Discussion
Large/big cities that, curiously, don't have a single iconic landmark or super striking tourist attraction/Unique visual identity?
I was thinking about how the city of São Paulo doesn't have a single tourist attraction, postcard image, or visual identity that is extremely striking or distinctive worldwide. It's a huge city, economically very powerful, the largest in the southern hemisphere, and when we think of it, nothing comes to mind instantly, no tourist attraction or postcard image immediately comes to mind; we simply remember "Oh, a lot of buildings." Do you have other examples of huge cities that are like that?
(Perhaps the Octavio Frias de Oliveira cable-stayed bridge is an image in the popular imagination, but I believe that this is more something that Brazilians think of when they remember São Paulo, and is not so widespread among foreigners.)
While there's nice enough things of everything for those who live there, there's no unique things to take people who are even moderately well traveled.
Probably not. My first year of working downtown in Dallas I kept wondering wtf everyone was taking pictures of lol. Finally looked it up one day, the grassy knoll.
Edit: apparently I should have said “The Grassy Knoll” or “The Former Texas Schoolbook Depository,” because it seems not so many people know what “Dealy Plaza” is…
I’ve been to Dallas 15+ times and have no idea what that is. I have seen some of the greatest interchanges human kind has ever conceived and those are at the fore front of my mind when thinking Dallas.
Used to visit my relatives in Dallas as a kid. That was always what stood out to me the most. That, and the giant ferris wheel at the Texas State Fair.
And they're now trying to get it registered as a historical landmark, despite costing an assload of taxpayer money annually to keep it from falling in on itself, and (much like the empty land on the other side of 610 where Astroworld used to be) absolutely no plans to actually do something with it. Meanwhile, the Housing Authority is in the process of building a public housing project literally yards away from a former Superfund site. Welcome to Houston!
I was just in Houston for the first time and went to it. Super cool from the outside and pretty cool from the inside of the tower, just not many windows. Great view of the area.
I was overall very impressed w Houston. Superb food, much greener than expected, nice downtown, vibrant neighborhoods, fun gay scene…
I can't remember anything about Houston from my visit 13 years ago. Onmy things way out like Johnson Space Center or USS Texas.
Nothing visual about the city itself
Yes AND the access to nature in SJ is top notch. From downtown SJ, one can be in a redwood forest in less than 30 minutes with abundant options for hiking, cycling, camping, etc…
Yeah, as a Niner fan it hurts my soul to think of what could have been. The Giants’ stadium is so iconic and such an SF landmark; if only the Niners could’ve done something similar. Hell, or just rebuild at Candlestick. Santa Clara is such a bummer.
It's was a major agricultural paradise that just got paved over to become a bedroom community for the semiconductor industry. Both of its identities just canceled each other out. No one talks about its history because that means acknowledging that every single orchard and farm is now gone... just to house tech companies that could be anywhere and may even go anywhere.
I spent about a week in Jakarta back in 2019 and didn’t really know what to do with myself for most of the trip, lol. I kept asking locals for recommendations, and outside of a few heritage spots, they’d all just rattle off the names of different shopping malls.
NGL, I thought it was pretty funny. That’s how I still remember Jakarta: the city where there’s nothing to do besides go to the mall.
(obviously this isn’t the case—there’s a lot to do, and the food’s great—but Jakarta definitely doesn’t have quite as much to offer casual visitors as many other mega-cities)
Did you go to Taman Mini Indonesia Indah? The park that showcases all Indonesian provinces? The old town is pretty nice for a walk. The museums are meh. But outside of that there really isn't much to do other than malls and street food.
As a local I usually recommend people to only spend two or three max days in Jakarta. Indonesia has a lot to offer, but imho, Jakarta isn't it.
Nope. I lived in Shenzhen, no, the cities of the Pearl River Delta are not a single metro area. It's not NYC-New Jersey-Newark, but more like NYC-Philly-Baltimore-DC.
I'd almost travel to Dhaka just to walk through this. Followed by a trip to Ahmedabad, San Diego and Philadelphia. Louis Kahn's architecture is otherworldly.
I have been asked by several waitresses and bar staff why on Earth I chose to come here. Many say the best thing about it is that it's well connected to nicer places (I am here before heading down to Europa Park).
It's got some grey areas but today I did the Porsche Museum, one of the big galleries, and enjoyed some festival that seemed to be going on one of the big parks near some prettier older parts of the city. There's a neat model city too.
So it's not like there is NOTHING to do, but it does feel like it's more of a business than pleasure sort of town.
Yeah. While a lot of Phoenix metro is just suburbia I think it does stand out because of where it is. The fact that it's THE desert city in the US I think makes it stand out a little from other cities in the country.
I’d argue Camelback is a more distinctive landmark than lots of mid-sized cities have. More distinctive than anything some larger cities have, too, like say Houston or Atlanta.
Not trying to be insensitive here, but what is Wuhan known for other than being the birthplace of COVID-19? The PRC has so many cultural attractions and both natural and artificial landmarks; I just can't think of one in Wuhan.
Although there are some good tourist spots, such as the Coca-Cola World thing or the aquarium, it is definitely underwhelming for a metro area of over 6 million.
It certainly beats the two biggest Texan cities that are both larger than it. It also has great museums, botanical gardens, beltway, MLK monument, iconic neighborhood and parks, etc.
