important as say Paris or London (I question how important Paris is by the way), but is kind of stuck with a disfunctional leadership and the recent collapse of it's corporate base.

Chicago unfortunately finds itself in a declining unfashionable (of my ivy classmates, no one outside of the midwest wanted to end up there) region, and plays kind of a second, third or fourth fiddle to NY in too many areas. In other words, outside of derivates and commodities (and there tenuously), it hasn't found any niches where it securely leads NY.

The Bay Area is very globally important in something that can't get no respect on this forum - tech. And it's possible to argue that technological progress is more economically and socially important than anything else in today's world. But even in tech, it feels like Silicon Valley might soon become just a first among equals with competitors like Bangalore, Chinese centers, Japan, S Korea, Boston, etc.

Every other significant city in America (of which there are many) just doesn't have the mass.

Anyway, Paris, probably London and possibly NY will be blown away by Shanghai and Mumbai in 40-50 years, but that's another topic.

[rocky]

all you americans questioning paris make yourself look bad.

[brooklynprospect]

all you americans questioning paris make yourself look bad.

I didn't say it's not beautiful or historically important. I'm talking about importance in 2005.

[rocky]

^^thats why i second what i said earlier haha

[brooklynprospect]

^^thats why i second what i said earlier haha

very witty

[rocky]

from wikipedia

Paris
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
For other uses of the term "Paris," see Paris (disambiguation).

The Eiffel Tower has become the symbol of Paris throughout the world.Paris is the capital city of France, as well as the capital of the Île-de-France région, whose territory encompasses Paris and its suburbs. The city of Paris proper is also a département, called Paris département (French: département de Paris).

Paris, together with its suburbs and satellite cities, forms the Greater Paris metropolitan area, with a population estimated at 11.5 million as of January 2004. It is the second largest metropolitan area in Europe (after Moscow, and along with London), and approximately the 20th largest in the world.

Greater Paris metropolitan area, with a total GDP higher than Australia, is the largest financial and business center of Europe (alongside London), harboring more than 30% of France's white-collar population, as well as more than 40% of the headquarters of French companies, with the largest business district of Europe (La Défense), and the 2nd largest stock exchange in Europe (Euronext).

Known worldwide as the City of Light (la Ville Lumière), Paris has been a major tourist destination for centuries. The city is renowned for the beauty of its architecture, its urban perspectives and avenues, as well as the wealth of its museums. Built on an arc of the River Seine, it is divided into two parts: the Right Bank to the north and the smaller Left Bank to the south.

Formerly the capital of a colonial empire stretching over five continents, Paris is still regarded as the heart of the French-speaking world and has retained a strong international position, hosting the headquarters of the OECD and the UNESCO among others. This, combined with its financial, business, political, and tourism activities, have turned Paris into one of the major transportation hubs in the world. Alongside New York, London, and Tokyo, Paris is among the four most important global cities.


I didnt said it its wiki! plus we have a disneyland in our metro area. Paris is almost the capital for most of africa too, since most of the francophones africans elite are in paris or often go to paris.


http://www.chickenshop.co.uk/acatalog/Cost526.JPG
bloody french did it

[maxpowers20]

Finally some non-Americans to talk sense! (mass generalisation)

London and Paris are hugely important global cities due to the UK and France's dominating position in the EU. Germany should be in there, but due to some problems (WWII nazis etc) they weren't invited to the party.

Like it or not ask any analyst and they'd say London, Paris, NY and Tokyo are the 'Big 4', in terms of economic and political influnce.

As for the original point of US cities 'making it' it as truly global cities, LA and Chicago are pretty much there, but wont get much further.

[Rockford]

brooklyn wrote


Chicago unfortunately finds itself in a declining unfashionable (of my ivy classmates, no one outside of the midwest wanted to end up there) region, and plays kind of a second, third or fourth fiddle to NY in too many areas. In other words, outside of derivates and commodities (and there tenuously), it hasn't found any niches where it securely leads NY.


um dude, last time I checked virtually the entire Midwest is growing faster than the entire Northeast. New York and Boston are actually in the middle of the real declining region. And anyone who drops the "Ivy" league crap wouldn't be welcome in the Midwest anyhow.

[Rockford]

and I repeat, how is Paris, the capital of a country of 55 million (and actively ceding its autonomy to Brussels as we speak) more important than Moscow????

I JUST DON"T GET IT!!! Ditto for Beijing and Delhi.

[crawford]

and I repeat, how is Paris, the capital of a country of 55 million (and actively ceding its autonomy to Brussels as we speak) more important than Moscow????

