Largest city?

[spotila]

Many of you would've seen my urban area maps in other threads, and obviously I spend many hours creating them. That being the case, I (at risk of sounding a little arrogant), have a very good grasp on the size of urban areas/urban spread and where their boundaries are best drawn.

While my maps of these places are not 100% complete, I can say with a good conscience that the metropolitan area of New York is the largest single urban entity there is currently. This followed closely by the likes of Greater Los Angeles, Chicago and of course Tokyo.

This doesn't take into account megalopoli which have been mentioned already in this thread, or continuous polycentric urban masses. Examples are of course the Rhine-Rhur metropolis, Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta or combining single entities like New York, Boston and Philadelphia, which for the sake of argument we probably shouldn't do in this thread.

also - Blackpool mentioned a few posts ago that in my thread Atlanta seemed the biggest. While I do use it a lot as a comparison and it's likely the least dense major city there is, it still doesn't quite edge out the big boys

Cheers

Spot

[Blackpool88]

Originally Posted by spotila

Many of you would've seen my urban area maps in other threads, and obviously I spend many hours creating them. That being the case, I (at risk of sounding a little arrogant), have a very good grasp on the size of urban areas/urban spread and where their boundaries are best drawn.

While my maps of these places are not 100% complete, I can say with a good conscience that the metropolitan area of New York is the largest single urban entity there is currently. This followed closely by the likes of Greater Los Angeles, Chicago and of course Tokyo.

This doesn't take into account megalopoli which have been mentioned already in this thread, or continuous polycentric urban masses. Examples are of course the Rhine-Rhur metropolis, Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta or combining single entities like New York, Boston and Philadelphia, which for the sake of argument we probably shouldn't do in this thread.

also - Blackpool mentioned a few posts ago that in my thread Atlanta seemed the biggest. While I do use it a lot as a comparison and it's likely the least dense major city there is, it still doesn't quite edge out the big boys

Cheers

Spot

Indeed, I think the reason Atlanta got so much attention was because it completely dwarfed cities that people thought were very large myself included (London, Paris etc) with a relatively low population.

[Metro007]

That's true. But the question still makes sense: what is the density-limit we stil can consider being an urban area? For me it's a joke that Atlanta should have almost the size of LA. Once again i am talking about what the perception is...if we talk about very low density urban areas, isn't the Blue Banana the biggest in the world? But that would of course be a very large interpretation of what can be called urban;-)

[spotila]

Mmmm indeed. Perhaps lets keep the limits to mono-centric (single major city core) areas for this thread to avoid too much mud slinging (with obvious exceptions like Dallas-FW and the Bay Area). Hkskyline is dead right, these types of threads fall apart if we all start disagreeing on what constitutes city boundaries, or what density defines a city. But there seems a general consensus that NY, LA and Tokyo are the gentlemen of this topic.

[Metro007]

Yes. Good post. I agree! ;-)

[anak_mm]

when you go up on one of the hills around LA ....the city seems like its endless

Originally Posted by soup or man

^ Actually, the celebs live in those mountains.


http://thinkingpixels.com/print/prev...s_by_night.jpg

[Dralcoffin]

But then Tokyo:


(From TechedOn.com)

[spotila]

both of those images are stunning examples

[Yuri S Andrade]

Beautiful Los Angeles and Tokyo!

Originally Posted by Metro007

That's true. But the question still makes sense: what is the density-limit we stil can consider being an urban area? For me it's a joke that Atlanta should have almost the size of LA. Once again i am talking about what the perception is...if we talk about very low density urban areas, isn't the Blue Banana the biggest in the world? But that would of course be a very large interpretation of what can be called urban;-)

OK, but specifically, which part the US Census Bureau designates as "urban" in Atlanta area you think it's not urban?

Anyway, here's the map from Wikipedia: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...-Areas.svg.png. Atlanta urban footprint is clearly larger than Los Angeles'.

[Chrissib]

Originally Posted by Yuri S Andrade

Beautiful Los Angeles and Tokyo!



OK, but specifically, which part the US Census Bureau designates as "urban" in Atlanta area you think it's not urban?

Anyway, here's the map from Wikipedia: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...-Areas.svg.png. Atlanta urban footprint is clearly larger than Los Angeles'.

I don't think it is larger, but it certainly feels larger. The problem in Atlanta is that it is very difficult to determine if land is developed or not. Development in suburban Atlanta usually consists of roads generously cut into the forest:






In suburban LA, typically the whole area is cleaned and developed, leading to higher densities and much easier determination of whether a piece of land is urban or not:




I tried to make both pictures at the same scale.

[oliver999]

i notice LA house lights are so bright.

[the spliff fairy]

they are, but its also a long exposure on the camera.

[Suburbanist]

Atlanta is located in a very forested area. It's a very different vegetation than what is original to Los Angeles, but I get the argument

Phoenix, for instance, goes like Atlanta though it is surrounded by desert.

[Metro007]

I once have seen LA from the plane beetween San Francisco and San Diego. It's just incredible how big it is! About 4-5x the size Paris. I must admit that i never was in Atlanta but i have seen a lot of pictures of it. From what i could see there is no comparaison! LA is much more massive and dense and obviously we cant consider both cities being almost the same size (my opinion). I say it again: there is from my point of view no larger one-city-sized agglomeration in the world than LA i f we consider what can be seen from the eyes (so i am not talking about other megalopolises with a lot of free spaces beetween them and who are bigger)

NY has a completely different structure with a lot of big rivers etc. so that we dont have the same impression, even if it is in reality bigger.

[Yuri S Andrade]

But if it is a matter of density, Tokyo would beat Los Angeles, being both larger and denser. Or even São Paulo, altough smaller, is denser. And no way Los Angeles is 4-5 times bigger than Paris.

[Metro007]

Originally Posted by Yuri S Andrade

But if it is a matter of density, Tokyo would beat Los Angeles, being both larger and denser. Or even São Paulo, altough smaller, is denser. And no way Los Angeles is 4-5 times bigger than Paris.

I meant about 4-5 time bigger, visually talking...perhaps it's only 3x? ;-) Look at the maps of Spotila...

Tokyo is almost as big as LA (size). Of course it is much more dense. In my opinion it would be the second largest one-city-urban-area of the world. NY would be third. Visually talking once again. Thats my opinion of the visual effects.

[Yuri S Andrade]

Tokyo is larger. Los Angeles urban area (counting the Inland Empire) covers 5,900 km² (Census 2010). Tokyo, if I'm not mistaken, about 8,000 km².

[Metro007]

Originally Posted by Yuri S Andrade

Tokyo is larger. Los Angeles urban area (counting the Inland Empire) covers 5,900 km² (Census 2010). Tokyo, if I'm not mistaken, about 8,000 km².

I am not talking about numbers...as you know every country has his own definition ;-)

[Yuri S Andrade]

Ok, but in any case, Tokyo is both larger and denser than Los Angeles, therefore should "look" bigger. Yes, the urban definition changes from country to country, but I'm pretty sure Japanese standards are stricter than Americans.

[Metro007]

Thats the reason i want to fly to Tokyo once...but i really can't imagine a bigger city than L.A. So i would have to see it first :-)