Can You See Your City Geographically Situated Elsewhere?

[Centropolis]

here’s Rosario -

getsouth.com


pinterest.com

I’m actually pretty blown away. Rosario clearly functions as a secondary tier city in Argentina instead of tertiary or whatever St. Louis is now even though theres a million less people in the metro.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by ue

Winnipeg could've been in the US. It looks Midwestern and has the manufacturing industry that other Prairie cities lack. It could've been somewhere around Fargo or Omaha or Minneapolis or perhaps Kansas City. Alternatively, it could've been where Edmonton is - they're similar as it is and also have similar climates.

100%. it’s a bit different in Canada since the space between Winnipeg and Toronto is a lot different than south of the lakes but the archetype is there, nonetheless.

[ue]

Originally Posted by Centropolis

100%. it’s a bit different in Canada since the space between Winnipeg and Toronto is a lot different than south of the lakes but the archetype is there, nonetheless.

Absolutely. Winnipeg's typology can also be seen in the other Prairie cities, but in Alberta and Saskatchewan, the post-war resource booms transformed them into much newer, glossier cities (not unlike Winnipeg itself a century ago). Whereas Winnipeg is a bit dustier; it could've been the setting of Adventures in Babysitting or Gran Torino. I said Winnipeg could have been where Edmonton is earlier, but that only works if there was no oil in Alberta, otherwise Winnipeg would've probably ended up like an even bigger Edmonton.

What's interesting to me though is that politically, Calgary is probably the most stereotypically American city, but it doesn't really look like any American city except Denver (and even then there's clear differences in vernacular). Winnipeg is less like that, but the air of the place is not unlike the American Midwest nonetheless.

[kool maudit]

You can't separate Stockholm from the archipelago. Everything about this place is in response to the landscape.

[ue]

Originally Posted by Centropolis

here’s Rosario -

I’m actually pretty blown away. Rosario clearly functions as a secondary tier city in Argentina instead of tertiary or whatever St. Louis is now even though theres a million less people in the metro.

Yeah, Rosario is beautiful. It also has some great Art Deco architecture.

I'd say the ranking of Rosario isn't too surprising. It's no different than how Vancouver has far more importance in Canada than Pittsburgh or Salt Lake City or Sacramento do in the US. Or how China has cities of millions that most Westerners haven't even heard of, and who are far down the pecking order from Shanghai and Beijing, or even Chongqing.

[LA21st]

Originally Posted by Centropolis

ive never been to cdmx but i’ve always thought LA might have a similar soul.

is that Mexico City? Im gonna disagree because LA metro has so much beach culture. I was just in Malibu only and there are people everywhere.
I dont think you can have LA without the beach. Same as SD

[Buckeye Native 001]

No, because most of the cities where I've lived (Cincinnati, Phoenix and Flagstaff) were the result of geography restraints or advantages.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by LA21st

is that Mexico City? Im gonna disagree because LA metro has so much beach culture. I was just in Malibu only and there are people everywhere.
I dont think you can have LA without the beach. Same as SD

of course, yeah i thought of that immediately aftarwards but there is still this immense metropolis in a basin ringed by mountains on many sides and in between.

[Nomad9]

Birmingham would fit pretty well in PA. The “Pittsburg of the South” nickname applies to more than just steel production.

[SFBruin]

I could see elements of Seattle as being situated somewhere else.

For instance, it is conceivable that a hyper-capitalist, tech-focused city could be located just about anywhere in the world that doesn't have a polar climate.

However, Seattle also has an outdoors and nature focus that probably couldn't exist anywhere else in the US outside of Denver or Hawaii.

[hauntedheadnc]

Greenville already looks and feels like a piece of Atlanta that wandered away from its mother at K-Mart. Assuming there's anywhere in the Atlanta suburbs hilly enough for waterfalls, it could slip right in and feel at home in the fold. Having never been to Alabama I can only guess, but Greenville's politics are neolithic enough for it to probably fit in as a secondary city in the Birmingham metro as well. I don't think it would fit in anywhere in North Carolina though.

[BillM]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Toronto could definitely be somewhere else. It isn't really a product of its surroundings. It's on a Great Lake, but it barely has a port and never relied on lake-bound shipping or shipping-reliant industries for its bread and butter.