I JUST DON"T GET IT!!! Ditto for Beijing and Delhi.


How about global capital of the French-speaking world?

[rocky]

moscow will be more important than paris when rich, but for the moment, see my post above, paris surpasses moscow because russia is poor as fuck.

[brooklynprospect]

How about global capital of the French-speaking world?

sorry to burst your bubble, but the French-speaking world consists of France, 1/5 of Switzerland, less than half of Belgium, Quebec, maybe Haiti (creole), a few tiny tropical islands, and some of the poorest and least developed countries in Africa, itself by far the poorest and least developed continent in the world.

If those African countries actually mattered for anything, Washington would've taken them away from France's orbit a long time ago. South Africa by itself counts for far more than all of them put together.

[Rockford]

How about global capital of the French-speaking world?


Are you sure you are in Cambridge?

More people speak Portuguese than French, does that make Lisbon more important than Delhi???

Globalize people, gloooobalize. Outside of Europe and the northeast of America, such opinions are downright embarassing.

[brooklynprospect]

um dude, last time I checked virtually the entire Midwest is growing faster than the entire Northeast. New York and Boston are actually in the middle of the real declining region. And anyone who drops the "Ivy" league crap wouldn't be welcome in the Midwest anyhow.

Boston, NY and Washington are by far the single largest concentration of talent and power in the United States. The region is also, along with California, the largest immigrant destination. The decline you're talking about is happening in upstate NY, rural PA, and other places that no one in NYC, Boston or Washington gives a shit about. Not many people in NYC even think of Buffalo or Rochester as being in the same region. We draw talent from the whole country.

[Rockford]

again, Massachusetts, the state, tiny that it is, lost population last year. St. Louis had some of the fastest growth in terms of jobs last year. The Midwest is drawing an increasing number of immigrants from both abroad and from the coasts themselves. Hindu temples are popping up in places like Omaha.

Your perceptions of the Midwest are obviously comtrolled by the same places you think are uber alles, the coasts.

Here's a prediction for 2010, the Coasts will be bleeding population as a housing crash in those regions send people inward. It's already happening in California.

[Rockford]

there won't be a crash in Rockford :)

from an NPR show

Coastal Housing Bubble May Be Set to Burst
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4572672

and from the left coast
San Francisco Bay Area Housing Crash Continues

Charlie Munger of Berkshire Hathaway: "There are some very extreme housing price bubbles going on."

Foreclosure listings nationwide went up 50% from February to March 2005.

PMI mortgage insurance now refuses to insure more than $350,000 of risk in speculative markets like San Jose/San Francisco.

A large majority of Bay Area houses are now bought with interest-only adjustible rate mortgages, exposing owners to bankruptcy.

New house sales plummet 9.2% nationally in January nationwide, while median prices fall 13%.

Speculators now account for 25% of all purchases nationally, and an additional 13% are vacation houses, making a market free-fall possible when they all sell.

Sydney, London, and Las Vegas are already well into their crashes. Now it's our turn.

Why?

# Interest rates going back up. When rates go from 5% to 7%, that's a 40% increase in the amount of interest a buyer has to pay. House prices must drop proportionately to compensate.

82% of Bay Area loans are now adjustable, not fixed. This means a big hit to the finances of many owners every time interest rates go up, and this will only get worse as more adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs) get adjusted upward.

From CBS.MarketWatch.com on 13 Jan 2005: "There is a double whammy inherent in these ARMs," said Frank Nothaft, chief economist for Freddie Mac. "At the end of fixed-rate period you face a hike in interest rates and you have to start paying principal. There is more default risk in these interest-only ARMs than in a fully amortizing product."

# Massive job loss. More than 300,000 jobs are gone from Bay Area since the dot-com bubble popped. This is the worst percentage job loss in the last 60 years. It's worse than Detroit car problems or Houston's oil bust. People without jobs do not buy houses and owners without jobs may lose the house they are in. Even the threat of losing a job inhibits house purchases. Santa Clara County posted its third straight year of job losses in 2004, so it's not over yet.

# Salary declines. From http://www.mccallstaffing.com/need/needsal.html we hear that "salaries have in fact returned to 1997 and 1998 levels." Local incomes are nowhere near what they need to be to sustain current house prices.

# Mortgage fraud. Incidents of mortgage fraud tripled in 2004 compared to 2003, according to the FBI. A typical scenario is where the seller, buyer, both agents, and the appraiser all collude to inflate the price of a house to get a huge loan. They split the excess amount of the loan between them. The buyer then hides his share of the excess and defaults on the loan.

