In the past 2 weeks I have spent a lot of time in these 3 downtown areas. I know Cleveland may seem like a stretch so I'll save that for last. I went to NYC over the weekend to go apartment and job hunting with my girlfriend since she is in musical theater, has an agent, is going in for an audition for Mamma Mia on Broadway, blah blah blah. I have to say that outside of Times Square, minus being immaculately clean, NYC felt so much like the Windy City. The architecture is a lot different and suprisingly it didn't feel as high as Chicago's. One can obviously tell that both cities began their development around the same time. I still have more of a love affair with Chicago than NYC, although I'm waiting for Jivecity to come on here and miraculously change my opinion (that is a joke by the way, I'm from Cleveland we all have dry senses of humor and homeless people living on our doorstep to go along with our failing economy and lack of being as cool as St. Louis). I sound so bitter but I'm actually being sarcastic I swear. Anyway, New York is a wonderful city, and it is the only other city besides Chicago where I could see myself setting up a permanent residence once I finally get this damn bachelor's degree. Now onto Cleveland. I have to say that Cleveland definitely has the potential, and had the potential but blew it somehow, to be on par with New York and Chicago. We're obviously smaller but we actually have some of the coolest stuff I've ever seen in a city of its size. We have the rock hall, the great lakes science center, a public library the size of Chicago's (I'm a nerd so I like libraries), key tower, the terminal tower, the warehouse district, University Circle, the best orchestra in the country (usually ranked right behind Vienna for tops in the world), an amazing art museum, the second largest theater district outside of New York, and a shit load of other cool stuff that nobody ever notices because the only recognition we ever get is for having the largest number of people who make under 25,000 dollars a year in one metro area. Go figure. I have to say though, that Cleveland has the potential to be a major player and a wonderfully active city. We just need to get people to go further north than Strongsville and Parma to look for a place to live. I know this is a rant but I truly feel that Cleveland is the only mid-sized city that has the potential to be in Chicago's league. Our history has always been one of experimentation and liberal attitudes, and in the 50's and 60's that really bit us in the ass. We had the second suburb in the country (in the modern sense of the word, meaning sprawl), and the first suburb ro ever have more than 100,000 citizens. And people wonder why our downtown suffered so much. I guess I would like to extend an invitation to anyone on the Chicago board to give the cleve another chance and I also would like to ask, what do you think we could have done differently? How did Chicago remain successful with a city that was set-up with the same foundations as Cleveland? Chi-town is my favorite city, and ultimately where I would like to end up, but I will always feel that Cleveland is that diamond in the rough that will never get its chance to reach its full potential. Thank you all for listening and have a wonderful day!

on a side note- NYC, Chicago, and Cleveland have one more thing in common that I just found, out I-80!! It is in all 3 metro but never go insde the city limits!!

Anyways, back on subject. I hope that Cleveland is doing better than before and gain population soon. SOme of my relatives live in Cleveland, I forgot what part, if I find out, I'll post it.

As for "what do you think we could have done differently?"
Make the lake more attractive... get rid of the nickname "mistake on the lake" and to me, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum shouldnt be by the lake, but more inner city. Clean the Cuyahoga River, I heard form many site, that the water turn black and then caught on fire.

Thanks for the compliments about Chicago. There are certainly some similarities and differences with New York. Like you, the only other place I could see myself setting up a permanent residence is New York. I love that place. You'll get varying opinions or preferences on the whole New York vs. Chicago idea depending on the subject matter. I like Chicago better for several reasons, but I love New York. If I were from New York, I would probably like it better than Chicago, but I would love Chicago.

The architecture didn't feel as high to you there because it isn't. Chicago's tallest buildings are bigger than New York's. The difference is that New York has more buildings that Chicago. It carries out the density from Lower Manhattan to Midtown and beyond whereas Chicago's tapers off. Also, where Chicago's highrise development is limited to the lakefront along LSD and tapers off as you move West, New York's does not. Manhattan is completely closed in by skyscrapers, and to an even greater degree when you include Jersey City. Its fucking awesome.

As far as Celveland goes, I think it gets some very good reviews on this forum. I wouldn't give up on it yet. In many ways, it is similar to St. Louis, which is entering a surge in building. Cleveland has just as much if not more potential than St. Louis does.

At this point, Cleveland will never be on par with New York or Chicago, but that really doesn't matter because it doesn't have to be. It is and will be a gem of the midwest for many years to come, and in my mind will always be the greatest city in Ohio.

Jive appears in 3....2....1....

one thing that facors negatively into the equation for cleveland is the state in which it resides. cleveland has to fight with columbus and cincy for attention even within its own state, whereas as NYC and chicago so utterly dominate the states that they are in that the residents adopt a "chicago" or "NYC" identity at the expense of an "illinois" or "new york state" identity.

Thanks for the compliments about Chicago. There are certainly some similarities and differences with New York. Like you, the only other place I could see myself setting up a permanent residence is New York. I love that place. You'll get varying opinions or preferences on the whole New York vs. Chicago idea depending on the subject matter. I like Chicago better for several reasons, but I love New York. If I were from New York, I would probably like it better than Chicago, but I would love Chicago.

The architecture didn't feel as high to you there because it isn't. Chicago's tallest buildings are bigger than New York's. The difference is that New York has more buildings that Chicago. It carries out the density from Lower Manhattan to Midtown and beyond whereas Chicago's tapers off. Also, where Chicago's highrise development is limited to the lakefront along LSD and tapers off as you move West, New York's does not. Manhattan is completely closed in by skyscrapers, and to an even greater degree when you include Jersey City. Its fucking awesome.


JB, I do respect your love of NYC and its density. And I can fully understand how density and other massive issues appeal to you with NYC more than they do in Chicago. However, I think that what is important than Chicago never being able to compete with New York in density (it won't) is Chicago's total desire not compete with New York in density. I get the feeling that the very lack of Manhattan type of density is selling point to Chicagoans and those from other places who love our city. Hell, I know it works for me.

There already a whole slew of Asian cities that probably exceed NYC density and more on the way. My sense is Chicago's more rational approach will make it faire far better than NYC in the future, as density-for-density sake will become more and more in question and the ills of excessive density become more and more apparent.

JB, I do respect your love of NYC and its density. And I can fully understand how density and other massive issues appeal to you with NYC more than they do in Chicago. However, I think that what is important than Chicago never being able to compete with New York in density (it won't) is Chicago's total desire not compete with New York in density. I get the feeling that the very lack of Manhattan type of density is selling point to Chicagoans and those from other places who love our city. Hell, I know it works for me.

There already a whole slew of Asian cities that probably exceed NYC density and more on the way. My sense is Chicago's more rational approach will make it faire far better than NYC in the future, as density-for-density sake will become more and more in question and the ills of excessive density become more and more apparent.

In full agreement. For the record, I do like Chicago better, especially the skyline and its relationship with the water. I never said the density of New York appealed to me more. And while were on the subject, Chicago is no slouch when it comes to density. It is very dense and very huge. I was merely pointing out some of the aspects of New York that I really like and make sure I give it its proper due, if for nothing else so I didn't end up getting skewered by Jive.

Thank you to some people for the compliments that had to do with Cleveland. I know that Cleveland will never be in the same league as Chicago, but I do feel that if Chicago were to ever claim a mini me, then Cleveland should be it! On a side note, I just read that the same guy who designed Crocker Park (really cool new urban project that combines retail with housing in an old-fashioned city set up, but usually located in a suburb) has just proposed a similar set up downtown! He wants to break ground in June and along with it would come some really great retail business with stores such as H&M, Saks, a Cheesecake Factory, and other things that our downtown so desperately needs. I want to write in an opinion article to let the developers know my fears, and tell them to look to Chicago and NYC so they can really incorporate all of the business in a healthy way that will let people navigate the rest of the city as well. Crocker Park and Legacy Villiage are such mucrochosms that they almost feel like really fancy outdoor malls. That would suck if it was downtown. Hopefully this will help rejuvinate the city even more, along with all of the new housing projects that are either proposed or under construction on the lakefront. I will just end my post by saying that Chicago is awesome, and if my city ever wants to reinvent itself, it should definitely take some cues from its older brother to the west.

one thing that facors negatively into the equation for cleveland is the state in which it resides. cleveland has to fight with columbus and cincy for attention even within its own state, whereas as NYC and chicago so utterly dominate the states that they are in that the residents adopt a "chicago" or "NYC" identity at the expense of an "illinois" or "new york state" identity.

Bingo. Ohio in general is the only state over 10 million without a "megacity" (aka 4 million and up). Cincinnati and Cleveland are at 2 million and combined with Dayton or Akron, around 3 million. That is as close as we get. In a sense, we are a smaller version of Texas (in terms of how cities are spread). Cincinnati was once the greatest city west of Philadelphia. Then Chicago bitchslapped us AND took our stock market. Oh well. Whoopy do. Then in the 1900's, Cleveland came along and boomed and was Ohio's largest city. Now both are sinking compared to the South/West and the only "hope" now is Columbus, in terms of growth. I truely hope all three Ohio cities "come back" and attempt to dominate some sort of field or whatever but I'm satisfied with the Three C's.

Cleavland is a great city and has much potential. But to be Chicago's mini-me it would have to start by reinventing it's relationship with it's lakefront. As far as having a mini-me, Chicago already has one... Toronto. I've been there many times and it's the one I feel most at home in. It's lakefront, cleanliness and other factors add to the sense of being in a slightly smaller Chicago. I even like their Hooter's better, with it's rooftop garden offering excellent views of the skyline at night. But if you go I must warn you about Chloe... not exactly the best waitress ever.

BTW The Chicago Symphony Orchestra headed by Daniel Barenboim is second to none and is doing a fine job of carrying on Sir George Solti legacy of excellence.

I think that the NE-ern tide that hit the Midwest at pretty much the same time to Chicago, Toronto, and Ohio. It gave the cities (and some smaller ones) denser and vibrant cores, and the foundations of public transit. I think Sharptent raises a good point about Chicago, NY [and Toronto] not having to compete in-state with any other cities, while Cleveland obviously had to. Chicago became a Midwest hub because of its transportation/railway links and a center for manufacturing and commerce, and Cleveland became the Philadelphia/Boston secondary city that it is today. I think each region eves out competiting cities and comes out with a dominant cities. I think this may or may not happen in the Southeast too, just because of the coreless sprawly character of its cities.

I've spent a lot of time in Chicago and I used to live in Cleveland. The two cities are very similar. They both are on lakes and the both have rivers that run through the middle of downtown. Both cities have a rivalry between citizens on opposite sides of the rivers. Both cities have very similar architecture including the numerous beautiful bridges that cross their rivers.