Toronto would have to be in Canada, though. Toronto is unmistakably Canadian. And it would have to be in Ontario. Pretty much right after it was founded in the wake of the American revolution, it was clear that Upper Canada (Ontario) was going to eventually be the most populous province. It already had more people than Quebec by 1850, and the power and size of Canadian cities are more a function of their provinces than of the country as a whole.

I can imagine Toronto being near the site of Hamilton. Or, perhaps Hamilton would be the big city.

[BillM]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

You can't separate Stockholm from the archipelago. Everything about this place is in response to the landscape.

What if we imagined the re-orientation of cities while keeping the metro area roughly in its same location. For example, could there be an alternate geographically interesting location for downtown?

[samne]

For Toronto, it would need to be at water edge since the city has an abrupt stop forming a half moon.

I also think it would need to be in a temperate climate and forest region. The foliage and four seasons make the city.

The built form is not really conducive to hot climates.

Toronto could relocate elsewhere in S Ontario maybe upper Great Lakes, North East US or even N. Europe.

That said I always found Melbourne to be a southern hemisphere Toronto.

[Razor]

Originally Posted by samne

For Toronto, it would need to be at water edge since the city has an abrupt stop forming a half moon.

I also think it would need to be in a temperate climate and forest region. The foliage and four seasons make the city.

The built form is not really conducive to hot climates.

Toronto could relocate elsewhere in S Ontario maybe upper Great Lakes, North East US or even N. Europe.

That said I always found Melbourne to be a southern hemisphere Toronto.

Got me thinking about Toronto over looking Sydney Harbour and Houston as a Great Lakes city...I can see some Canadian cities in Ohio.. London & Saskatoon perhaps?.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by BillM

What if we imagined the re-orientation of cities while keeping the metro area roughly in its same location. For example, could there be an alternate geographically interesting location for downtown?

fun question.

i suppose it's possible that downtown chicago could've risen at the mouth of the calumet river on the far south side of the city, as it would've provided the same "river port" opportunity that the chicago river did.

but the fact that mud lake connected the south branch of the chicago river to the des plaines river, and thus connected the great lakes basin to the mississippi basin, it kind of sealed the fate that the young city would be centered at the mouth of the chicago river.

interestingly enough, in the early 20th century, as the chicago river in downtown became less and less important as a port, the city's main port facility, and a good chunk of the heavy industry that went along with it, was moved down to the calumet river anyway. The calumet river was also eventually connected to the des plaines river with a canal of its own in the 1920s.


source: https://chistockimages.com/downloads...-side-chicago/

[shappy]

Originally Posted by Doady

I can see Toronto being located in the Sunbelt: very new, mostly post-war, sprawling and auto-oriented. Basically one giant suburb. People constantly compare Toronto to New York or Chicago because they are nearby, but in reality Toronto is more akin to Los Angeles or Las Vegas.

This is kind of old. And I'm struggling to find the humour or the point, really. Is this a response to something, or...?

[Quixote]

Since LA has a Mediterranean climate and is the only major global city (maybe Lima, Peru as well) situated on an ocean with miles of decent beaches, snow-capped mountains with peaks above 10,000 feet*, deserts, and islands*, I would say no.

*San Diego doesn’t have these features.

[MolsonExport]

Montreal could never be anyplace else. It exists because of where it is. The farthest upriver one could navigate prior to the canals. Adjacent to the most hospitable (I am speaking generously) climate in what was then "Lower Canada". The mountain which gives it it's name its constrained geography. Primarily French-speaking but with a large English population, in a French Province in a bilingual (albeit predominately English-speaking) country. The city is the canvas upon which the tensions between business-culture, French-English, Quebec-Canada, Quebecois-Cosmopolitanism, Separatism-Federalism, Europe-North America, and so forth, are played out.

London (Ontario) could be anyplace else. It straddles a river, but incidentally, as the river has always been unnavigable. It sort of acts like a hub for a region of Ontario, but is very generic, albeit with some nice parts.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by Quixote

Since LA has a Mediterranean climate and is the only major global city (maybe Lima, Peru as well) situated on an ocean with miles of decent beaches, snow-capped mountains with peaks above 10,000 feet*, deserts, and islands*, I would say no.

*San Diego doesn’t have these features.

mmmmm maybe a counter factual twentieth century roman empire that spawned a vast and wealthy modern north african metropolis on the mediterranean.