# Stock option expensing. The Financial Accounting Standards Board issued final guidelines that will force companies to deduct billions of dollars of employee stock options from profits starting in mid-2005. This will reduce the amount of money that local technology employees will get, and that in turn will depress housing prices even more.

# Population loss. San Francisco continues to lose population at the fastest rate of any city in the US and most of those are professional jobs. The problem is not only the dot-com crash, but also the outsourcing technical jobs to India, which continues at a frantic pace as corporations realize they can pay an Indian only 20% of what they must pay a similarly qualified employee in the Bay Area. Fewer people in the Bay Area means less demand for housing.

# Stock market crash. The NASDAQ at about 2000 is still only 40% of the 5000 it was at the peak of the recent stock market bubble. The crash in the NASDAQ probably hit the Bay Area harder than anywhere else because of all the stock held by employees of tech companies. That money would have been spent on housing, but is now gone.

# Extreme use of leverage. Leverage means using debt to amplify gain. Most people forget that losses get amplified as well. If a buyer puts 10% down and the house goes down 10%, he has lost 100% of his money on paper. If he has to sell due to job loss, he's bankrupt in the real world. Even a small price decline will bankrupt buyers with small equity. Buyers foolish enough to buy with no money down are already bankrupt, but still unaware of the fact.

# Inflation warp. The rest of the economy shows little inflation, but housing inflation has been very high. This disconnect makes houses more expensive in terms of real work. There is no increasing salary to pay off the ever higher interest, so the only way to do it is more work. Many recent buyers will have to postpone retirement because they overpaid for their house.

# Surge in foreclosures. We are already reaping the consequences of bad lending. Foreclosures are at the highest rate they've been in 40 years, about 1,500 per quarter in Santa Clara county. There are only about 4,500 sales in the quarter, so on average, about one third of house sales are ending in foreclosure.

# Shortage of first-time buyers. According to the California Association of Realtors, the percentage of Bay Area buyers who could afford a median-price house in the region plunged from 20 percent in July 2003 to 14 percent in July 2004.

# Lightbulbs going on in many brains in the Bay Area: "Hey, I can just go to New Mexico or Oregon, buy a gorgeous house outright, and comfortably retire on the rest of the price difference. My neighbors just did it, so I'll have friends there too."

# Surplus of speculators. Nationally, 25% of houses bought in 2004 were pure speculation, not houses to live in. It is now possible to buy a house with 103% financing. The extra 3% is to cover closing costs, and the buyer needs no money down. All this is on the unwise assumption that housing will rise ever higher, covering interest payments through appreciation. Even the National Association of House Builders admits that "Investor-driven price appreciation looms over some housing markets."

# Trouble at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. They are now being forced to tighten up sloppy lending. This means they are not going to keep buying very low-quality loans from banks, and the total money available for buying houses is falling. Fannie Mae recently announced a $9 billion loss and its mortgage portfolio shrank at an annualized 16.8 percent rate in January 2005, on top of a 10.1 percent decline in December 2004.

# The best summary explanation, from Business Week: "Today's housing prices are predicated on an impossible combination: the strong growth in income and asset values of a strong economy, plus the ultra-low rates of a weak economy. Either the economy's long-term prospects will get worse or rates will rise. In either scenario, housing will weaken. Caveat emptor."

[crawford]

Are you sure you are in Cambridge?

More people speak Portuguese than French, does that make Lisbon more important than Delhi???

Globalize people, gloooobalize. Outside of Europe and the northeast of America, such opinions are downright embarassing.

You do of course know European Portuguese is virtually unintelligable to a Brazilian? I'm not sure what Delhi has to do with Portuguese or French (or with Chicago for that matter).

French is one the top 10 languages on the planet and its capital is Paris. The Arab world, though isn't primarily French-speaking, looks first to Paris. Places like Cario and Beirut have much closer ties to Paris than to London or New York. Most people in the Arab world probably haven't even heard of Chicago.

[crawford]

again, Massachusetts, the state, tiny that it is, lost population last year. St. Louis had some of the fastest growth in terms of jobs last year. The Midwest is drawing an increasing number of immigrants from both abroad and from the coasts themselves. Hindu temples are popping up in places like Omaha.

Your perceptions of the Midwest are obviously comtrolled by the same places you think are uber alles, the coasts.