Clevelanders and Chicagoans are very similar too...They have a similar ethnic make up consisting of many ethnic Europeans, African Americans and fairly large Puerto Rican communities. Chicagoans and Clevelanders are big city people but have a hometown friendliness unlike their peers in NYC and Boston IMO.

Another great thing about these cities is their great neighborhoods. Both cities have an appreciation for art and vast cultural attractions.

Cleveland is much more hilly and has more opportunities to view the city from many angles and elevations.

Much of what made Chicago so great and left Cleveland behind was the railroad in the 1800s which made Chicago the gateway between America's east and west. Ever since Chicago has been a magnet for industry.

Cleveland definitely has the potential to be Chicago's mini me. The cities just feel the same. I grew up in Cleveland and have been to other cities all over the world but something about Chicago feels familar almost like home to me even though I have no family there. That has to be because the cities are so alike.

Chicago is Cleveland on steroids.

Cleveland would have been great if it hadn't lost so many jobs.

Things Cleveland should learn from Chicago....

You must see the waterfront as public space, Cleveland's biggest mistake was not making the lakefront a grand boulevand and public space like Chicago's. Cleveland has been planning to do this since my grandparents were kids there. Its also doesn't help to have an expressway between the city and the lakefront, I mean, who's great idea was that?

Cleveland needs growth more than anything. It's already a great city it just needs a burst of energy.

Cleveland needs to reinvent itself as a cool artsy place. The people are already cool and creative but the city still has that boring, midwestern factory city reputation. Cleveland needs a good public relations agent.

But growth can solve all of these problems. Cleveland just needs more jobs and everything else will fall into place.

Good luck Cleveland!

Cleveland also has direct competition from Pittsburgh which is only 130 miles away, even closer than Columbus by a bit.

I think people sometimes forget that Cleveland also served the role of the midway point between Chicago and New York, the link between the two. In was in this role that Cleveland had the tallest building in the nation (Terminal Tower) outside of NYC for almost an eternity.

One other thing I see that is special about Cleveland: out of all cities in the middle west, none is closer physically, emotionally, and historically to the northeast than is Cleveland. As part of CT's western reserve, Cleveland creates more of an east coast traditonal environment than any other city in our region. The midwestern city most similiar to Cleveland in that sense is Chicago. Chicago, for all its individuality and its own brand of midwestern drive, was is a product of an East Coast/Midwestern alliance, Chicago serving as the western link for Great Lakes shipping and commerce, paired with NYC in the east. Eastern interests, particularly NYC's, helped separate Chgo from other midwestern cities.

This topic has been much on my mind recently - I was born in Detroit & spent chunks of my childhood in the bedroom communities of NYC, but lived in Cleveland for years before relocating to Chicago in '04. I still reflexively compare Chicago to both Cleveland & NYC.

Cleveland & Chicago share a certain topography - the Great Lakes/river thing, as lauderdalegator points out (lake-effect snow, anyone?); they have experienced similar immigration patterns; they are both quite segregated (East/West, Cleve; North/South, Chicago); their CBDs are both encased by industrial zones. Both of their rivers have caught on fire (although Chicago's caught fire first!)

Cleveland has an extraordinary arts scene for a city of its size, the legacy of robber-baron endowments (though, honestly, Chicago's theater scene is more vibrant - Cleveland puts on mostly touring shows (CPT excepted)). You do need a car or bus pass in Cleveland - the Rapid is an excellent commuter rail system, but its inner-city stations were designed for population clusters that have since shifted - this is especially so on the East side. The city of Cleveland seems more focused on NYC than on Chicago.

Cleveland is a timber-frame city, having had no Great Fire to spur masonry construction. My last Cleveland 'hood of Tremont was a dynamic, fun place to live (and Civilization is a great coffee house), but I can't say that it really felt at all like Chicago (much wood, lower density). The Cleveland 'hood with the most "Chicago" feel to it is, IMHO, the W. 25th St./Market area.

The crucial difference between the two burgs, I posit, is that Cleveland has evolved primarily as an industrial producer, whereas Chicago has evolved primarily as an industrial processor. Transitioning into a service economy has come more naturally to Chicago than to Cleveland, because Chicago has always provided services in addition to supplying manufactured goods.

Somehow, Chicago manages to be pro-business and pro-labor simultaneously - the legacy of Carter Harrison? - the business/labor divide in Cleveland is huge, a real chasm.

What realy strikes me as different about the two cities (and this sounds kinda goofy, I know) is the quality of light. Cleveland gets serious lake effect cloud cover from Lake Erie, and the light there is soft & muted. On a clear day, Chicago's light is so very lucid, almost like San Francisco's. This was a real surprise to me. A blue Chicago sky can be so intense, I practically want to weep with joy (corny, but true).

^ Well said.

Bingo. Ohio in general is the only state over 10 million without a "megacity" (aka 4 million and up). Cincinnati and Cleveland are at 2 million and combined with Dayton or Akron, around 3 million. That is as close as we get. In a sense, we are a smaller version of Texas (in terms of how cities are spread). Cincinnati was once the greatest city west of Philadelphia. Then Chicago bitchslapped us AND took our stock market. Oh well. Whoopy do. Then in the 1900's, Cleveland came along and boomed and was Ohio's largest city. Now both are sinking compared to the South/West and the only "hope" now is Columbus, in terms of growth. I truely hope all three Ohio cities "come back" and attempt to dominate some sort of field or whatever but I'm satisfied with the Three C's.

ColDay, since the rise of Columbus has been a relatively new thing (there was a time it was more Madison-like, mainly the home of the state capital and state u, but not huge city), is there a tendency in Cincy and Cleveland, two very well established cities, not to take it seriously?

AREA in SQ mile POP Density
Columbus city, OH 210.3 711,470 3,383.1
Cincinnati city, OH 78.0 331,285 4,247.2
Cleveland city, OH 77.6 478,403 6,165.0

I dont think Colombus is the new hope, as they cheated(got more almost 3 times as much as the other Major C city in Ohio).

Wow, I'm flattered that I've been mentioned so many times, but you people have me all wrong. I can easily see how one would prefer Chicago over New York, I just don't think anyone in their right mind could ever say Chicago is the superior city by any measurable standard. I don't know why it makes you guys so angry with me when I say that Chicago and New York are just not even on the same playing field IMO. Anyone has the right to disagree with me.

As for Cleveland, it has always been one of my very favorite cities and it used to be one of the major players (as did STL and several other places that have lost luster). But it is an old economy city. It probably won't ever be "sexy" to live in Cleveland, but I don't know why you'd want it to be. It's a hometown. It's got what you need, it just isn't glitzy. One drawback of Cleveland that doesn't plague places like Saint Louis, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati is that Cleveland is pretty fucking ugly when it comes to residential neighborhoods. It was built to be practical, functional and utilitarian, but not beautiful. It's not really going to exude an "oh my god, I can't believe I can afford one of these beautiful homes!" to the same degree as the other cities I mentioned. That's not an attack (because I absolutely love Cleveland), but it is the truth. The other cities are built primarily of brick, and that makes a huge difference, whereas Cleveland is mostly frame. It's just not that pretty of a city, although it does have examples of great architecture. I'm always rooting for Cleveland, and I know it will continue to improve.

Monadnock, the way you put it was very well said. I have to agree that for the most part, a lot of Cleveland feels nothing like Chicago until you get downtown around Euclid and E. 9th, and also around W 25th. The fact that Cleveland has to compete with a lot more cities that are close by is an interesting point. I never stopped to think that cities like Chicago and New York are basically on their own when it comes to regional supremicy. Cleveland has to compete with Pittsburgh, Columbus, Cincinatti, Detroit, and to an extent Chicago. Compared to the cities we have to compete with (minus Chicago) I will always have a bias that says Cleveland is the superior based on the culture that exists within the city. But, again that's hometown bias so I could be totally wrong, but in my trips to the neighboring cities, none of them seemed as alive or as important as Cleveland. Until I actually visited Chicago, I knew nothing about the hugeness of it. I just thought it was like all of the other great lakes cities...run down, medium sized, and tortured by sprawl. I guess I didn't read enough when I was younder. :)

ColDay, since the rise of Columbus has been a relatively new thing (there was a time it was more Madison-like, mainly the home of the state capital and state u, but not huge city), is there a tendency in Cincy and Cleveland, two very well established cities, not to take it seriously?

Bingo. Cincinnati and Cleveland still view Columbus as second tier (ironically, Columbus will pass both of them in the not-to-distant future and then start laughing). But Columbus is still a relatively newcomer so we'll see what future it holds. It, like other multi-state capital cities (aka Austin and Sacramento) are still coming into their own.

Azn_chi_boi, no one is talking city populations. I'm talking metro numbers, in which Columbus is growing faster than Cincinnati and Cleveland. Again, Cincinnati was the 1800's and below. Cleveland was the 1900's. And now Columbus is 2000 or whatever until the next Ohio city steps up. Who will it be? Marietta? I'm hoping...

toledo.... lol

Youngstown, Jk..

possible Sandusky!!

B But Columbus is still a relatively newcomer so we'll see what future it holds. It, like other multi-state capital cities (aka Austin and Sacramento) are still coming into their own.


Good analogy betw Cols and Sacto and Austin, esp Austin (capital plus the "flagship" state university)

. I can easily see how one would prefer Chicago over New York, I just don't think anyone in their right mind could ever say Chicago is the superior city by any measurable standard.

And yet I do so think, Jive. And yet I am in my right mind, Jive.

You say great things about Chicago, but have real diffculty keeping your hands off the condeceding "but...." button, keeping coming back with "C'mon, guys, don't get me wrong; I love Chicago!"

We've been here so many times before, haven't we? A signficiant number of Chicagoans see our city being superior to New York. An even larger percentage of us believe we are on paar.

Is that the main stream opinion in the nation? no

If you ask most Americans which is a greater city, New York or Chicago, what would the vast majority of them say? Unquestionably New York.

Chicagoans, however, must be a breed apart from people in other cities. We don't see our city in the shaddow of New York. We think the place is totally complete and unbeatable in what it offers.

This sounds like a broken record, Jive, but there is a big difference between having an opinion and believing others are nuts if they don't share it. If a Philadelphian or Houstonian thought their city were greater than Chicago, I wouldn't agree with them, but I would hardly queston their sanity. And I'd see nothing faulty in their thought processes.

So I'll stick to my opinion: like Baby Bear with Golilocks, Chicago isn't too this or too that, it's just right. It is the best and greatest city in the country by far because it is large enough to have the full array of urban offerings without being so big to make it overpowering and inaccessible. I love living in a real city without the excesses of NY or LA. Chicago is as good as it gets.

