Favourite major cities

Excepting Dublin and Belfast, which I've lived in and around for my entire life, these are my favourite big cities.

1. London
2. San Francisco
3. Amsterdam
4. New York
5. Berlin
6. Prague
7. Manchester
8. Madrid

Others I've been to I haven't liked as much or haven't spent enough time to get to know them properly. And I'm confining it to fairly big cities only.

You?

No particular order:

Hong Kong
Stockholm
Amsterdam
Paris
Boston
New York
Philadelphia
Los Angeles
Guadalajara
St. Petersburg
Prague
Kyoto
Miami

I guess that's enough for now. There's quite a few that might make the list if I get a chance to see them.

Los Angeles.


That is all.

Denver - fun place, nice people, good food

Washington, DC - like the monuments and museums, don't like the Brutalist architecture although I suppose it is fitting for bureaucrats

Milwaukee - breweries! Lakefront is the best. Don't bother with MillerCoors; I think they have a serious mold problem and I've had tastier water.

Philadelphia - museums, historical sites

Brugge - boat tours!

Polokwane - first glimpse of civilization in a while. Actually I didn't like it that much, but had some really good pies there.

Seattle - don't have to drive too far to find wilderness

San Francisco
New York
DC
London
Florence
Venice (though it's a lot smaller than the others)

I really wanna try to make it to Singapore, Tokyo, Boston, and Dubai someday.

New York, Seoul, London are great IMO. I hate Los Angeles.

BTW:

"Rome, London, Paris, Munich everybody talk about.....pop music!"

Yeah, LA is probably one of the worst cities I've been to.

Paris will always be my first. I love the place. After that, New York, London, Chicago, Boston, Oslo, Vienna, Moscow and, although not exactly a city, Dubai. Yes, I know I live in London but it remains one of the greatest cities in the world, even if it's too fucking expensive.

I also loved Tehran for it's sheer differences and lack of Coca Cola culture. But no doubt I'll hear the same old tedious should about being a Muslim lover by mentioning it.

In terms of places I'm not that keen on, I'd have to say the major Spanish cities. I didn't care much for either Madrid or Barcelona. Oh, and Geneva was a graffiti covered shithole.

Looking at just Alpha- and above cities that I've been to, here'd my classification:

Great cities:
Tokyo - Just mindblowing. Food, service culture, energy level.
Dubai - Cosmopolitan, free-wheeling, energetic.
Singapore - Incredible quality of life.
Los Angeles - Perfect weather with just the right amount of shallowness.
Seoul - Personal bias, but love the food.
Miami - Great party city.
Zurich - Personal bias, beautiful lake, nightlife.
Istanbul -Incredibly vibrant.
Vienna - Very high quality of life, culture.
Bangkok - Energy level, organic-ness.

Okay cities:
Hong Kong (would probably be higher if I knew it better)
Paris
Milan
Toronto
Madrid
Frankfurt
Washington, D.C.
Munich
Boston

Shitholes:
London
New York City
Kuala Lumpur
San Francisco

Seoul.

Montevideo and Paris were also very nice.

Tokyo, by far--easy to get around city on train and there's so many districts that you'll never get bored. Plus, super safe, outside of the Roppongi nightclub scene.

Seattle is second...beautiful scenery, although I love my sunshine too much to make a permanent move there.

And in spite of living near SF my entire life, most of what I know about it is from friggin' Pier 39, which is the biggest tourist trap ever.

Oh, almost forgot about Sydney...pricey as all shit. Even that aside...meh. I can take it or leave it.

Seattle
Vancouver, BC
San Francisco
Los Angeles

That's it.

London
Sydney
Paris
Munich
Hong Kong
Edinburgh

I haven't even been to that many major cities, oddly. Just Boston, Chicago, D.C., New York, L.A. and Paris. Chicago is probably my favorite.

Chicago?

Da Bears! Da Bulls!

Chicago is great to visit.
Everything is within walking distance.

The Art Institute
The Planetarium
The Aquarium
The Museum of Science and Technology
The Park
The Fountain
Michigan Avenue

People cross the street against the light.
The panhandlers are polite.

No particular order:
Portland (yes, I'm biased)
Minneapolis/St Paul
New York
London
Paris
Bruxelles
Seattle
Vancouver
Toronto
San Francisco
Salt Lake
Budapest
Venezia
Amsterdam
Los Angeles
and what the hell, Albuquerque

Cities that look interesting just from the drive through:
Frankfurt am Main
München
Köln/Bonn
Houston
San Antonio
Phoenix
Tucson

Not when there's a gorram ball game going on. I paid $30 for parking that day when I went to see the Chicago aquarium and planetarium, more than I paid for admission to those places, because the stadium took up all the other parking around.

If only Chicago had some way to get around without a car. Something fast, reliable, elevated above it all....

If only....

. . . it would cost $30+3 hours for tourists to park and get around?

One day, unlimited pass: $10.

http://www.transitchicago.com/travel_information/fares/unlimitedridecards.aspx

^
Plus the cost of parking (and no guarantee they haven't jacked up the prices there, as they did everywhere else on game day), plus the time and effort spent to make sure to be in the right place at the right time on a day with far heavier than normal traffic loads . . . not much of an upside.

Park outside the core, walk to a station and take the train in. Less time circling the block looking for parking and $10 instead of thirty. Sounds like an upside to me.

Park & Rides are $5-8 (again, hoping that they aren't jacking up prices). Parking even further away means less time for museums and even greater chances for schedule issues or making a mistake, not to mention leaving car in a potentially unsafe area. Upside gets narrower and narrower.

Don't tell me you are a fatass like Chad and can't walk a block or two?

Oh well, enjoy paying $30... a fool and his money....

Green room. Plus it's not about being lazy; I walk/run all over the place and I'm quite a bit more lithe than you. Plus I didn't realize at the time I'd be shelling out so much when before I'd parked in the area for much less.

I definitely know to check if some sporting event is going to totally f^*# up traffic in a city now. But the experience certainly didn't improve my impression that spectator sports are an idiotic waste of time that keep people from doing something more productive with their lives, like science and discovery.

You probably should have gone to the game instead of the nerdy aquarium and planetarium. Or you could live somewhere cool enough to already have those things. If I want to go to either (or to the game), my car has nothing to do with my transportation.

Does Chicago have anything like this:
http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/epark/

I never drive downtown (it's 12 minutes to the south end of downtown, 19 to the north end from my house http://www.soundtransit.org/Schedules/Central-Link-light-rail ) but my wife occasionally will. I'll always check the nearest garage to where I am for availability in case she can't find on street parking.


Top favorites:
NYC
Boston
Seattle
Munich

I've only spent a day or two in Philly, DC and London, I'd need more time to judge them right.

While smaller cities I do love Portland and Heidelberg. Heidelberg is in terms of just the city (not family or friends) the second best place I've lived. I've got special places in my heart for Bilbao and Moenchengladbach, but I have a hard time separating the actual city from them being the first places I really experienced Europe or urban living.

Chicago and San Fransisco are the places in the US I most want to see but haven't. Paris, Berlin, Istanbul and Milan are my European ones.

Utter shitholes: Baghdad, Atlanta, Kabul and Houston.

Agree, park (or get a motel) on the edge of a city and take the train/subway into the high cost area. My family and I do that all the time, it saves time and money.