Here's a prediction for 2010, the Coasts will be bleeding population as a housing crash in those regions send people inward. It's already happening in California.

Care to cite a reference to the "housing crash" or the "bleeding populatiion" in California?

You do realize Chicago's population is decreasing, right?

[brooklynprospect]

The Arab world, though isn't primarily French-speaking, looks first to Paris..

For what? Moral support against Israel? How about education? Investment? Oil expertise? America is the dominant political player in the middle east, and America and the UK the dominant foreign economic players.

Again, the French speaking world consists of France, Quebec, Haiti, 1/5 of Switzerland, less than half of Belgium, a few tiny tropical islands, and some of the poorest and least developed countries in Africa, which is itself the poorest and least deveoped part of the world. How is that important?

[Rockford]

Especially if they are staying at the Chicago Beach Hotel in Dubai

http://www.terraco.com/gfx/photos/references/uae/chicago.jpg

[Rockford]

Care to cite a reference to the "housing crash" or the "bleeding populatiion" in California?

You do realize Chicago's population is decreasing, right?

According to the Coastal folks at the Census, which has cionsistently underestimated Midwest populations for decades.

[Rockford]

from a local blogger
http://www.chicagoist.com/images/population.jpg
Census Announces Population Figures, Probably Wrong Again

Chicagoist is one of those people who actually pours over census data in its spare time. As a result, we've come to view Chicago area population estimates with skepicism, such as those 2004 numbers announced yesterday. The big story is that once again, Cook County lost about 20,000 people, while the Collar Counties gained about 65,000 people.

We have no doubt that the Collars are growing that fast. Take a trip out to Elgin's new sub-divisions, and you'll believe 70,000 more people have moved to Kane County in the past five years. But a quick look at the graph we made of Census data from the past fourteen years shows a curious bump in Cook County numbers. That bump is the (surprise!) correction the Census made when they received hard counts from Chicago in 2000. While DC number crunchers had been expecting a steady drop of Chicagoans since 1990, when they got real numbers, they found an additional 96,000 people living in the city they hadn't been looking for. What the heck?

Anyone living in Chicago can tell you, lots of people are moving into the city, in lots of places. Not only is there tons of new residential construction downtown, but throughout the city -- and density is increasing. Vacated neighborhoods have turned a corner. Like Taylor Street near Western Ave. Or Kenwood.

Chicagoist will continue to bear the brunt of the Census' errors, and then in 2011, we will enjoy seeing the new correction, and yet another bump on the trend line. Population data geeks unite!

[Rockford]

Must be the best and the brightest from the Ivies running the Census huh?

[brooklynprospect]

Must be the best and the brightest from the Ivies running the Census huh?

come on man. It's attitudes like that which make people on the coasts think of Chicago as provincial. The ivies, whether you like them or not (yes the students can be arrogant dicks), process a large chunk of this country's most talented people.

[Rockford]

And back at ya. It's attitudes like that make the East Coast seem provincial.

[Rockford]

Anyhow, I'm with ya on the France thing. :)

[brooklynprospect]

And back at ya. It's attitudes like that make the East Coast seem provincial.

no offense man, but no one in NY cares what people in the midwest think about us. And the definition of "provincial" is from or like the provinces. How can the business (NY) and political (DC) capitals of the most important country in the world be provincial?

[eklips]

"Again, the French speaking world consists of France, Quebec, Haiti, 1/5 of Switzerland, less than half of Belgium, a few tiny tropical islands, and some of the poorest and least developed countries in Africa, which is itself the poorest and least deveoped part of the world. How is that important?"

THE FRANCOPHONIE


The Francophone world is made up of people throughout the world who use French as a normal language of communication. It can also be defined as the sum total of territories where French is frequently used.

A country can be a member of the Francophone world if French is its first or second official language. It may also be a member if a significant proportion of its population is French-speaking. Today the Francophone world comprises fifty-two member countries and states. More than 500 million people live in these territories.

Living in a Francophone region does not of course mean that one necessarily speaks French. Nor does being a Francophone imply that one speaks French on a daily basis. At the present time, some 70 million people throughout the world use French as their mother tongue. For another 50 million, French is just a second language.

French enjoys the status of being a world language. This makes it a major language, but among the twelve languages most spoken around the world, it ranks only tenth. French is spoken on all five continents and taught in most countries throughout the world. It is also a standard option at large international gatherings.

The number of Francophones has been on the rise over the years, most notably in Africa, which contains the largest number of French-speaking countries. In this area of the world, many people still do not speak French fluently, even if it is the official language of their country. Since more and more people are going to school, the number of Francophones is expected to double by the year 2015.