Here's with I find fascianting and unique about Ohio:

While a whole group of former slave states (Florida, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, and broken-off-from-VA West Virginia) bordered the original 13 states, only one free state does: Ohio. So Ohio alone abutted the region of the northeastern US, the place that has generated so much of what they nation is about. I realize that western NY and western PA share a lot with the midwestern and that Buffalo and Pittsburgh have much in common with midwestern cities. Still, as a real state, Ohio retains the distinction I mentioned.

It makes for a great concept: the culture of the n.e. in its purest form being established west of the Appalacians. It conjurs up pictures of CT's western reserve, of village greens that are more likely to appear in Ohio than in any other part of our region.

And yet, for midwesterners, Ohio is still the real thing. Pure midwestern.

And yet I do so think, Jive. And yet I am in my right mind, Jive.
^This is why I think you people take everything I say the wrong way. I did not question your sanity in thinking that Chicago is better than New York. I said it does not compare by most measurable standards. Sure, you have the intangibles which can be subjective. I was speaking in terms of quantifiable comparisons. You guys need to give me a break-- saying Chicago isn't the supreme city of the United States isn't an insult, at least it shouldn't be.

Pittsburgh feels more eastern to me than Midwestern.

Hearing it a several thousand times is. Are you capable of talking about something else. Over and over and over. Find a new city, maybe the LA or Houston or something people need a wakeup call from you. Go badger them for several years as you have us, please.

Pittsburgh is certainly Eastern AND Midwestern, "to the T" in both perspectives. SE Ohio is Appalachian and Pittsburgh is the true King of Appalachia.

Hearing it a several thousand times is. Are you capable of talking about something else. Over and over and over. Find a new city, maybe the LA or Houston or something people need a wakeup call from you. Go badger them for several years as you have us, please.
Considering the fact that my name was mentioned four times before I even joined this particular discussion, I took it as an invitation to chime in. And I haven't said anything offensive to anyone about any place. Take it how you will.

Wow, I'm flattered that I've been mentioned so many times, but you people have me all wrong. I can easily see how one would prefer Chicago over New York, I just don't think anyone in their right mind could ever say Chicago is the superior city by any measurable standard. I don't know why it makes you guys so angry with me when I say that Chicago and New York are just not even on the same playing field IMO. Anyone has the right to disagree with me.



I think people are just tired of you repeating yourself. You believe it's you God-given duty to keep telling us over and over again about how great New York is. Not everyone has the incredible hard-on for New York that you do.

Not everyone has the incredible hard-on for New York that you do.

Particularly not the 1776-foot Freedom Tower-inspired one that Jive seems to have.

You guys are picking on Jive for no good reason. As if you don't have a hard on for a certain city? Chicago is in our blood- we love it!

You guys are picking on Jive for no good reason. As if you don't have a hard on for a certain city? Chicago is in our blood- we love it!

STLgasm, Jive is fine on 95% of the stuff he says and he clearly does like Chicago. I don't have a problem with him thinking NYC is greater than Chicago; my only problem is that is say it factually and he questions the sanity of anyone who disagrees with him on it.

I realize that he doesn't flame and he isn't trying to be offensive, but he just doesn't pickup on that the fact/opinion issue here is offensive to a lot of people.

Truth is, there are very few Chicagoans who want to be told they are wrong to have the opinion that Chicago is a greater city than NYC.

^You obviously don't read too well. I never said anyone is crazy for preferring Chicago over NYC. In fact I said just the opposite. You guys know the point I made, I don't think you're that dense. You just don't want to admit it.

I can easily see how one would prefer Chicago over New York, I just don't think anyone in their right mind could ever say Chicago is the superior city by any measurable standard.

sorry, i must have been confusing your comments with another Jivecity from STL
:)

^I guess you missed where I said measurable standard (a.k.a. quantitative comparison).

I think people are just tired of you repeating yourself. You believe it's you God-given duty to keep telling us over and over again about how great New York is. Not everyone has the incredible hard-on for New York that you do.

I think that goes FOR MOST PEOPLE DO NOT.
Actually, I have never heard some one so pro NYC than Jive. Even the people I know who lived in Manhattan or NYC and liked it, would always say "But I hated this or that" and mention some NYC flaw which would lead them to move somewhere else.

The way you hear about NYC on this forums is funny-no one mentions the fact that if it wasn't for immigrants, NYC doesn't gain 1 person for the 1990s. Not one. If it wasnt for immigrants, NYC loses population.
But on these forums, its "Everyone wants to be in NYC". BULLSHIT.
It dont give me that crap "its too expensive". Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island and the Bronx obviously have enough affordable housing for those millions of low income people.

^I guess you missed where I said measurable standard (a.k.a. quantitative comparison).

quantitative comparisons looks at cities in terms of how much they can acculumate. carried to extreme, it can create the absurdity of a city that is unbelievably great, but a place that nobody can enjoy.

ultimately, greatness still comes down to a matter of opinion.

however, if i were going to get into the insanity of quantification, I could make a compelling argument that Chicago exceeds New York in archtitecture, transportation, open space. Our restaurants are very much on paar with New York, innovative theatre in Chicago often exceeds New York. In education, NU and the U of C more than hold their own vs. Columbia and NYU. City planning and public projects (i.e. Navy Pier, Museum Campus, Millennium Park) are far more effective in Chicago than in New York today.

all of which doesn't prove Chicago is a greater city than New York, but it does make me believe it is.

Jive, you just don't get it:

IT'S NOT THE OPINION THAT GETS YOU IN TROUBLE; IT IS STATING OPINION AS FACT

And so much of the response you're getting here has little to do with you or me, with Chicago or New York, with right or wrong, with civility or rudeness. It has everything to do with human nature. Post things that seem negative about Chicago's status vis-a-vis NYC, you will automatically get the response that you've seen. So would anyone else. And the response would get the same type of response on the NY or LA boards. Human nature, Jive.

Now you can ignore the response. You can post as you wish. That's your perogative. But if you do, don't be surprised if you get bashed; it is inevitable. You now by posting along the lines in question, you lose any semblance of good will you developed and it will end up being, "there goes Jive again..."

Harry Truman got it right when he said "If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen". Silverlake, when he posted, could actually stand the heat; he didn't give a flying fuck what anyone thought. If you are sensitive to what others say, than you're no Silverlake and you might want to think twice before you press "Submit Reply".

What I said before, I still think: 95% of what you write is great, fine. And you are not a flamer, a troll, or anything like that. More than anything else, I think you are a person who loses sight of human nature 5% of the time and gets hurt when called on it.

I think that goes FOR MOST PEOPLE DO NOT.
Actually, I have never heard some one so pro NYC than Jive.
I don't believe that for a second. I think there are millions of people who agree that New York is the greatest city in America.


Even the people I know who lived in Manhattan or NYC and liked it, would always say "But I hated this or that" and mention some NYC flaw which would lead them to move somewhere else.
Gee, let's see-- I lived in New York for a while and then left New York. That would lead a reasonable person to believe that there were things about it that I didn't like. Are there things about Chicago that you guys don't like? I doubt it.


The way you hear about NYC on this forums is funny-no one mentions the fact that if it wasn't for immigrants, NYC doesn't gain 1 person for the 1990s. Not one. If it wasnt for immigrants, NYC loses population.
^You mean like Chicago?


But on these forums, its "Everyone wants to be in NYC". BULLSHIT. It dont give me that crap "its too expensive". Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island and the Bronx obviously have enough affordable housing for those millions of low income people.
True, but get your ducks in a row, pal. New York is generally a very expensive place to live relative to other places, no matter what your income. That's why public assistance programs in New York pay more to low-income residents. It's a rather rudimentary concept.


And yet again, you guys gang up on me because my opinion isn't the same as yours. You call me predictable?

NYC not gaining any migrants for a entire decade tells me it isnt popular as you think it is. I dont go around saying Chicago is king shit of the world like you do with NYC.

Millions of people think Chicago is the greatest city. Millions of people think Boston is, SF, or even DC. But those same people who think NYC is the greatest, dont go around saying "I love the grit of the South Bronx".
Thats why I said you are more pro NYC than I anyone I have heard or read.

Some people I know will just say "I like parts of Manhattan, but thats it."

NYC not gaining any migrants for a entire decade tells me it isnt popular as you think it is.
I never said NYC was popular, I said it was the greatest city in America, which millions and millions of people throughout the world agree with. Even still, are immigrants not people too? Are they inferior to migrants from other parts of this country?


I dont go around saying Chicago is king shit of the world like you do with NYC.
So let me get this straight-- you guys can say whatever you want, but I can't say whatever I want?


Millions of people think Chicago is the greatest city. Millions of people think Boston is, SF, or even DC. But those same people who think NYC is the greatest, dont go around saying "I love the grit of the South Bronx".
Thats why I said you are more pro NYC than I anyone I have heard or read. Some people I know will just say "I like parts of Manhattan, but thats it."
So I guess you're the authority on everything since the people you know don't care much for New York. They sound pretty lame to me, because Manhattan isn't really the best part of New York IMO. Brooklyn kicks ass. Maybe the people you associate with are ignorant of the outer boroughs. The rest of your final paragraph was incoherent and nonsensical.

Greatest city is opinion, not fact. I grew up in NOVA, and there were many people who thought DC was the best city in America. Yes, they went to NYC.

While alot of people do think NYC is the greatest city in America, they are alot who do NOT.

^And I never, ever, ever said anything contrary to that.

You know, Jive..... :sleepy:

It's so obvious that the Chicago camp loves to keep this going as much as Jive does...

Jive, I have nothing against immigrants. Its just on these forums, people take it as a knock against LA or California.

"How does LA grow?"
"LA only grows because of immigrants".
"What a joke. Lets stop immigration so LA/California can lose population".

What goes unsaid, is that NYC and New Jersey (the whole state) is in the same boat, more so than LA. So I will bring that up, because some people here in general tend to ignore that fact.

Jive, for some reason, you never addressed the issue I brought up: the idea that rational people would not think that Chicago is a greater city than New York. I would be curious about what you have to say. To be honest, that is my one big objection in what you say. I do believe you like Chicago very much. And I respect that you think New York is a greater city than Chicago. My only complaint is that you state it as fact rather than opinion and that my opinion, quite the opposite of yours, is one that is easily defensable...but one I have no desire to defend, since it is just opinion.

I think that Jive would readily agree that Chicago is a greater city in terms of livability. It's more affordable, slower paced, dense but not clausterphobic, culturally rich and full of character.
Aside from being much bigger and more imposing, it's hard to deny that New York has a colorful street culture and frenetic vibrancy that no American city even comes close to, and it has to be experienced to even understand it.