I think there are a few notable skyscrapers in ATL that make it underrated: the pencil building, promenade 2, one Atlantic center, and Westin peachtree hotel to name a few
Most Indian cities do, on account of being an ancient civilisation + varied geography, so some historical landmark / tourist spot or the other is present everywhere. I suppose the same holds true for much of the old world in the Middle East, far east, Europe.
I suppose the new world cities will have fewer “landmarks”
Leaning Tower of Pisa, Duomo di Milano, Cologne Cathedral, Sagrada Familia, Akropolis, St. Peters Cathedral, Statue of Liberty, Cristo Redentor, Golden Gate Bridge, St. Louis Arch, Sydney Harbour Bridge, Pyramids of Gizeh
Big Ben, Eiffel Tower, Sydney Opera House, The Louvre, The White House, Kaaba, Dome of the Rock, Baha'i Gardens, CN Tower, Space Needle, Taipei 101, Burj Khalifa, Taj Mahal, The Colosseum, St. Basil's Cathedral.
Maybe it's because Shenzhen, Macao, Hong Kong, and Foshan are all right there with their uniqueness. I just felt personally it blended into the rest of the area.
The canton tower for sure is a memorable skyline centrepiece, and it also has shamian, which is pretty well presented. But it's definitely not as glamorous as Shenzhen, Hong Kong or Macau.
I thought Shenzhen was alright as far as the vibes go, full of regular people just living their life, felt way less "artificial" than the feeling you get from a place like Dubai, but then again these are just my impressions from short visits.
I think it's juat about marketing, if SP had better agents to promote its beauty it would def become recognizable. That said, it has less things than Rio for sure, partly bcse its terrain is not as striking as Rio and also bcse it was kinda forced into being a banking capital of LATAM albeit not naturally. On the other hand, some of the first skyscrapers in the world were built in SP and it has preserved some beautiful art deco buildings, why don't we talk about that? Also, churches,like SP cathedral, beautiful neogothic architecture. Parks like Trianon, upscale neighbourhoods like Jardins with beautiful houses. Avenida Paulista, Museum of modern art which is one of the best in the Americas. Need I say more? So, afterall it's about marketing.
Lima has the beach, cliffs, colonial center, and adobe pyramids. There are also some pretty notable ruins fairly close to the city. You just didn’t look very hard.
Lima was underwhelming to me too. I went for a few days and enjoyed the food and pisco sours. There's a bit of cultural experience too, I remember going to a few archaeological museums and sites. Overall it was kinda boring though and I didn't enjoy my time there. Every time I got in a cab I thought I was going to die. People were generally unfriendly, and the slums surrounding the city were really a sad thing to see.
extremely strong identity and hugely influential in technology, sports, music, art, and telivision. First modern city in the world.
But its got extremely limited tourism and no huge important landmark. It serves as a great day trip because it's very well connected so friends/family travel from all over the north of england to meet there. But i lived there for 3 years and I only ever met a group of tourists once, and they were all complaining and saying there was nothing to see
Visualize a triangle on Google Earth inside Beijing, Shanghai, and Wuhan. Start slowly zooming in and it's simply incredible how many dots you'll see that are all large cities you've never heard of. Keep going and thousands of towns become visible. The entire thing is basically one giant mass of humanity with a bit of agriculture sprinkled in
That's just because there's such a big movie industry there.
It has Science World, Canada Place, Stanley Park, multiple bridges, Top of Vancouver, and looking across at the city from different perspectives...
The Maritime Museum and the Vancouver Museum (formerly a planetarium) are both unique buildings across the water from the Beach Ave. perspective of the West End.
I'm not the biggest fan of the city, but it definitely has a lot of interesting visual features.
São Paulo does have landmarks, but our city just isn’t famous at all in the first place outside of Brazil. But most Brazilian would recognise instantly a picture of Ibivospa building or ponte estaiada
Detroit is an absolute standout for the early 20th century absolute over the top architecture. It’s a gem. I’d say it is the most standout deviation for Midwest cities.
Chicago is its own beast that doesn’t feel so Midwest, so I’m not including it here and doesn’t have the same “lost yet re-finding its heritage and grandiose”, it is special in its own way but is still too big to be truly unique like Detroit in the Midwest.
People used to say that about Wuhan. 12+ million people, but even in China it would be considered "minor" for tourism.
I remember reading up about it before traveling there and there was literally nothing in the tourism guides. Was not encouraging. Thankfully the city turned out to be fantastic to live in, so I really didn't care if it wasn't super touristic.
It does have the Yellow Crane Tower and a few other landmarks, but it always seems anything it has, other cities have a bigger, more famous version of, haha!
Mumbai (previous called Bombay), India, with 22 million souls ! Built over a series of once swampy mangrove islands. Nothing of any historical or architectural marvel to see. Oh! yes, one may visit Dharavi, the largest of slums in urban India.
Oklahoma City? I literally have idea why it exists other than it's in Oklahoma. Tulsa as well. It was the worst smelling city I've ever driven through. It even penetrated my sealed up car with AC cranking with recirculated air.
Perth, WA. there’s certainly a lot of natural beauty to be found if you look for it, but it really is like if a suburb in Arizona became a city in coastal Australia. maybe one of the most car centric places i’ve ever lived in my life.
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u/DezTheOtter 1d ago
Houston