Source:http://www.virtualmuseum.ca/Exhibitions/Instruments/Anglais/musees_en.html

Now you might say the source is unreliable, maybe it is, but I heard this many times over. Now Paris has a least, influence for 500 Million people, wether we are against it or not, not bad is it, and yes Paris has a important influence in the arab-speaking world, should I say that Yasser harafat, wether we agreed with him or not, frenquently went to Paris, his wife was french, and he died in a parisian suburb.

[brooklynprospect]

Anyhow, I'm with ya on the France thing. :)

Yeah, sorry for the below the belt comments. Chicago is actually a great city. I just think they need to work a little on the international fame department. If you pay attention to the European posters, most of them are saying stuff like "we don't know about anything related to Chicago here..."

[Third of a kind]

all of the major cities in the world had to start as something at one point.

many of the cities here in the us have a long way to arrive, although many are starting to create the foundations for elements. Some cities in the country have had those elements but they were never realized

in my opinion, when a city can offer jobs that attract people from other regions of the country, and internationally...extensive public transportation system (a combination of commuter rail, Heavy or LRT rail, and an extensive road system connecting the reigon)..cultural institutions....international commerce, regional commerce

grand ass boulevards, shit man it goes on and one but thats just my personal opinion...

I think one reason this has happened with our world class cities now is because they have had periods where they were treated as works of art (even in declining periods)

and now it just seems like that feeling of art has disappeared (sometimes :) )

[Justadude]

no offense man, but no one in NY cares what people in the midwest think about us.

Do you think anyone else in the country particularly cares about the opinion of a New Yorker?

How can the business (NY) and political (DC) capitals of the most important country in the world be provincial?

Funny you should say that, just the other day a native New Yorker mentioned to me that Brooklyn residents (I kid you not) were the most provincial people he'd ever met. Can't see out of their own back yard. I had to chuckle when I came across this thread.

[brooklynprospect]

Do you think anyone else in the country particularly cares about the opinion of a New Yorker?.

THey don't care about 1 NYer, or 1 Londoner, but taken as a whole, NYers exert far more influence with their opinions about art, literature, fashion, pop culture or just about anything else than do people from any other city in America. btw, your cheap insult is off the mark, since I'm actually not from brooklyn. Just use it as my screen name.

[rocky]

The american dream is new york, or even LA.. not chicago

[Rockford]

Let me bring up the quintessential New York show of the moment, the Apprentice. This was my first time watching it and apparently the 2 finalists are a woman from Iowa and (not sure, East Coast?) where the other girl is from. Well during the baord meeting, several NY execs were giving their opinions to the Donald, and one, in talking about the Iowa woman was babbling incoherent nonsense about how "the small town girl" didn't have what it takes to make it in the big city.

Do New Yorkers really believe their own propaganda? Here is a woman on national (global; actually) TV, confident ambitious etc, in the final 2, and some middle age dick pulls that crap? I'm sure a big part of America rolled their eyes at that one.

Not to mention the fact that millions of people have moved to New York from countless villages and shtetls around the world, the vast majority much smaller than Des Moines, and most of them "made it" there.

[brooklynprospect]

Not to mention the fact that millions of people have moved to New York from countless villages and shtetls around the world, the vast majority much smaller than Des Moines, and most of them "made it" there.

The whole point is that NY draws talent from all over the world. From Des Moines, India, whatever. That's what makes it great. If it was just native born NYers, this city wouldn't amount to anything.

That being said, the northeast does have by far the biggest concentration of talent (born here and elsewhere) in America. California would be second, after that, I don't know...

[Rockford]

what kind of talent. Agricultural expertise? The University of Chicago has been home to more Nobel Prize winners than any other university in the world. The midwest has greater manufacturing "talent" than the East Coast. They make planes in Kansas and tractors in Illinois.

God,there are so many snobs on this board. There are talented people everywhere.

[edsg25]

Dude you seem to have a massive inferiority complex! Chicago aint a world city and probably never will be!

To be a world class city it has to be the economic and everything else capital of an important country, i.e. New York, London, Paris, Tokyo. In terms of the USA, LA and Chicago could well be world cities if they were economic hubs in their own right, but they'll always play second fiddle to NY!

Secondary World cities i guess could include Sydney, Fankfurt, Hong Kong. Here, they are the showpiece city of their respective country, but aren't in the same league as the big 4!

fascinating, max, where did i mention "chicago" in my post? or even alude to it? is there something wrong with your ability to read, max?