Ok, since I started this post I feel a need to chime in. Jive, you're an intelligent person by most accounts. You're not perfect and neither am I, nor was Mozart, Debussy, or Michaelangelo. The difference between those people and you, is that they admit to their faults and when they're wrong. No one here is calling you an uninformed person, nor are they insulting your intelligence. If they do make the arguments personal then they are dropping to a level below what you should worry about. The only reason people on this board use you as a whipping post to these types of replies is because whenever Chicago is compared to New York, you always chime in and say that people are diluted and somehow pedantic if they don't feel that, by every measurable standard, New York is superior to Chicago. A few analogies. A measurable standard that places New York ahead of Chicago is population. Ok, so Mexico City has more people than Chicago, the fact that the drinking water may or may not be poisonous doesn't matter because it's bigger so it is obviously a better city in every sense of the word, especially because it has a definitive number to prove it. New York has more "grit" than Chicago. Last night my girlfriend had more alcohol than she should have and i was up until 4 holding her hair while she puked. My problem with New York is that I was never awe-struck by it because of all of the hype behind it. It's like Gigli. Gigli was supposed to be this amazing blockbuster movie because Ben Affleck AND Jennifer Lopez were in it so the love they displayed on screen was the most realistic since the last scene in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure (you know where they meet the princesses and Rufus gives them new guitars). The city itself IMO doesn't live up to the hype surrounding it. Like I said in my original post, outside of Time's Square I felt like I was in Chicago only it wasn't as clean and I didn't feel as safe. Am I wrong for feeling that way? I feel you would tell me that I was wrong for feeling that way and that "it's all just part of the experience man". I love Chicago and it is my favorite city. Yes, I feel that Chicago is superior to New York, just how I feel Cleveland is superior to St. Louis (sorry man, but I'm aloud to feel that way). No, Chicago isn't New York, but Brahms isn't Beethoven so does that mean that because more people know who Beethoven is that he's ultimately the better composer? Nope, that's the beauty of SUBJECTIVITY. You should read more eastern philosophy and learn to realize that despite numbers, everything has its own relativity. In my universe Chicago is a superior city to New York because I like the setup, the architecture, the people, the planning, the parks, and the lake more than those respective things in New York. Chicago to me is New York minus all of the excess that I feel needed to be trimmed in the planning process. Chicago built out of necessity, New York built to keep up an image. In my opinion, in my opinion, in my opinion.

^I question how much time you spent in New York. Chicago and New York don't feel too much alike. I get the feeling that some of you think that because you live in Chicago you are somehow in more of a position to offer a realistic view, but you're not.

It seems clear that some people on this thread aren't comfortable with differing opinions.
You guys are really picking on Jive for no good reason. Jive's opinion isn't the be-all end-all, and either is yours.

^
Thats the way I felt.
NYC didn't live up to the hype from the media. I remember one summer day coming out of Grand Central station on Saturday afternoon, walking east on 42nd to the United Nations building. We saw like 5 people on the street, and it was very quiet. Then we walked down Lexington Ave in the Upper Eastside, and there were few people on the street.The movies shows Manhattan bustling around the clock, no matter where it is. That just isn't true at all.

C-Town, everything you said is perfectly fine and good. You are entitled to like Chicago more than New York. I like Chicago more than New York for certain reasons too. But I don't think they feel similar at all. They have certain fundamental urban qualities in common that a lot of cities have, but the feel, pace and atmosphere are totally different. If you think the two cities feel the same, then why would you prefer one over the other. You like Chicago more because it offers something different from New York. New York feels like a huge East Coast city, Chicago feels like a big Midwestern city. There are inherent differences in each.

edsg-- I hear you, and I agree that quantity doesn't mean that much when comparing cities and places. Houston is a hell of a lot bigger than a lot of cities and a lot less urban and less interesting at the same time. To me, New York offers an experience that cannot be found any place else, on top of being just a lot bigger. I can't describe it, it can't be found in statistics, I can't show you pictures of it. But it is there. Perhaps it doesn't speak to others here in the same way, but look at all the movies, books, stories, memoirs, documentaries, etc. set in New York City. There is a certain ambiance about it that supercedes other cities in the psyche of American culture. That doesn't mean that other cities don't have their own essence, influence and appeal as well, because they do. But New York stands out, and I know I'm not alone in my opinion.

btw, C-Town-- as I stated before, I love Cleveland, but I don't think it has shit on St. Louis. :)

To Jive, just to keep things in perspective: NY may dawrf Chicago in "big city feel", but you can probably say that Tokyo dwarfs NYC just the same way (I have never been to Tokyo but I am saying that based on everything I have read).

To the Chicago defenders: Stop talking about how much better the quality of life is. Your city had more murders than NYC last year with half the population. And Chicago has just as much, if not more, slums as NYC.

First of all, if you look at who writes movies or sitcoms, you see a pattern. Many were raised or lived in the NYC metro, so they write about their experiences about what they know. Makes sense-people living/raised in Seattle aren't going to set a movie or story in Queens and vice versa.
The Baltimore crime shows "Homicide, Corner, The Wire" are written by a Baltimore native with a retired Baltimore cop. John Grisham bases novels/movies in Memphis and the South. It doesn't matter if movies or shows are set in NYC..they are only set there because the WRITER (who usually is from NYC Metro) puts them there. The national audience isn't saying "Lets put more movies in Manhattan! Please!".

Jive, you keep saying NYC can't be found anywhere else? Do you mean energy and vibrant streetlife? Because places like Tokyo shit all over NYC when it comes to that. Other giant cities, with populations close to NYC can probably match the energy level too. But Tokyo is in a league of its own.

Thats the thing..you keep comparing NYC with Chicago's street life. It better have more people on the street and energy if it has 5 million more people living there. Thats why Im not that impressed...you expect to see that.

Thats like us comparing Chicago's energy to Baltimore or something. What NYC beats Chicago in, is expected because it is a larger city. But with Chicago, it is unexpected to see such a clean CBD, one of the biggest in the world. That is the first thing that I noticed off the bat being from the east coast-the downtown was actually CLEAN.

Jive, you keep saying NYC can't be found anywhere else? Do you mean energy and vibrant streetlife? Because places like Tokyo shit all over NYC when it comes to that. Other giant cities, with populations close to NYC can probably match the energy level too. But Tokyo is in a league of its own.
^You just love to keep bringing Tokyo up, because when you run out of ammo with Chicago (never had any to begin with), you move on to Tokyo. For the record, I don't doubt for a second that Tokyo shits on NYC. But we're not talking about Tokyo. The title of the thread is "New York, Chicago and Cleveland" isn't it? When we do a Tokyo vs. NYC thread, then you can cut & paste your post.


Thats the thing..you keep comparing NYC with Chicago's street life.
I do?


It better have more people on the street and energy if it has 5 million more people living there. Thats why Im not that impressed...you expect to see that.
Exactly, so why are you so defensive?


Thats like us comparing Chicago's energy to Baltimore or something.
So Baltimore is to Chicago as Chicago is to New York. Yeah, that's about right IMO.


What NYC beats Chicago in, is expected because it is a larger city. But with Chicago, it is unexpected to see such a clean CBD, one of the biggest in the world. That is the first thing that I noticed off the bat being from the east coast-the downtown was actually CLEAN.
^What? Chicago has a clean downtown for a big city? And this has what to do with what? Your points are disjointed and you are arguing with no one, and no one is arguing with you.

Well, i know my name is C-Town, but the C stands for Cleveland. I don't live in Chicago but I have spent equal time in Chicago and New York. Oh, and Jive...Cleveland kicks St. Louis's ASS! Actually my last statement is a hint of sarcasm because now I feel as if Jive and I have made friends based on our agreeing to disagree about our respective hometown biases. Cleveland is my third favorite city in the U.S....this is what I am :weirdo: . I'm still kind of disappointed though, I thought for sure someone would think the Bill and Ted's comment was cool. :pet: . Oh well.

Baltimore...hahha. That was the funniest thing I heard all day.

You are comparing a city with 5 million more people. Tokyo is brought in, because the populations are more silimar. If NYC can't compare with cities its size, then tough shit.

To Jive, just to keep things in perspective: NY may dawrf Chicago in "big city feel", but you can probably say that Tokyo dwarfs NYC just the same way (I have never been to Tokyo but I am saying that based on everything I have read).

To the Chicago defenders: Stop talking about how much better the quality of life is. Your city had more murders than NYC last year with half the population. And Chicago has just as much, if not more, slums as NYC.

Chicago didn't have more murders than New York last year. I also doubt that Chicago has anywhere near as many slums as New York simply because of the size difference.

I like you, C-Town.

Baltimore...hahha. That was the funniest thing I heard all day.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but you brought Baltimore into this not me. You're laughing at yourself.

Ok, since I started this post I feel a need to chime in. Jive, you're an intelligent person by most accounts. You're not perfect and neither am I, nor was Mozart, Debussy, or Michaelangelo. The difference between those people and you, is that they admit to their faults and when they're wrong. No one here is calling you an uninformed person, nor are they insulting your intelligence. If they do make the arguments personal then they are dropping to a level below what you should worry about. The only reason people on this board use you as a whipping post to these types of replies is because whenever Chicago is compared to New York, you always chime in and say that people are diluted and somehow pedantic if they don't feel that, by every measurable standard, New York is superior to Chicago. A few analogies. A measurable standard that places New York ahead of Chicago is population. Ok, so Mexico City has more people than Chicago, the fact that the drinking water may or may not be poisonous doesn't matter because it's bigger so it is obviously a better city in every sense of the word, especially because it has a definitive number to prove it. New York has more "grit" than Chicago. Last night my girlfriend had more alcohol than she should have and i was up until 4 holding her hair while she puked. My problem with New York is that I was never awe-struck by it because of all of the hype behind it. It's like Gigli. Gigli was supposed to be this amazing blockbuster movie because Ben Affleck AND Jennifer Lopez were in it so the love they displayed on screen was the most realistic since the last scene in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure (you know where they meet the princesses and Rufus gives them new guitars). The city itself IMO doesn't live up to the hype surrounding it. Like I said in my original post, outside of Time's Square I felt like I was in Chicago only it wasn't as clean and I didn't feel as safe. Am I wrong for feeling that way? I feel you would tell me that I was wrong for feeling that way and that "it's all just part of the experience man". I love Chicago and it is my favorite city. Yes, I feel that Chicago is superior to New York, just how I feel Cleveland is superior to St. Louis (sorry man, but I'm aloud to feel that way). No, Chicago isn't New York, but Brahms isn't Beethoven so does that mean that because more people know who Beethoven is that he's ultimately the better composer? Nope, that's the beauty of SUBJECTIVITY. You should read more eastern philosophy and learn to realize that despite numbers, everything has its own relativity. In my universe Chicago is a superior city to New York because I like the setup, the architecture, the people, the planning, the parks, and the lake more than those respective things in New York. Chicago to me is New York minus all of the excess that I feel needed to be trimmed in the planning process. Chicago built out of necessity, New York built to keep up an image. In my opinion, in my opinion, in my opinion.


