Skyline Ranking

[circusoflife]

Not sure if this website has been mentioned anywhere on Cyburbia..but I thought it would be useful to some folks in analyzing large city density, etc...

http://www.emporis.com/en/bu/sk/st/sr/


PS: if you have any questions of any of the places - I have been to many of them.

I have spent at least several days+ in at least 35 of the top 50 cities.
Exceptions:

Sao Paulo and Mexico City only from a window - quite enough frankly

Have not been to:
Seoul, Istanbul, Guangzhou, Moscow, Dallas, Caracas, Dalian, Gold Coast City, Miami, Calagary, Recife, Benidorm, Panama City

[dobopoq]

Excellent site! Thanks circusoflife.

[mgk920]

Excellent site! Thanks circusoflife.

Fascinating for me, too.

Especially since a tiny, recently incorporated suburb (Aventura, FL) is on that top 100 list (according to the site, it is densely developed with high-rise condomini(m)um buildings).

NOW, what would be one's personal favorite city skyline?

Me: Chicago, hands down. I never tire of the views approaching DT Chicago from any direction.

Also, I liked NYC's skyline much more prior to 2001-09-11 than I do now. Without its exclamation point, it just strikes me as an incomplete agglomeration of anonymous, generic buildings.

Mike

[circusoflife]

Fascinating for me, too.

NOW, what would be one's personal favorite city skyline?

Mike

I guess my answer is a combination of both natural geography (Either visually - important as some vistas were nice but are now covered by smog - nearby, or built on top of) combined with the skyline itself. Speaking only a from a visual standpoint (Aerial) at a distance (Some cities get quite a bit uglier on closer inspection)...

I just counted the rest, I've been to only 13 of places 51 - 100. Which means overall I've seen nearly 1/2 the list.

I would vote either Rio de Janeiro, Rotterdam, Sydney, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Vancouver, Dubai, Seattle, and San Diego (Ruined by the ridiculous eyesore of the new baseball field)

--
You didn't ask this...but as for where I would choose to LIVE -

1) If I could NEVER move
2) Only could travel occassionally (2-4 weeks/year)
3) Must live in the actual city limits (No suburbs)
4) Confined to this list and to what I have seen in person

Vancouver - the main city proper is too much of a concrete jungle (Yes - surrounded by beautiful mountains of course, Stanley Park is superb, possibly right next to Stanley Park in a overlooking condo) Crappy weather for long periods.

Dubai would be fun for awhile - assuming I had the income to match, but I would tire of living in a desert. Great architecture - but totally car dependent (Great bus system though!). Beautiful uncrowded beaches.

Rio - only on the extreme city limit edge - just too dense in most parts. Great night life and hot girls in thin bikinis! Favela/shantytowns on hillsides though. Not attractive. Subway system only services part of town. Great food. Unmatched topography for a major city.

Sydney - good harbor area, and good public rail. Ozzie laid back approach to life

Seattle - crappy weather for long periods of time, but global warming is changing that. Surrounded by great mountains. Progressive thinking place. Great library system (Seen the new Seattle library?) Built on hills. Great REI headquarters!
transport outside of city is pretty much via a bus system - though good.

Singapore / Kuala Lumpur - super modern with lots of great trees, though in major heat zone. Excellent transit. Great food choices.

San Diego - excellent density (Enough, but not too crowded - though possibly getting worse as more buildings go up) and good nightlife. Colorful architecture. By the sea, city itself is flat though.Good trolley system.

Rotterdam - by the sea, plus I like the Dutch way of using lots of bicycles and rail. But flat. Lots of history.

the answer...a tie between Rio, Sydney, San Diego, Seattle, Rotterdam (A place which I have spent all of a couple of hours - so impressed I was). I just can't pick right now....Sydney, Rio, or Rotterdam come up more than Seattle or SD as I prefer to live outside the US now.


Note -- I don't actually live in Seattle despite my bio on the left, I live 10-15 minutes away in a suburb. My preference would be to not live in any of these cities proper, but nearby. Or better yet in a decent sized town, but not necessarily with a major skyline. (Copenhagen might be a good example). or even better...just move around and sample different places - like now.

---

Flat plains of just buildings don't do much for me...like Chicago, any city in Texas, Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo, Bangkok, etc...unless there are some really interesting buildings.or other outstanding layout feature (Like Singapore or in certain areas of Tokyo).

[Dan]

Looks like some mid-sized South American cities rank very high. Could that be because many have high-rise apartments scattered throughout the city? They don't have skylines in the North American or Australian sense, but rather a sea of concrete?

Mississauga, Ontario is also on the list; like South American cities, it also has a lot of high-rise housing.

Paris ranks rather high; too. The only skyline of note is La Defense, but that's in the suburbs; otherwise, it's mostly dense six and seven story street wall in the city.

Emporis is a pretty good Web site. I wonder how they make money, especially considering the time and effort it took to accumulate all the data on the site; for example they have information about never-built high-rises, buildings under construction, and 'scrapers that are only in the planning stage for even the smallest city.

[the north omaha star]

Tulsa made the list? How? I would rank Baltimore on the list before Tulsa. At least Baltimore has boats of all different sizes pulling into the Inner Harbor at different times of year which makes for great picture taking.

[Tranplanner]

The only caveat I would put on this data is that it is gathered by volunteers in each city. Therefore, if there is no one living in that city or the data is incomplete, that city will not show up on the rankings.

[zman]

I'm surprised that Denver was even on there. Surprised, but flattered. I love that skyline.

[mgk920]

Looks like some mid-sized South American cities rank very high. Could that be because many have high-rise apartments scattered throughout the city? They don't have skylines in the North American or Australian sense, but rather a sea of concrete?

Many of those cities are kind of like Paris x2 or x3 on heights of residential buildings. Air photos of Buenos Aires, for example, often show a just sea of mid-rise residential buildings.

Mississauga, Ontario is also on the list; like South American cities, it also has a lot of high-rise housing.

Paris ranks rather high; too. The only skyline of note is La Defense, but that's in the suburbs; otherwise, it's mostly dense six and seven story street wall in the city.

Check the population vs. land area for Paris. It is dense.

Emporis is a pretty good Web site. I wonder how they make money, especially considering the time and effort it took to accumulate all the data on the site; for example they have information about never-built high-rises, buildings under construction, and 'scrapers that are only in the planning stage for even the smallest city.

They do have a very extensive 'pay' area on their website that is aimed at and used by real estate and development professionals.

Mike

[jordanb]

^-- Of course one thing you have to remember about Paris (and probably most such cities) is that its land area is nearly entirely housing. American cities like NYC and Chicago have massive areas where no one lives, principally industrial zones and airports (both cities have TWO airports within their city limits) plus cemeteries, parks, etc (Paris has two large parks in its city limits though, but they're outside the Peripherique).