[edsg25]

the save the few, miniscule, questionable molecules of santity I have left, would somebody (ANYBODY!) tell me: WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON ON THIS THREAD?

I know, technology being what it is, threads can and have ended up being mixed up on various boards. Is that what happened here? I'd have to assume that was the case because there were 45 replies and none seemed to deal with what I brought up in the first place, short of Jason questioning the second post.

ALL I WAS TRYING TO FIND OUT WAS: WHAT DO PEOPLE THINK ARE THE QUALITIES THAT SHOW A CITY HAS ARRIVED....WITHOUT THE NEED TO MENTION ANY CITY

I reread what I wrote: I never mentioned Chicago. Or any US city. I went out of the way the avoid total mention of US cities and suggested others might do the same. I only mentioned foregin cities (London and Paris) to show that great cities can be in close proximity.

Then, I read the second post and I found a poster who thought I was defending Chicago. Huh?

On subsequent threads, all I read was the last thing in the world that I was suggesting in the first place: a barrage of insults directed at innumerable US cities and just the kind of pissing match that was the exact opposite of the spirit of the post.

If wires got crossed, threads mixed, so be it, but I'll stick to what I said initially: how did my original intent, fairly well and logically presented (if I must say so myself) get preverted to such a degree.

******

PS...I live in one of the world's greatest cities, an urban gem that stands so well on its own that it doesn't need to be defended. Yet my love of Chicago has nothing to do with putting down other cities. From my end, I know Chicago's world class status is not hurt by fact that other US cities can and will achieve that status...which, I hope I got across when I first posted.

I never said one good thing about Chicago here and yet was met by a barrage of insults as to why Chicago is anything but world class.

[Dampyre]

Especially if they are staying at the Chicago Beach Hotel in Dubai

http://www.terraco.com/gfx/photos/references/uae/chicago.jpg


:lol:

[Dampyre]

come on man. It's attitudes like that which make people on the coasts think of Chicago as provincial. The ivies, whether you like them or not (yes the students can be arrogant dicks), process a large chunk of this country's most talented people.


Wait a minute, places like Los Angeles, San Francisco and especially Boston have some of the most provincial people on Earth.

[Dampyre]

The american dream is new york, or even LA.. not chicago

The American dream can be found in any American city. Stick to talking about cities in France, my friend. On second thought, don't. There's only 1 worth mentioning. :lol:

[samsonyuen]

It's a shame that such an intelligent thread can be tainted with such trolling and lack of respect. Let's get back on topic, shall we?

[Dampyre]

Dude you seem to have a massive inferiority complex! Chicago aint a world city and probably never will be!




You sound like a fool. Chicago, is indeed, a world city. Just becasue it isn't on the level of New York, Tokyo or London doesn't mean it isn't. And, no, Paris is not on that level either although it's fairly close.

[Justadude]

THey don't care about 1 NYer, or 1 Londoner, but taken as a whole, NYers exert far more influence with their opinions about art, literature, fashion, pop culture or just about anything else than do people from any other city in America.

You're speaking as if New Yorkers are anything close to united in their opinions. There are so many sub-divided communities in NYC that treating it like one huge community is just laughable.

The only thing that makes New York more influential is that the movers and shakers live there. Aside from that small and influential group, the opinion of New Yorkers, even taken by the million, means dick.

btw, your cheap insult is off the mark, since I'm actually not from brooklyn. Just use it as my screen name.

Doesn't really matter, it wasn't intended as a cheap insult. It was a true story expressing a truism about NYers: they are absolutely as provincial as the most remote mountain men. Regardless of whether you are from Brooklyn, the fact is that Brooklyn is the only place in the world according to its residents. That, my friend is provincial.

[maxpowers20]

This has turned into a bit of a Chicago vs. rest of world so lets wrap it up fellas. Chicago is good, but not as important or significant as NY, LA, London, Paris (yes Paris read the Francophone stuff and get over Iraq. France & allies are BIG!) It has got a little out of hand, edsg25 I can read, i just don't like people from mediocre places trying to gain acceptance, like alll these damn Chinese people saying China is big and great, believing their Governments own hype.

Qualities indicating that a city has made it? How about a couple of fortune-500 companies (NY, London), high GDP, education (someone get the figures!), big hub airport (yay o'hare) take your pick!

[eklips]

China has more than a billion and 200 hundred million resident, it's one of humanity's oldest civilisation so yes, China is indeed big