Damn this is good!

C-Town, everything you said is perfectly fine and good. You are entitled to like Chicago more than New York. I like Chicago more than New York for certain reasons too. But I don't think they feel similar at all. They have certain fundamental urban qualities in common that a lot of cities have, but the feel, pace and atmosphere are totally different. If you think the two cities feel the same, then why would you prefer one over the other. You like Chicago more because it offers something different from New York. New York feels like a huge East Coast city, Chicago feels like a big Midwestern city. There are inherent differences in each.

edsg-- I hear you, and I agree that quantity doesn't mean that much when comparing cities and places. Houston is a hell of a lot bigger than a lot of cities and a lot less urban and less interesting at the same time. To me, New York offers an experience that cannot be found any place else, on top of being just a lot bigger. I can't describe it, it can't be found in statistics, I can't show you pictures of it. But it is there. Perhaps it doesn't speak to others here in the same way, but look at all the movies, books, stories, memoirs, documentaries, etc. set in New York City. There is a certain ambiance about it that supercedes other cities in the psyche of American culture. That doesn't mean that other cities don't have their own essence, influence and appeal as well, because they do. But New York stands out, and I know I'm not alone in my opinion.

btw, C-Town-- as I stated before, I love Cleveland, but I don't think it has shit on St. Louis. :)

Jive, you managed to get through that one rather nicely without once suggesting that we were talking about fact instead of opinion. I didn't find anything offensive here at all.

Meanwhile, as far as the NY aura, a lot of it is just that. Aura. You seem to think that New York created the dream without giving enough credit to the dream creating New York. So much of the movies and songs created the myth of New York as much as New York generated the topic for movie and song. NYC has done more than a fantastic job of selling itself. Hollywood had every bit as much in creating the New York mystique as Bwy has.

It doesn't matter if movies or shows are set in NYC..they are only set there because the WRITER (who usually is from NYC Metro) puts them there.
^This is the funniest fucking post in the whole thread. LA1, you are hopelessly clueless. You're either in 7th grade or you live in a bubble.

edsg, I think you are being extreme. New York City itself has had plenty to do with "creating the dream." Long before Hollywood and pop culture influenced the world, New York was still the preeminent city of the United States, where thousands of cultures and ideas meshed together to produce an exciting, diverse and storied atmosphere, where trends and styles and innovation were born and cultivated. That hasn't changed. There is a reason that New York still reigns supreme on the silver screen-- because there's no place like it.

Even if it is a result of marketing and self-promotion, its success in doing so speaks volumes about what kind of place it is.

No, Im laughing about your comment on Baltimore and Chicago. Funny shit.

Thats the thing..you keep comparing NYC with Chicago's street life. It better have more people on the street and energy if it has 5 million more people living there. Thats why Im not that impressed...you expect to see that. Thats like us comparing Chicago's energy to Baltimore or something.
You mean the comment you made.

22 million people in metro NYC
10 million people in metro Chicago
-----------------------------
= a difference of 12 million people


10 million people in metro Chicago
2.5 million people in metro Baltimore
---------------------------------
= a difference of 7.5 million people

What's so far-fetched about saying that Baltimore is to Chicago as Chicago is to New York? If anything, that's being generous to Chicago. Chicago's metro area is closer in size to Baltimore (esp. when you factor in DC) than it is to New York's. This is because LA1 wants to play the numbers game.

^This is the funniest fucking post in the whole thread. LA1, you are hopelessly clueless. You're either in 7th grade or you live in a bubble.

You live in bubble if you think that isnt true. Are you saying screenwriters ARE TOLD WHERE TO SET THEIR OWN STORY??

22 million people in metro NYC
10 million people in metro Chicago
-----------------------------
= a difference of 12 million people


10 million people in metro Chicago
2.5 million people in metro Baltimore
---------------------------------
= a difference of 7.5 million people

What's so far-fetched about saying that Baltimore is to Chicago as Chicago is to New York? If anything, that's being generous to Chicago. Chicago's metro area is closer in size to Baltimore (esp. when you factor in DC) than it is to New York's. This is because LA1 wants to play the numbers game.

And Baltimore can't compete with Chicago. So you proved my point.

^Hey genius, I'll let your immature comments speak for themselves. I will not respond to stupidity.

22 million people in metro NYC
10 million people in metro Chicago
-----------------------------
= a difference of 12 million people


10 million people in metro Chicago
2.5 million people in metro Baltimore
---------------------------------
= a difference of 7.5 million people

What's so far-fetched about saying that Baltimore is to Chicago as Chicago is to New York? If anything, that's being generous to Chicago. Chicago's metro area is closer in size to Baltimore (esp. when you factor in DC) than it is to New York's. This is because LA1 wants to play the numbers game.


Baltimore is 1/4 the size of Chicago. Chicago is roughly 1/2 the size of New York. In addition, Baltimore is nowhere near Chicago's league. Chicago is only a step below New York in the world pecking order. Jive, your ignorance is laughbale but what can one expect from someone who grew up in St Louis.

It doesn't matter if movies or shows are set in NYC..they are only set there because the WRITER (who usually is from NYC Metro) puts them there...You live in bubble if you think that isnt true. Are you saying screenwriters ARE TOLD WHERE TO SET THEIR OWN STORY??
lololololololololololololol. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. You probably don't live in a bubble. But I'd be surprised if you were a day older than 14.

Baltimore is 1/4 the size of Chicago. Chicago is roughly 1/2 the size of New York. In addition, Baltimore is nowhere near Chicago's league. Chicago is only a step below New York in the world pecking order. Jive, your ignorance is laughbale but what can one expect from someone who grew up in St Louis.
Ahh...so refreshing. Nothing like a cheap shot at St. Louis to bolster a point that really doesn't exist.

Ahh...so refreshing. Nothing like a cheap shot at St. Louis to bolster a point that really doesn't exist.

I just pointed out the flaws in your lame arguemnt, runt.

What is far fetched is that you are from St. Louis.

NYC is 2.7 times the size of Chicago and Chicago is 9 times the size of St. Louis.

You should debate with a city in the same league as your. Maybe Kansas City, lol.

^
You must be 5 if you think writers are told to set their stories in NYC.

What's the flaw? My numbers are every bit as valid as yours. I don't understand why you need to take jabs at St. Louis to make your arguments sound good. It just makes you sound weak.

What is far fetched is that you are from St. Louis.

NYC is 2.7 times the size of Chicago and Chicago is 9 times the size of St. Louis.
Who asked? 10 million is not "9 times" larger than 2.7 million, check your math.


You should debate with a city in the same league as your. Maybe Kansas City, lol.
^Look who's talking!

btw, I wasn't the person who brought St. Louis into this. You guys just love talking about ol' STL. I don't blame you.

Who asked? 10 million is not "9 times" larger than 2.7 million, check your math.



^.
City not suburban sprawl. But considering that St. Louis has lost 2/3 its population post WWII, the largest percent loss in western times not including war or natural disaster, I would put the density of St. Louis in the same league as semi compact sprawl.

Every time St. Louis is knocked down in threads like these (which initially have NOTHING to do with STL), I take it as a concession that you have indeed run out of reasonable, relevant arguments. It's a smokescreen you use to distract us from your hollow points.

Because you see, nobody has insulted or thrown rocks at Chicago. But you just can't play nice can you? Fine with me. It's kind of satisfying to know that what I say makes you so upset.

I love these type of threads, always fun to read.

Hey, did anyone know that Cairo has some 12 million people living in an area less than 200 square miles? Cairo shits on New York! :lol:

Seriously, personal attacks against Jive aren't going to get your point across. The numbers argument is a little faulty based on world and country position between the cities, but the numbers aren't going to lie. Chicago is 9 times bigger than Cleveland too but why bring up cities that aren't a part of the discussion? Although some of Jive's arguments are flawed, it seems as if he's done a more admirable job of keeping his head on and not content with just throwing out another zinger in order to make everyone's heart skip and somehow feel bad about themselves. I think the people on this board take Jive seriously for the same reason edsg25 is looked at as a Chicago forum guru. Their arguments are concise, they make sense, and they don't become personal. It's impossible to make your lawn greener by insulting your neighbors' mother, it just makes the neighbor resent you and your lawn even more brown because you were too busy making someone else feel bad and not tending to your front yard. People don't win dog shows by throwing mustard on the poodles, that just makes them look weak and desperate. Please, I meant for this thread to be a productive debate comparing and contrasting 3 cities, and I have more respect for Jive and edsg25 because they both get their points across without attacking the other and taking cheap shots. If you want a new debate that can also go on forever, how about this...did God make man, or did man make God? It's a fun debate but it loses its validity if your only response is to call the person you're debating with a fart face and then kicking them in the shins all while running away and reciting lines to Clerks over and over. My arguments are flawed because I'm not Socrates, and my opinion is just like anyone else's...always wrong in the eyes of someone else, but valid in their own way. It just doesn't make sense to make personal attacks in ones and zeros because what does that prove?

Dampre,so do some other cities not named Tokyo. :)

I will have to disagree C-Town. Jive is one of the first ones to start immature name calling and hardly ever keeps his cool in these debates.

Yeah and he doesn't shut up about Chicago year after year after year or at least since I joined SSC in 2003.

these city battles are hilarious. We need to give some of you M-16s and tell you that Bin Laden and his bitches said that Saint Louis and Chicago are ugly, midwestern dull, small time dumps that they call cities.

Aww qwerty, don't be bitter. At least you have LA1 on your side. ;)

Thank you, C-Town. I enjoy your posts as well.

edsg, I think you are being extreme. New York City itself has had plenty to do with "creating the dream." Long before Hollywood and pop culture influenced the world, New York was still the preeminent city of the United States, where thousands of cultures and ideas meshed together to produce an exciting, diverse and storied atmosphere, where trends and styles and innovation were born and cultivated. That hasn't changed. There is a reason that New York still reigns supreme on the silver screen-- because there's no place like it.

Even if it is a result of marketing and self-promotion, its success in doing so speaks volumes about what kind of place it is.

boy, did you give me more credit than i deserve. i didn't come up with this idea on my own; it's one that has been discussed many times in the media and other places. In fact, there was even a piece about it in the PBS sereis on NYC.

Jive, you do have this extremely strong feeling about New York and its status. I still don't get why you want to share it with Chicagoans when you know the type of reaction you get. It just seems so counterproductive. Your premise is that NYC is in a class by itself that no other city can match, not Chicago, not LA, not San Francisco. Since you feel that way, it would seem the best place to have such discussions, one totally appropriate, would be the NYC board, especially since your argument doesn't depend on Chicago (or any given city, seeing how you don't think any are in NYC's league or equal to it). I don't say this to discourage you from posting. It's just that you seem to be unusual among posters in regards to the way that you operate. You are not a troll or a flamer and if you were, you wouldn't give a shit what anyone thinks. Instead, you operate in a way that must be totally frustrating for you:

• you post stuff that you know will get a rise out of people

• you frequently get the response that you expect

• then you defend yourself and say we got you all wrong and seem hurt

You could, for your own peace of mine, make a decision to leave the NYC observations out of your posts on the Chgo board, knowing the ire you draw. That allows you to talk about Chicago, a place you like, on very safe ground. But somehow, you seem to always want to shoot yourself in the foot.

You guys are the ones with blinders on. You make it sound like Jive is looking for every opportunity to bring New York up in Chicago threads. Did you not read the title of the thread? Did you not notice all the people referring to Jive even before he started posting here? It's easy for you to single out Jive as being a shit disturber because he is like the one person who doesn't fuck Chicago in the ass like you guys do. You can talk shit, but it's obvious that you really like when Jive participates here. Otherwise these threads would die down after the first page or whenever you blow your loads all over your city, whichever comes first. Just keep in mind that they don't call it the "Second City" for nothing. You make it seem like Jive is the weird one for thinking New York is king, when it's really you guys with the bizarre fixation.

ps. I just got into Philly! Goodnight!

You guys are the ones with blinders on. You make it sound like Jive is looking for every opportunity to bring New York up in Chicago threads. Did you not read the title of the thread? Did you not notice all the people referring to Jive even before he started posting here? It's easy for you to single out Jive as being a shit disturber because he is like the one person who doesn't fuck Chicago in the ass like you guys do. You can talk shit, but it's obvious that you really like when Jive participates here. Otherwise these threads would die down after the first page or whenever you blow your loads all over your city, whichever comes first. Just keep in mind that they don't call it the "Second City" for nothing. You make it seem like Jive is the weird one for thinking New York is king, when it's really you guys with the bizarre fixation.

ps. I just got into Philly! Goodnight!

You don't get it, STL: it's not talking about NYC or Jive's opinions; it is the assumption that NYC's greatness exceeds Chicago's and that reasonable people would automatically see it. That's my concern here. Nothing else. It's how Jive expresses himself and the inability to distinguish fact from opinion and the ability to respect others opinions.

a thought about New York worship:

We live in a time of excess. And in such a time, New York is top stage. We are eating up our planet and altering the urban landscape at a rate unknown in human history. There are numerous fans of NYC who would like nothing better than to see Manhattan filled with 100 storey+ buildings from the Battery to Harlem...and beyond. To the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn. For some, an ideal New York would allow you to drive the full length of Broadway in Manhattan and never see sky unless you managed to look straight up.

Greatness seems to be equated with building up every inch of urban space to its maximum height. It is, of course, part of an American form of capitalism that requires growth to sustain itself, creating want in people so that they constantly want more.

Unfortunately such thinking has no man-made breaks. Only forces such as the availability of energy and creating a totally dysfunctional enviornment could put a stop to it. NY, more so than any US city, is about making a buck. Its grided landscape is viewed as a place where constant replacement is part of the game. Extrapolate the type of growth you see in New York today with what you will see happen in the next ten or twenty years and ask yourself: is this the type of city that will be functional? will it be a place you'd want to live?

So much of what we see in New York that we like has much more to do with the city as some sort of living organism as opposed to a vessel in which people can live, work, play, visit. It is almost ironically a place where the city and its list of superlatives is spectacularly great, but that does not translate into spectaularly great lives lived trying to endure it. That is, in the sense that there are those who will tell you NY's greatness includes that it is a 24/7 city when they never invision being up at 2:30-3:30 am to enjoy. Or those who will tell you that no other city has 150 Pakastani restaurants...yet never have a desire for Pakastani food themselves.

Look, Chicago is not Omaha or Cheyenne. It's big and crowded and negotiating it is not always an easy thing to do. Yet Chicago, unlike New York, unlike almost every 10,000,000+ peopled Asian poddunk, doesn't view itself as a place that needs to pack more and more into every available space.

Chicago, to me, in that sense, far exceeds New York in greatness and frankly pure, unadulterated class. In Chicago, if you want to build, you go to a process and get it right. Even Donald Trump had to run through hoops to build his building in a way that never would happen in New York. Talk about confidence: which city is most willing to say "Fuck off" to Donald Trump? I'll give you a clue: its the one on a lake.

Residential construction in our city proceeds in a way that never would be the case in Manhattan and in much of the close in areas of the Bronx, Queens, and Brooklyn: 3 and 4 storey buildings are still the norm in new construction. These buildings are located on tree lined streets. The feeling that eminates is first class big city without a need to exceed density to make itself feel better.

Sorry...I'm really getting long winded here, but let me close by saying IMHO Chicago is the ultimate great American city, bar none. Its population is big enough for greatness, small enough to respect the individual. It has not passed in that stage of post-cityness that NY and LA have, cities that are more than cities but regions, with component parts within their city limits almost functioning as totally spearate communities. We have no boroughs like New York, separated from Manhattan and each other by the width of the East River, by New York Harbor from SI, by Long Island sound as in the Bronx and Queens. We do not have almost separate villages within our cities, the types that dot much of the landscape in places like Queens and Staten Island. We don't have a major chain of mountains dividing us like LA does, where the city is to the south and the valley to the north (even though the valley is still the city and places like Beverly Hills, a separte community, is actually in the heart of the city and more a part of the city than Encino or Northridge or any number of valley communities). I won't even get into the absurdity of LA's narrow link with its harbor.

That's not Chicago. Chicago is one, from Rogers Park and Edison Park clear down to Lake Calumet. The address that more people have in the US than any other is Chicago, Illinois. We have no addresses like Brooklyn, NY or Forest Hills, NY, or North Hollywood, CA. If you live in Chicago, you live in Chicago, and you get a Chicago address. A city. A real city.

You guys are the ones with blinders on. You make it sound like Jive is looking for every opportunity to bring New York up in Chicago threads. Did you not read the title of the thread? Did you not notice all the people referring to Jive even before he started posting here? It's easy for you to single out Jive as being a shit disturber because he is like the one person who doesn't fuck Chicago in the ass like you guys do. You can talk shit, but it's obvious that you really like when Jive participates here. Otherwise these threads would die down after the first page or whenever you blow your loads all over your city, whichever comes first. Just keep in mind that they don't call it the "Second City" for nothing. You make it seem like Jive is the weird one for thinking New York is king, when it's really you guys with the bizarre fixation.

ps. I just got into Philly! Goodnight!

Doesn't fuck Chicago in the ass? No, he does that with NYC and the Northeast.

edsg25:

Based on your reasoning, you would seem to prefer New York. Check your stats before making sweeping generalizations.

You argue that Chicago is preferable because construction is dispersed throughout the city, while it is concentrated in New York. The opposite is true. Queens and Brooklyn are the centers of new construction, and even the Bronx builds more units than Manhattan.

In contrast, Chicago construction is centered along the lakefront from the South Loop to Lakeview, along with West Loop and Wicker Park growth. The bungalow belt neighborhoods that characterize half of Chicago are not yet receiving infill. Similarly, the depressed parts of the West and South sides have not yet rebounded population-wise.

2004 Housing Permits for New York

New York- 25,208
Bronx- 4,924
Brooklyn- 6,825
Manhattan- 4,555
Queens- 6,853
Staten Island- 2,051

That was a beautiful post, edsg. Your passion for Chicago is inspiring and totally awesome. Just some responses....

You don't get it, STL: it's not talking about NYC or Jive's opinions; it is the assumption that NYC's greatness exceeds Chicago's and that reasonable people would automatically see it. That's my concern here. Nothing else. It's how Jive expresses himself and the inability to distinguish fact from opinion and the ability to respect others opinions.
I fail to see the difference between your opinion and mine other than the fact that our allegiance is to two different cities in this particular discussion. If I were from Chicago, I would probably be on your side of the issue. It's hard to be objective when your hometown is in the mix. I respect your opinions to prefer Chicago. I do, however, disagree that most people wouldn't consider NYC to be the more prominent city of the two.


a thought about New York worship:

We live in a time of excess. And in such a time, New York is top stage.
I have a feeling that 250 years ago wouldn't have been considered "a time of excess," and yet, New York was still "top stage" back then, just as it is today.


We are eating up our planet and altering the urban landscape at a rate unknown in human history. There are numerous fans of NYC who would like nothing better than to see Manhattan filled with 100 storey+ buildings from the Battery to Harlem...and beyond. To the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn. For some, an ideal New York would allow you to drive the full length of Broadway in Manhattan and never see sky unless you managed to look straight up.
And there are probably even more people in NYC who don't give a flying fuck about skyscrapers or how many there are.


Greatness seems to be equated with building up every inch of urban space to its maximum height. It is, of course, part of an American form of capitalism that requires growth to sustain itself, creating want in people so that they constantly want more.
But you're neglecting the notion of demand, especially when it is necessary to accommodate the comings and goings of over 10 million people on an island that is only 22 square miles. If you can't build out, where do you go? Up.


Unfortunately such thinking has no man-made breaks. Only forces such as the availability of energy and creating a totally dysfunctional enviornment could put a stop to it. NY, more so than any US city, is about making a buck. Its grided landscape is viewed as a place where constant replacement is part of the game.
Come on now, how many cities have remained as preserved and intact as New York City. It oozes with history. Don't make it sound like it tears everything down. It's not true.


Extrapolate the type of growth you see in New York today with what you will see happen in the next ten or twenty years and ask yourself: is this the type of city that will be functional?
New York is one of the most functional cities in the world. It works. If it didn't, it would self-destruct. All evidence indicates that in fact the opposite is happening. It is growing, and property values are growing with it.



Will it be a place you'd want to live?
I don't think there has ever been a time when New York was more in demand than it is today.



So much of what we see in New York that we like has much more to do with the city as some sort of living organism as opposed to a vessel in which people can live, work, play, visit. It is almost ironically a place where the city and its list of superlatives is spectacularly great, but that does not translate into spectaularly great lives lived trying to endure it.
I guess you neglect to notice that more people choose to endure New York than any other city in the United States. Faulty logic there. What one considers "spectacularly great" is highly subjective. There are millions of people who wouldn't live anywhere else.


That is, in the sense that there are those who will tell you NY's greatness includes that it is a 24/7 city when they never invision being up at 2:30-3:30 am to enjoy. Or those who will tell you that no other city has 150 Pakastani restaurants...yet never have a desire for Pakastani food themselves.
Couldn't the same be said about any place?


Look, Chicago is not Omaha or Cheyenne. It's big and crowded and negotiating it is not always an easy thing to do. Yet Chicago, unlike New York, unlike almost every 10,000,000+ peopled Asian poddunk, doesn't view itself as a place that needs to pack more and more into every available space.
Because Chicago is geographically much more spacious, and the demand for high density is not as great as NY.


Chicago, to me, in that sense, far exceeds New York in greatness and frankly pure, unadulterated class. In Chicago, if you want to build, you go to a process and get it right.
Okeeee. I have absolutely no idea what the basis of this argument is, but if you say so, I won't question it. It's just odd that you have adequate knowledge about each city's "process" to draw such a conclusion. You lost me once again on the "class" thing, that's warped.


Even Donald Trump had to run through hoops to build his building in a way that never would happen in New York. Talk about confidence: which city is most willing to say "Fuck off" to Donald Trump? I'll give you a clue: its the one on a lake.
And the one on the river-- St. Louis told Donald Trump to fuck off in 1985 when he wanted to build a 30-story condo tower overlooking the Mississippi River, in place of two square blocks of historic warehouses. He never came back.


Residential construction in our city proceeds in a way that never would be the case in Manhattan and in much of the close in areas of the Bronx, Queens, and Brooklyn: 3 and 4 storey buildings are still the norm in new construction. These buildings are located on tree lined streets. The feeling that eminates is first class big city without a need to exceed density to make itself feel better.
I think Chicago's scale of development is awesome. But you are making it sound like New York is "trying" to build big just for ego satisfaction. Again, I'll remind you that Manhattan is only 22 square miles. There isn't much of a choice in many cases. New Yorkers have been used to living on top of one another for centuries. Isn't only natural for development patterns to maintain the standard that a city is used to? New York is densely populated because that's the way it developed, not because it needs to "make itself feel better." That just sounds dumb to me.


Sorry...I'm really getting long winded here, but let me close by saying IMHO Chicago is the ultimate great American city, bar none. Its population is big enough for greatness, small enough to respect the individual. It has not passed in that stage of post-cityness that NY and LA have, cities that are more than cities but regions, with component parts within their city limits almost functioning as totally spearate communities. We have no boroughs like New York, separated from Manhattan and each other by the width of the East River, by New York Harbor from SI, by Long Island sound as in the Bronx and Queens. We do not have almost separate villages within our cities, the types that dot much of the landscape in places like Queens and Staten Island. We don't have a major chain of mountains dividing us like LA does, where the city is to the south and the valley to the north (even though the valley is still the city and places like Beverly Hills, a separte community, is actually in the heart of the city and more a part of the city than Encino or Northridge or any number of valley communities). I won't even get into the absurdity of LA's narrow link with its harbor.
You're absolutely right. Chicago is different than New York, New York is different than LA, LA is different than Chicago. And in the end, it's all about personal preference.


That's not Chicago. Chicago is one, from Rogers Park and Edison Park clear down to Lake Calumet. The address that more people have in the US than any other is Chicago, Illinois. We have no addresses like Brooklyn, NY or Forest Hills, NY, or North Hollywood, CA. If you live in Chicago, you live in Chicago, and you get a Chicago address. A city. A real city.
Yes, you're right. New York is not a real city. :runaway:

edsg25:

Based on your reasoning, you would seem to prefer New York. Check your stats before making sweeping generalizations.

You argue that Chicago is preferable because construction is dispersed throughout the city, while it is concentrated in New York. The opposite is true. Queens and Brooklyn are the centers of new construction, and even the Bronx builds more units than Manhattan.

In contrast, Chicago construction is centered along the lakefront from the South Loop to Lakeview, along with West Loop and Wicker Park growth. The bungalow belt neighborhoods that characterize half of Chicago are not yet receiving infill. Similarly, the depressed parts of the West and South sides have not yet rebounded population-wise.

2004 Housing Permits for New York

New York- 25,208
Bronx- 4,924
Brooklyn- 6,825
Manhattan- 4,555
Queens- 6,853
Staten Island- 2,051

You would be suprised. There is some new construction in far off areas like Midway Village and Ohare. Bridgeport is going through a residential boom, SF developments going over a million. University Village is adding a few thousand units alone.The redevelopment of CHA projects will add thousands of new residential units.

More high crime hoods, such as West Town (around the United Center), Humboldt Park, North Lawndale are building new townhouses and 3 flats too.

"Chicago, to me, in that sense, far exceeds New York in greatness and frankly pure, unadulterated class. In Chicago, if you want to build, you go to a process and get it right."

Oh, come on. We live in the most corrupt city in the country. Let's not make paeans to the "process."

And Jesus. I don't think Jive has been all that obnoxious. Chicago is great, New York is great, 85% of Americans think that New York is greater. I and most of the people here are in that 15%.

Having just taken a tour of Bronzeville and the West Side, though, where we have destroyed acres of architectural beauty and historical community as important as Harlem and replaced them with Miesian institutions and public housing, I'm going to have to dispute anyone talking about Chicago's untouchable class.

"Chicago, to me, in that sense, far exceeds New York in greatness and frankly pure, unadulterated class. In Chicago, if you want to build, you go to a process and get it right."

Oh, come on. We live in the most corrupt city in the country. Let's not make paeans to the "process."

And Jesus. I don't think Jive has been all that obnoxious. Chicago is great, New York is great, 85% of Americans think that New York is greater. I and most of the people here are in that 15%.

Having just taken a tour of Bronzeville and the West Side, though, where we have destroyed acres of architectural beauty and historical community as important as Harlem and replaced them with Miesian institutions and public housing, I'm going to have to dispute anyone talking about Chicago's untouchable class.

Oshkeoto,

1. the post you referred to doesn't refer to Jive once. it wasn't about him.

2. I never question corruption in Chicago or in other cities; what I said was that Chicago has put more limits on how it builds than NY does. A lot of the destruction that went on in the city occurred at a time when Chicago and other cities were less vigilant about their environment

3. I never made a blanket condemnation of Jive. In fact, I've always said he's 95% on track. He knows I call him on one issue only: when he not only says that NY is greater than Chgo, in fact not opinion, and more importantly when he questions the sanity of those who disagree. Look back over my posts and you'll see that was my one and only objection. So, no to you and to STL, I don't think I've been off base on my observations.

^ Edsg, sorry, I wasn't really referring to you about bashing Jive. I had quoted you on something else and then didn't make sure to distinguish what I said.

On the other point, though, I think there are plenty of people who think that we still aren't very careful in how we build.

This reminds me of a discussion I had in a class when I was in Madison. We were reading a National Geographic article about Manhattan written in the 30s, while the Chrysler and Empire State buildings were going up, basically recording the birth of the first real skyscraper jungle in the world. My teacher brought up that the article seemed to treat the boom as something unstoppable, completely natural, and contrasted New York's growth to Madison's, which as most people here probably know has a height restriction to keep the capitol's place in the skyline.

I also remember that the article had a picture of Broadway or something, marveling at all the neon lights, and that it looked about as lit-up as Touhy Avenue in West Rogers Park.

I agree with Jive. NYC is better IMO. Most of those points that edsg said before is subjective, this address thing, like Chicago doesn't feel segregated in parts, if it were separated into boroughs, you'd probably be celebrating it's diversity, and if Chicago had projects like Dubai, I don't think you all would be talking about being careful, but how progressive your planning committees are to get projects up and building upwards. NYC has sustained itself for decades, and it's doing just fine, they know what to do to keep the good things in the city, NYC has class, do you really believe what you're saying? NYC has so many working class people that come to this country, yes to make a buck, but not out of selfishness but for opportunity, NYC still functions this way, and more then any other city in the US.

And that thing about people not staying up but calling it a 24/7 city, I really don't understand what is so much different in this regard to Chicago. All it seems you're doing is taking the good things about NYC and making it sound like a detriment to the city.

The fact there's so much passion and opinion about NYC IMO shows how important it really is. Chicago is great in it's own right and Chicagoans have a lot to be proud of, but it seems like that some, not all or even most, Chicagoans really do care that they get the publicity although they say they don't.

This reminds me of a discussion I had in a class when I was in Madison. We were reading a National Geographic article about Manhattan written in the 30s, while the Chrysler and Empire State buildings were going up, basically recording the birth of the first real skyscraper jungle in the world. My teacher brought up that the article seemed to treat the boom as something unstoppable, completely natural, and contrasted New York's growth to Madison's, which as most people here probably know has a height restriction to keep the capitol's place in the skyline.


and I'm sure the observation about unstoppable could have been made at so many moments in history. It's a normal reaction to change.

That said, I sure see an enormous amount of difference between 2005 and the 1930's (even without the Depression). It wasn't until after WWII that American capitalism turned to rampant consumerism and that consumerism has grown exponentially in the last 50+ years.

Today, some of those worries and concerns from the past have become real and identifiable problems that I don't think I'm going out on the limb in saying could very well determine our survival; I think any reasonable person could come to the same conclusion. We have a growing population that depends on an economy where excessive resources must be used to fuel our out-of-control consumerism. Waste and planned obselescene are virtues. We use far more of the earth's resources than any nation on earth; its usage drives all aspects of nation, including its foreign policy (ask yourself: would we be in Iraq today if it were not rich in oil?). Meanwhile, we are quite literally raping this planet, other societies are rising and developing and will be getting bigger and bigger parts of an incredibly shrinking pie, and our very consumerism has taken the edge of us as a nation; we are far more driven to gain consumer goods than to get the education and pursue the very technical careers that will be more and more a part of our future. As our nation grows, we sprawl around all our metropolitan areas and we create and feed a monster that future generations will have to deal with.

Our reaction to all these problems is: it can't happen here; how many people out there are unaware of how energy costs, for example, will impact out lives?

Depression and rising dictatorships and impending war in Europe and the Pacific in the 1930's may actually seem quite simple compared to what we may have to deal with due to our excesses.

I agree with Jive. NYC is better IMO. Most of those points that edsg said before is subjective, this address thing, like Chicago doesn't feel

Nova, truthfully, it's all subjective. Even NYC. But you guys are right. It is time to get off my high horse on this one. Truthfully I believe that determining greatness is an individual choice/preference and that I can be equally rational thinking either New York or Chicago is greater. You and Jive believe that a pecking order can be determined and that cities can be plugged into slots on it with no question of debate. Clearly we each have our own opinion.

The real loser if New York is the unequivacable #1? New York. If a city that a mere 100 years ago didn't appear on the list of the world's greatest cities can today be #1 without question, I feel sorry for our friends in Gotham in the next 100 years, when change will happen even more quickly and other cities that we may not even know about today could be the next New York in 2105.

The real loser if New York is the unequivacable #1? New York. If a city that a mere 100 years ago didn't appear on the list of the world's greatest cities can today be #1 without question, I feel sorry for our friends in Gotham in the next 100 years, when change will happen even more quickly and other cities that we may not even know about today could be the next New York in 2105.[/QUOTE]

Edsg, I, and many other people, view New York the way you view Chicago. NYC is indisputably great, regardless of how it stacks up with anybody else. I know that Tokyo, Hong Kong, and probably a handful of other places exceed NYC for "big city" feel, but, so what? Outside of this message board, I don't think anybody from NYC, Chicago, or anywhere else, for that matter, spends much time worrying about how there city compares to other cities.

About the "New York is the greatest" idea, most people who say that are politicians and media types who don't know very much about the world beyond our borders. The world does not start at the Atlantic and end at the Pacific. Do you honestly think that your typical NYC booster knows about Tokyo's 35 million people or Hong Kong's level of density or London's volume of currency trading?

The real loser if New York is the unequivacable #1? New York. If a city that a mere 100 years ago didn't appear on the list of the world's greatest cities can today be #1 without question, I feel sorry for our friends in Gotham in the next 100 years, when change will happen even more quickly and other cities that we may not even know about today could be the next New York in 2105.

Edsg, I, and many other people, view New York the way you view Chicago. NYC is indisputably great, regardless of how it stacks up with anybody else. I know that Tokyo, Hong Kong, and probably a handful of other places exceed NYC for "big city" feel, but, so what? Outside of this message board, I don't think anybody from NYC, Chicago, or anywhere else, for that matter, spends much time worrying about how there city compares to other cities.

About the "New York is the greatest" idea, most people who say that are politicians and media types who don't know very much about the world beyond our borders. The world does not start at the Atlantic and end at the Pacific. Do you honestly think that your typical NYC booster knows about Tokyo's 35 million people or Hong Kong's level of density or London's volume of currency trading?[/QUOTE]

I agree. And I certainly think New York is great by any measure.

Well, I've read a bit of St.Louis bashing in this thread, so I'm going to pick it up some.
St. Louis has beautiful, urban neighborhoods. I have no idea where some people get the idea that St.Louis is ugly and depressing; I love to visit the wonderful ethnic area (particularly the Italian one, excellent restaurants), and I think that it's pure urban feeling makes it the midwest's second greatest city. Plus, it's the city that inspired my love of skyscrapers and an appreciation for the urban lifestyle over a suburban one, "lifting the fog" of my imperceptions and showing me just how evil suburbs actually are and how wonderful and unappreciated cities are.
Just some thoughts on St.Louis.

As far as New York and Chicago, Chicago smells a lot less like urine than NYC.

A cool, sweet breeze off the lake on a warm summer day; walking down the lakefront and gazing, mesmerized, at the towers and magnificent edifices of the city gleaming in the glow of an afternoon sun; listening to the sounds of traffic on Lake Shore Drive; the calls of the seagulls gliding overhead; the sounds of the happy people as they make their way down the path; all of it just says: "Chicago".

That says Chicago if you're a Chicagoan, for many, from Chicago and really the whole midwest, Chicago is their pride and joy, but for the east, it's the same thing with NYC, Central Park on a summer day can be just as charming, and so can many other parts of the city, it's all preference at this point.

Well, I've read a bit of St.Louis bashing in this thread, so I'm going to pick it up some.
St. Louis has beautiful, urban neighborhoods. I have no idea where some people get the idea that St.Louis is ugly and depressing; I love to visit the wonderful ethnic area (particularly the Italian one, excellent restaurants), and I think that it's pure urban feeling makes it the midwest's second greatest city. Plus, it's the city that inspired my love of skyscrapers and an appreciation for the urban lifestyle over a suburban one, "lifting the fog" of my imperceptions and showing me just how evil suburbs actually are and how wonderful and unappreciated cities are.
Just some thoughts on St.Louis.

As far as New York and Chicago, Chicago smells a lot less like urine than NYC.

A cool, sweet breeze off the lake on a warm summer day; walking down the lakefront and gazing, mesmerized, at the towers and magnificent edifices of the city gleaming in the glow of an afternoon sun; listening to the sounds of traffic on Lake Shore Drive; the calls of the seagulls gliding overhead; the sounds of the happy people as they make their way down the path; all of it just says: "Chicago".

I think it is very hard to be in St. Louis and not pick up on its unique urban beat. There is nothing cookie cutter about St. Louis. I doubt there is any city that can pick up elements of north, south, east, and west as well as St. Louis...and still manage to be a midwestern city. I would also say that there is no non-coastal city that can offer the historic feel of St. Louis. For all the years that it was down, there was always something there, something special. There is no way that this won't continue to be built on as the city really turns itself around. Personally I think it's hard to like what cities are about and not to like St. Louis.

You're a class act, edsg. I mean it. You have always maintained a high level of respect, even if we disagree about certain things. To be honest, you make me look like a big asshole. One thing is for sure though-- I truly, from the bottom of my heart, believe that Chicago is an amazing world-class city that continues to prove itself. If there's ever any doubt, refer to this thread:

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=160344

It will always, always be the Second City. It has earned it. I know a lot of you question my motives in threads like this, but let there be no mistake-- I have nothing but the utmost respect for Chicago and the city it has become.

You're a class act, edsg. I mean it. You have always maintained a high level of respect, even if we disagree about certain things. To be honest, you make me look like a big asshole. One thing is for sure though-- I truly, from the bottom of my heart, believe that Chicago is an amazing world-class city that continues to prove itself. If there's ever any doubt, refer to this thread:

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=160344

It will always, always be the Second City. It has earned it. I know a lot of you question my motives in threads like this, but let there be no mistake-- I have nothing but the utmost respect for Chicago and the city it has become.

thanks, Jive; truthfully I probably did go overboard on the fact/opinion issue. That one is a real bug-a-boo to me and I react to it. As you know, I hate the whole hierarchy of cities/pecking order thing. And as much as I think NYC is a great place (it is), I find the god-like NYC worship on the board something I dislike. I do have to remember those are my issues, not others.

^
Thats the way I felt.
NYC didn't live up to the hype from the media. I remember one summer day coming out of Grand Central station on Saturday afternoon, walking east on 42nd to the United Nations building. We saw like 5 people on the street, and it was very quiet. Then we walked down Lexington Ave in the Upper Eastside, and there were few people on the street.The movies shows Manhattan bustling around the clock, no matter where it is. That just isn't true at all.

You only saw 5 people because it was a SATURDAY AFTERNOON. Manhattan is a completely different place on the weekends. Go back to the same place around rush hour any work day and you'll see what I mean.

Edsg25, you argue that greatness is totally intangable and that there is no way of comparing one city with the next in terms of greatness but I disagree. For instance, Chicago is greater than Milwaukee. How could you not deny this? Chicago is hands down the most dominant city in the mid-west. Im not denying someone the right to prefer Milwaukee im simply saying that its obvious that Chicago is greater than a city like Milwuakee. (Im not trying to say that comparing Milwuakee to Chicago is like comparing Chicago to NYC im just trying to prove a point here)

You can say that im biased because I live in a suburb of NYC but I think that Jive is right in saying that NYC is a above Chicago in terms of greatness.

You cant deny NYC's place in the world as a global city. It is so large and important culturally and economically to not only the U.S. but the rest of the world. This has been said before but basically proves my point better than anything else: If you polled the rest of the country and ask them who they thought the most important city in the world is, who do you think would win?

One other thing I see that is special about Cleveland: out of all cities in the middle west, none is closer physically, emotionally, and historically to the northeast than is Cleveland.

I have to agree. Of all the Midwestern/Great Lakes cities I've been to, Cleveland felt the most northeastern of them all. The state of Ohio in general feels that way, probably because it has a longer history in dealing with the northeast than any other part of the country.

YEdsg25, you argue that greatness is totally intangable and that there is no way of comparing one city with the next in terms of greatness but I disagree. For instance, Chicago is greater than Milwaukee. How could you not deny this? Chicago is hands down the most dominant city in the mid-west. Im not denying someone the right to prefer Milwaukee im simply saying that its obvious that Chicago is greater than a city like Milwuakee. (Im not trying to say that comparing Milwuakee to Chicago is like comparing Chicago to NYC im just trying to prove a point here)

You can say that im biased because I live in a suburb of NYC but I think that Jive is right in saying that NYC is a above Chicago in terms of greatness.

You cant deny NYC's place in the world as a global city. It is so large and important culturally and economically to not only the U.S. but the rest of the world. This has been said before but basically proves my point better than anything else: If you polled the rest of the country and ask them who they thought the most important city in the world is, who do you think would win?

Truthfully, Etherea, I will tell you this: there are far more people who think that New York is greater than Chicago than the reverse. I'm not one of them. On nothing more than my opinion, I have to be honest here: to me, Chicago literally blows every other city out of the water....and a lot of those cities like NYC, SF, Bos, DC, etc. are places I like immensely. But for pure urban joy, nothing can match Chicago for me.

Let me say that none of those feelings would change one iota based on the percentage of people out there who agreed or disagreed with me.

I'd also have to tell you that there are many, many Chicagoans who think like I do....who are also totally unaffected about how others compare Chicago to New York or other places.

Etherea, the poll you were suggesting is ineresting because it deals with ow outsiders see our cities. Personally, I'm more interested in the polls that ask people how they feel about their own city. I know in such a poll, Chicagoans responses about our town is right at the top of the list.

In my book, no place can compare with my incomparible city of Chicago.

Chicago has what NYC or SF never will. A open body of water next to downtown. Sorry, but the those 2 rivers next to Manhattan are nothing compared to Lake Michigan. The Bay is better than those 2 rivers, but its no Lake Michigan.

Edg25, you are not alone. I have seen alot of travel polls, and Chicago gives NYC a run for its money with many categories. Alot of people don't want to accept that on these forums, but its the truth.

I found a link to a wikipedia page that ranks world cities in the Toronto forum:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_city


Both Chicago and NYC are ranked high (alpha catagory).

Chicago has what NYC or SF never will. A open body of water next to downtown. Sorry, but the those 2 rivers next to Manhattan are nothing compared to Lake Michigan. The Bay is better than those 2 rivers, but its no Lake Michigan.

Edg25, you are not alone. I have seen alot of travel polls, and Chicago gives NYC a run for its money with many categories. Alot of people don't want to accept that on these forums, but its the truth.

I will also add that NY and SF have nothing comparable to Grant and Lincoln Parks, as a result of how oriented toward the water Chicago is. Central and Golden Gate are incredible urban parks, but Chicago has a pretty unique set up with its parks being sandwiched by a wall of skyscrapers on one side and water on the other.

In the past 2 weeks I have spent a lot of time in these 3 downtown areas. I know Cleveland may seem like a stretch so I'll save that for last. I went to NYC over the weekend to go apartment and job hunting with my girlfriend since she is in ..................blah blah.......................................blah................blah blah................................................................blah........................blah.......................................................................................................................... Thank you all for listening and have a wonderful day!


ermm ? :wtf: