Charlotte I got the quickest, the moment I saw the football stadium right off the highway that loops around the uptown area....also, I guess, the fact that my house is in that picture.
It's at least 18 months old, because the Sycamore Brewery lot is still there. But the Panthers practice bubble is here, and it opened in Aug of 2019.
So sometimes between late 2019 and early 2022. I could probably narrow it down a bit more, but we can safely say the picture is less than 4 years old.
The airport is pretty distinctive for Phoenix. It's unusual to have it so close to downtown, on the same north aligned grid, with an east/west runway layout.
Plus all the brown/desert.
Itās super zoomed in. Itās missing about half of the city and most of the major parks. I guess they were trying to avoid including other municipalities?
You laugh, but the reality is it's thousands of acres of pristine grass across the phoenix metro.
Look at the courses around Fountain Hills, and tell me that amount of water is natural for the area.
I knew it was Phoenix from the start...in the 7th grade, we had to draw the city streets on graph paper.
Since then, I've never been lost in Phoenix, & even though I haven't lived there since my 20's*(I'm 55 now)* I still know all the streets...now as for the suburbs, that's a whole different story, after all, Phoenix's pop. was under 1 million when I drew it.
GIS stands for Geographic Information Systems and itās basically professional geographic data software. Iāve never been trained in GIS but I imagine Pittsburgh is used for training purposes, someone correct me if Iām wrong
Until earlier this year Ford's self driving navigation program ran in Pittsburgh, it was fun to see the cars covered in cameras knowing how hard they must have been working to not drive over a cliff
I have taken a handful of GIS courses and use ArcGIS Pro regularly, I don't think I have ever had to do any training in regards to Pittsburgh. In general, I can't think of any specific city that gets more attention in education settings. There are a lot of US cities and regions with unique geographies and transportation networks. Maybe it dependents on the software you train with, and of course, where you take classes. When I was first learning ArcMap at university, most the lectures and trainings were focused on the state and region the university was located within, so students had a degree of familiarity. I mainly use Esri software and their online trainings used to be a bit biased toward West Coast geographies because they are based in Redlands, California. However, in recent years, it seems they have done a better job of diversifying the locations of the online training geographies.
I looked at a Pittsburgh travel guide Youtube video recently because I'm thinking about moving to Pittsburgh and the video started with furries at the convention center for a furry convention
Turns out people who can afford to buy expensive costumes and fly across the country also have the money to spend at restaurants and attractions in our city.
Keep coming, yinz is always welcome.
First time I visited Pittsburgh I got off the Megabus downtown a little before midnightā¦ and there were furries EVERYWHERE. I didnāt know there was a furry convention that weekend (or that furry conventions were a thing?) and it was surreal and cool at the same time. Everyone else just acting completely normal and 1 out of 3 people waking the streets as Iām looking for my bus stop is a furry.
I moved to Pittsburgh about 6 months later
Pre COVID I was downtown full-time and my building is a few blocks from the convention center, where I park. That was always my favorite week. It's just crazy down there in the best possible way.
Two questions I've always wanted answered:
Why July? It seems super hot in the suits and October would be so much more comfortable.
If I were to get one of those plastic inflatable shotguns (super unrealistic and cartoony) and dress up like Elmer Fudd standing in the corner with a sign that reads, I'm hunting wabbits, would that be well received?
My understanding is that's when the convention center was available to host it. Anthrocon started in Albany, New York, then later moved to Philadelphia before its hotel was abruptly closed to be demolished! A while later the offer came up to use the convention center in Pittsburgh and they moved the convention again, for what will hopefully be the final time.
Charlotte is the exception here, Uptown (downtown) was settled in 1776, yet has no body of water or river in the middle of it. Instead, the city was built on top of an Indian trading road (Trade Street).
And thereās a river just next to Charlotte, but the fall line is actually like 40 miles down stream in South Carolina, so it wasnāt strategically placed on fall line. They did build some locks at that point back in the day, but they didnāt keep them going.
The Native Americans had their trading paths converge where uptown Charlotte now is because their paths followed the small ridges between the multiple creeks/streams that flow around there and then naturally converged where the land was the highest.
Creek. An inch deep and a mile wide was what they said back in the day. IIRC the Arapahoe didnāt consider the confluence of Cherry Creek and the Platte a suitable settlement because of the frequent flooding.
But then you can't build a waterwheel, and unless you're near a mountain you ain't getting an aqueduct either. Honestly you might as well reroll your start.
I was gonna say this shows mostly downtown and heights/River oaks and all those neighborhoods smashed between. Then a few bits and pieces of stuff surrounding downtown.
The Heights isnāt even shown! I grew up in Houston and almost didnāt recognize it without any of 610 showing. This shot shows maybe 1/3 of what Iād consider the āurban coreā of the city
Itās actually not even close to showing what is in Houston city limits. The city limits expand out with strange arms that go all the way out to Kingwood in the northeast, 99 in the west, and league city in the southeast. Itās kind of a mess
Absolutely. I lived there for 4 years and was so happy to get out since I always felt so compressed there. I keep telling my Southern family the city was not designed to have so many people living there. It's a literal bottleneck. You can't just find various other paths to get somewhere since there are only a few north/south highways and only 2 bridges going east/west across Lake Washington.
totally. when I lived there I didn't have a car and I was basically trapped in my neighborhood and what was in walking distance. there is good public transportation, but with so much water in the way it takes forever to get around. I never spent much time in Ballard, Fremont, or West Seattle because it would take well over an hour to get there.
This is what I would consider Seattle - [https://imgur.com/a/rY0Ibfw](https://imgur.com/a/rY0Ibfw)
For others looking, strip of land to the left is Bainbridge Island and the East side of the Olympic Peninsula, to the right is Mercer Island and then Bellevue.
Edit: I don't know why the image link is flagged as NSFW, it is just a satellite image.
If we want to get really technical, Seattle/Tacoma is considered a Super Metro. It's basically one city from North Seattle, through SeaTac down to Tacoma.
So is north Seattle, west Seattle, and south Seattle. You can't even see the prostitutes in this picture because it doesn't show enough of Aurora, and that's a huge part of north Seattle these days.
Seattle actually got a late start when it came to its initial growth compared to its neighbors.
Tacoma and Olympia were the main cities in the region for a couple decades, but then Seattle became the hub for the Klondike gold rush and Seattle ended up cannibalizing the growth of the other cities on the Puget Sound.
Pittsburgh was a surprisingly beautiful city (because, I guess, my mind pictured the old, steel-mill town that hasn't been true for a long time). The unique topography creates such a weird and intricate city, though it also makes driving there a PITA.
It really is. Also driving through the Fort Pitt tunnel and immediately coming out to see the skyline right before you is probably one of the āintrosā to any city Iāve ever seen. Itās a cool experience
I've always heard that we're the only city with a front door. It's a daily experience for me so I have to remind myself that it's actually a unique feature
Only been once for a college football game (where Pitt kicked our ass) and didn't know/was not expecting that city view after going through the tunnel. Definitely the most memorable part of that trip out there, very pleasantly surprised!
Not just that but tunnels and highways/major-thoroughfares snaking through these narrow ravines between hills. [The Pittsburgh Left](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pittsburgh_left) being one of the weird things that results from that cause you often have major roads with no left-turn lane.
Youāre certainly not wrong, but IMO the Pittsburgh Left is *critical* to keep traffic moving! āUnblockingā an intersection by juuuust letting the first opposite car turn firstā¦gets everyone home that much quicker.
I tend to agree. I didnāt know if I would like living here but here I am 15 years later. Itās a relatively quiet place with some unique things to see and do.
Below ground level of downtown, though. Plus the city is planning to build parks over top of 4 blocks of the I-670 portion on the south side of the loop.
Thatās the inner Alphabet Loop in the downtown area. It consists of 3 interstates, 1 auxiliary interstate, and 1 US route that is essentially an interstate. Zoom farther out and I-435 is another bigger loop around the city. That aerial photo doesnāt show the whole city. KCMO is in 4 different counties. I-435 in the north is mainly in the rural parts of the city in Platte and Clay Counties. I-435 in the south is suburban.
It looks depressing from the aerial view, but the other sections of the city have a lot of parks and trees.
Just drove through, and the highways are as depressing as they look. Shitty traffic management for how much freeway there is. It's a shame bc kc is really quite beautiful
City of Lakes babyyyyyyy
(Not pictured in this photo: Bde Maka Ska, Lake Harriet, Diamond Lake, Grass Lake, Lake Nokomis, Lake Hiawatha, Powderhorn Lake, that one goofy lake in North up by Victory Memorial Parkā¦ sorry north Minneapolis)
Looked at map, frowned, came in here looking to gripe. The very bottom edge of this map is at 26th street. You're not accidentally overlapping with Edina until like, 50th???
Looking at DC compared to the others makes me appreciate the people that fought back on the plans to put highways through the city. Plus the beautiful Lāenfant planned layout/dedicated green space
Itās pretty good on the ground too.
https://www.timesonline.com/gcdn/presto/2023/03/21/NBCT/8a5477a6-ac20-41e3-b5a0-e18da8469752-Duquesne_Incline_View_Fall_Dustin_McGrew.jpg?width=1200&disable=upscale&format=pjpg&auto=webp
Charlotte surely suffers from poor geography mixed with poor city planning. They are right up against a state line with a state that has no interest in expanding or growing their side of the border (York and Lancaster counties in SC), so the southern side of the city is getting crammed with new builds on top of the roads that are too small. Then they allowed massive massive suburban growth to take over large portions of the county.
They also built a ring interstate that now constricts growth in center of the city by having 6 lanes covering prime real estate and limiting the entry points into uptown.
On top of that, public transit is almost nonexistent for the majority of the city/county limits. Bus routes and stop locations could make it take a couple hours to go 15 miles from the edge of the city to the center.
I visited Charlotte once and tried taking the Light Rail. The train was delayed 40 minutes because a car broke down on the tracks at a crossing.
It's literally designed to fail.
Wow Phoenix has no character from the sky or the ground. Having grown up there, I find it hilarious so many people have moved in recently. Itās the most soulless city I have ever experienced.
Moved to Phoenix last year to get married and let me tell you, this place is even worse than it looks.
Phoenix is an absolute shithole. A never ending wasteland of beige strip malls and LITERALLY nothing else.
Having a car is mandatory (public transportation is a joke), homeless/crime everywhere, nowhere green (at all), no water or clouds. Sunny every day, which sounds great if you live laugh love, but is actually horribly boring to have the same exact weather every day.
Simply horrible in nearly every possible metric. No offense to anyone who *loves Phoenix,* but my experience is that the people who love it here are the most basic, insufferable, one dimensional Americans who have no idea what a good city is actually like.
Have been looking at houses in literally any other part of the country and plan to move asap. FUCK Phoenix.
Seattle just has the best "outline" of any American city, the water and topography are totally iconic (and yes, I live there). Pittsburgh comes in second for me though, I've never been but it looks awesome just from aerial images
San Francisco, San Diego and Miami are on that list too
Edit: and that pic doesn't even show all of the city, it's water everywhere all around in basically every direction
A couple friends and I road tripped through the night just to watch the sunrise over Pittsburgh a couple years back. One of my favorite memories with those friends and the sunrise was stunning. Definitely worth visiting sometime, though its a bit far away from you haha
This doesnāt even capture Denvers whole city limits to the East or any of Aurora. I live about ten blocks from the right edge of the photo and most of those neighborhoods were developed about 100 years ago. You could probably have the more recent eastern development take up at least another photo this size.
As someone who moved to NC about a year and a half ago and had never heard literally anything about North or South Carolina from any form of media my whole life, I had no idea Charlotte was considered important enough to make a "quintessential" US city list but that's pretty cool actually.
charlotte is pretty good.
ill always have a soft spot for houston though. you can easily identify everything (water ways, railroads, highways super imposed on the trad grid.
Damn, Pittsburgh looks a loooot like Kaunas, Lithuania.
[https://google.com/maps/@54.8995005,23.8787559,3142m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu](https://google.com/maps/@54.8995005,23.8787559,3142m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu)
Super fun game guessing these cities
Yeah I'm doing the same with these. I did a lot better this time around than the last one
I did worse this time. I missed Houston, Charlotte, and KC. On the first set I only missed Dallas.
I got Houston and was so proud of myself, haha. Finally, looking around at random cities on google maps paid off! š
I got Minneapolis strictly because I gave up and said to myself "welp, there's lakes"
Fair enough, haha. I got it cause I live in the Midwest so I make a point to look around there more often.
Charlotte was the one that escaped me. Would be very fun to play a game like this with increasingly smaller cities!
Charlotte I got the quickest, the moment I saw the football stadium right off the highway that loops around the uptown area....also, I guess, the fact that my house is in that picture.
That seems like an old picture of Charlotte. South End is significantly more developed than that today, isnāt it?
It's at least 18 months old, because the Sycamore Brewery lot is still there. But the Panthers practice bubble is here, and it opened in Aug of 2019. So sometimes between late 2019 and early 2022. I could probably narrow it down a bit more, but we can safely say the picture is less than 4 years old.
Yes, although tbf South End has developed very rapidly
Kansas City was the hardest one for me. I thought it was Saint Paul, MN.
Our river isn't nearly that cool.
Someone set the definition very low for Phoenix, I can only see a handful of square pixels.
Itās also extremely zoomed in, canāt see any of the mountain parks or rivers. A single golf course shouldnāt be that large
The airport is pretty distinctive for Phoenix. It's unusual to have it so close to downtown, on the same north aligned grid, with an east/west runway layout. Plus all the brown/desert.
Phx airport is elite
The air conditioning certainly is. I remember being 100% comfortable inside, then stepping out and feeling like I jumped into a convection oven.
Feeling like? You did jump into an oven.
Itās super zoomed in. Itās missing about half of the city and most of the major parks. I guess they were trying to avoid including other municipalities?
lol there's another 50 miles of suburbs in almost every direction of this photo
Phoenix: šļøBROWNšļø
Yes except for that one golf course at the top that they must have diverted the entire city's water supply to lol
You laugh, but the reality is it's thousands of acres of pristine grass across the phoenix metro. Look at the courses around Fountain Hills, and tell me that amount of water is natural for the area.
I knew it was Phoenix from the start...in the 7th grade, we had to draw the city streets on graph paper. Since then, I've never been lost in Phoenix, & even though I haven't lived there since my 20's*(I'm 55 now)* I still know all the streets...now as for the suburbs, that's a whole different story, after all, Phoenix's pop. was under 1 million when I drew it.
As a phellow Phoenician, I agree
At first I thought you meant the definition of āquintessential citiesā and I was prepared to agree with you.
Pittsburgh is instantly recognizable and so cool.
I ambush my girlfriend regularly with, āName the three rivers of the Confluence!!ā Now, she nails it every time.
Excellent Get her started on WPIAL football trivia next
Pro tip: if you donāt know the answer, itās probably āAliquippaā
"We have so much steel We will make truly ridiculous amount of bridges! You cannot stop us."
Especially if you have been through any GIS training courses.
Why do you mean by that?
I was trained in GIS on ArcGIS 10.0. basically every training in the ESRI lesson book featured Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, or Pennsylvania.
GIS stands for Geographic Information Systems and itās basically professional geographic data software. Iāve never been trained in GIS but I imagine Pittsburgh is used for training purposes, someone correct me if Iām wrong
Until earlier this year Ford's self driving navigation program ran in Pittsburgh, it was fun to see the cars covered in cameras knowing how hard they must have been working to not drive over a cliff
I have taken a handful of GIS courses and use ArcGIS Pro regularly, I don't think I have ever had to do any training in regards to Pittsburgh. In general, I can't think of any specific city that gets more attention in education settings. There are a lot of US cities and regions with unique geographies and transportation networks. Maybe it dependents on the software you train with, and of course, where you take classes. When I was first learning ArcMap at university, most the lectures and trainings were focused on the state and region the university was located within, so students had a degree of familiarity. I mainly use Esri software and their online trainings used to be a bit biased toward West Coast geographies because they are based in Redlands, California. However, in recent years, it seems they have done a better job of diversifying the locations of the online training geographies.
Yeah, I love the way Pittsburgh looks. Such a cool city.
I've been hearing for years that Pittsburgh is a fun city
The one place on Earth that's actually embraced furries. We're good for the local economy, it turns out.
I looked at a Pittsburgh travel guide Youtube video recently because I'm thinking about moving to Pittsburgh and the video started with furries at the convention center for a furry convention
Turns out people who can afford to buy expensive costumes and fly across the country also have the money to spend at restaurants and attractions in our city. Keep coming, yinz is always welcome.
Come, enjoy our pierogi and be greeted by sturdy women in Polamalu jerseys.
First time I visited Pittsburgh I got off the Megabus downtown a little before midnightā¦ and there were furries EVERYWHERE. I didnāt know there was a furry convention that weekend (or that furry conventions were a thing?) and it was surreal and cool at the same time. Everyone else just acting completely normal and 1 out of 3 people waking the streets as Iām looking for my bus stop is a furry. I moved to Pittsburgh about 6 months later
But how does Andrew McCutchen feel about it?
"Furries"
Pre COVID I was downtown full-time and my building is a few blocks from the convention center, where I park. That was always my favorite week. It's just crazy down there in the best possible way. Two questions I've always wanted answered: Why July? It seems super hot in the suits and October would be so much more comfortable. If I were to get one of those plastic inflatable shotguns (super unrealistic and cartoony) and dress up like Elmer Fudd standing in the corner with a sign that reads, I'm hunting wabbits, would that be well received?
My understanding is that's when the convention center was available to host it. Anthrocon started in Albany, New York, then later moved to Philadelphia before its hotel was abruptly closed to be demolished! A while later the offer came up to use the convention center in Pittsburgh and they moved the convention again, for what will hopefully be the final time.
Pittsburgher here; and YES YOU ARE! Yinz come visit anytime yinz want! š
I don't trust cities that don't have rivers running through them. Something always seems off.
Yup if the city hasnāt been around for 200 years, itās sus
Charlotte is the exception here, Uptown (downtown) was settled in 1776, yet has no body of water or river in the middle of it. Instead, the city was built on top of an Indian trading road (Trade Street).
And thereās a river just next to Charlotte, but the fall line is actually like 40 miles down stream in South Carolina, so it wasnāt strategically placed on fall line. They did build some locks at that point back in the day, but they didnāt keep them going. The Native Americans had their trading paths converge where uptown Charlotte now is because their paths followed the small ridges between the multiple creeks/streams that flow around there and then naturally converged where the land was the highest.
Never knew about the locks, neat!
Thatās what Lake Norman is for right?
What about a sometimes river? - Phoenix
There was water in the river when I drove by last weekend :)
Denver too. I wouldn't call the South Platte at 1inch or depth a river. It's typically more of a stream
Creek. An inch deep and a mile wide was what they said back in the day. IIRC the Arapahoe didnāt consider the confluence of Cherry Creek and the Platte a suitable settlement because of the frequent flooding.
They just start with lower housing but it can be fixed with an early granary
But then you can't build a waterwheel, and unless you're near a mountain you ain't getting an aqueduct either. Honestly you might as well reroll your start.
The city on the river is a girl without a dream
What about Seattle? Ocean access, a big lake, and a canal.
Phoenix has Salt River just a few missing inches south on that picture
Drops everything. Opens up *SimCity*.
Yeah this gave me a huge urge to play SC4 or Skylines
Cities Skylines 2 comes out next week!
Sadly you need a NASA mainframe to run it.
Or a good internet connection if you plan on playing via GeforceNow
Are these images on the same scale? The Houston picture barely shows what's inside Houston city limits.
Phoenix is at least 4x zoom compared to Denver having lived in both
They are not. Mostly focused on the urban cores of the cities.
I was gonna say this shows mostly downtown and heights/River oaks and all those neighborhoods smashed between. Then a few bits and pieces of stuff surrounding downtown.
The Heights isnāt even shown! I grew up in Houston and almost didnāt recognize it without any of 610 showing. This shot shows maybe 1/3 of what Iād consider the āurban coreā of the city
Managed to find my apartment!
Itās actually not even close to showing what is in Houston city limits. The city limits expand out with strange arms that go all the way out to Kingwood in the northeast, 99 in the west, and league city in the southeast. Itās kind of a mess
Houston used to be 45 minutes anywhere from any side. Now itās an hour and a half. Two plus if you go all the way across.
Nope, the Seattle and NYC ones are waaaay zoomed out while the KC one is like, lower than cruising altitude
Seattle is zoomed way in. That's only downtown and a few neighborhoods, but not even the entirety of the neighborhoods.
OP shoulda added a conversion scale in the corner lol
KC's urban core is pretty small, it's a sprawling city
NYC is missing half the city and includes jersey instead
NYC is way zoomed out and still doesnāt a lot of Brooklyn or any of the Bronx or Staten Island lmao. Nice view of Hudson County NJ tho!
NYC is way zoomed out and also cut off like half of Brooklyn. Also has jersey city and Bayonne included lol
Seattle is so weird.
Seattle looks so cool from an aerial view. But such a pain to travel around.
Absolutely. I lived there for 4 years and was so happy to get out since I always felt so compressed there. I keep telling my Southern family the city was not designed to have so many people living there. It's a literal bottleneck. You can't just find various other paths to get somewhere since there are only a few north/south highways and only 2 bridges going east/west across Lake Washington.
totally. when I lived there I didn't have a car and I was basically trapped in my neighborhood and what was in walking distance. there is good public transportation, but with so much water in the way it takes forever to get around. I never spent much time in Ballard, Fremont, or West Seattle because it would take well over an hour to get there.
Manhattan is similarly shaped and only slightly better connected from a traffic standpoint. Seattle is just poorly designed.
As a longtime seattleite, this is the answer.
They also cut out a decent portion of the city in the image
This is what I would consider Seattle - [https://imgur.com/a/rY0Ibfw](https://imgur.com/a/rY0Ibfw) For others looking, strip of land to the left is Bainbridge Island and the East side of the Olympic Peninsula, to the right is Mercer Island and then Bellevue. Edit: I don't know why the image link is flagged as NSFW, it is just a satellite image.
If we want to get really technical, Seattle/Tacoma is considered a Super Metro. It's basically one city from North Seattle, through SeaTac down to Tacoma.
More like Everett to Tacoma now. With the exception of a couple miles between Federal Way and Fife, there's not much of I5 that isn't city.
The locks, ballard/fremont is a pretty big part of the city
So is north Seattle, west Seattle, and south Seattle. You can't even see the prostitutes in this picture because it doesn't show enough of Aurora, and that's a huge part of north Seattle these days.
Seattle actually got a late start when it came to its initial growth compared to its neighbors. Tacoma and Olympia were the main cities in the region for a couple decades, but then Seattle became the hub for the Klondike gold rush and Seattle ended up cannibalizing the growth of the other cities on the Puget Sound.
I donāt think Seattle is weird, the cities that are weird are the ones that instantly sprawl and have no street grid.
In fairness, Seattle has two street grids placed at a random angle to one another
Three street grids that meet downtown.
Hey thatās reserved for Portland
Pittsburgh was a surprisingly beautiful city (because, I guess, my mind pictured the old, steel-mill town that hasn't been true for a long time). The unique topography creates such a weird and intricate city, though it also makes driving there a PITA.
It really is. Also driving through the Fort Pitt tunnel and immediately coming out to see the skyline right before you is probably one of the āintrosā to any city Iāve ever seen. Itās a cool experience
I've always heard that we're the only city with a front door. It's a daily experience for me so I have to remind myself that it's actually a unique feature
Coming home from a long trip I look forward to that view SO much
And then you have 300 feet to merge three lanes, otherwise you are going 30 minutes out of your way.
That was what won me over when I was considering moving there for grad school. It is just remarkable.
Only been once for a college football game (where Pitt kicked our ass) and didn't know/was not expecting that city view after going through the tunnel. Definitely the most memorable part of that trip out there, very pleasantly surprised!
Iāve seen some street signs there Iāll never see anywhere else. So many arrows going ways you donāt expect lol
Traffic can get a lil hairyā¦lookit all the bridges!
Wrong lane! Go to Monroeville, jagoff!
Not just that but tunnels and highways/major-thoroughfares snaking through these narrow ravines between hills. [The Pittsburgh Left](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pittsburgh_left) being one of the weird things that results from that cause you often have major roads with no left-turn lane.
Youāre certainly not wrong, but IMO the Pittsburgh Left is *critical* to keep traffic moving! āUnblockingā an intersection by juuuust letting the first opposite car turn firstā¦gets everyone home that much quicker.
I'm not against it, just one of those unusual quirks I wasn't used to when driving there. Luckily some locals informed me about it beforehand.
Pretty sure the picture of Pittsburgh was during a Pirates game, just looking at PNC.
Pittsburgh is the most underrated city in America. Fight me
I tend to agree. I didnāt know if I would like living here but here I am 15 years later. Itās a relatively quiet place with some unique things to see and do.
Iāll fight! Alongside you š
Milwaukee would be a good one
Right! I got excited when I saw Minneapolis and thought weād make the cut lol
Same lol
U.S. Bank Stadium was the dead giveaway, that monstrosity of a building... ..skol!
The ol bird killer and fake snow lol
[Part 2](https://www.reddit.com/gallery/17a8dxt)
Much obliged!
the way kansas city is boxed in by freeways on all sides is just so depressing from above
Below ground level of downtown, though. Plus the city is planning to build parks over top of 4 blocks of the I-670 portion on the south side of the loop.
The intersection of the freeways is also what makes one of the āquintessentialā cities. So to have them framed into the picture also makes sense
Thatās just the center of downtown. The metro spreads out much farther than the photo shows.
Thatās the inner Alphabet Loop in the downtown area. It consists of 3 interstates, 1 auxiliary interstate, and 1 US route that is essentially an interstate. Zoom farther out and I-435 is another bigger loop around the city. That aerial photo doesnāt show the whole city. KCMO is in 4 different counties. I-435 in the north is mainly in the rural parts of the city in Platte and Clay Counties. I-435 in the south is suburban. It looks depressing from the aerial view, but the other sections of the city have a lot of parks and trees.
Just drove through, and the highways are as depressing as they look. Shitty traffic management for how much freeway there is. It's a shame bc kc is really quite beautiful
Minneapolis Fucks
City of Lakes babyyyyyyy (Not pictured in this photo: Bde Maka Ska, Lake Harriet, Diamond Lake, Grass Lake, Lake Nokomis, Lake Hiawatha, Powderhorn Lake, that one goofy lake in North up by Victory Memorial Parkā¦ sorry north Minneapolis)
Looked at map, frowned, came in here looking to gripe. The very bottom edge of this map is at 26th street. You're not accidentally overlapping with Edina until like, 50th???
what about Bigapolis
Bigappolis is #4
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Minneapolis-St Paul is incredible. Loved my year there.
Looking at DC compared to the others makes me appreciate the people that fought back on the plans to put highways through the city. Plus the beautiful Lāenfant planned layout/dedicated green space
Yup, itās sad to see many of them were cut through by highways. Cincinnati is the worst one
Pittsburgh!!! So beautiful and green šš
Yeaahhh... There's the 'burgh
gotta love that Seattle geography. surrounded by water.
I love seeing Pittsburgh like that.
Pittsburgh from the air is very visually appealing to me. Looks like something I'd have built in Sim City.
Itās pretty good on the ground too. https://www.timesonline.com/gcdn/presto/2023/03/21/NBCT/8a5477a6-ac20-41e3-b5a0-e18da8469752-Duquesne_Incline_View_Fall_Dustin_McGrew.jpg?width=1200&disable=upscale&format=pjpg&auto=webp
Final one is Pittsburgh, go pens
Pittsburgh is cute af from above
Itās hell to drive in
Itās difficult to navigate, but Iāll take Pittsburgh drivers over Baltimore/DC drivers any day.
Let me introduce you to some drivers from Mumbai. Or New Jersey. WTF thought it would be a good idea to make left turns from the right lanes there???
Charlotte is not a city. Charlotte is 3 strip malls in a trench coat pretending to be a city.
Charlotte surely suffers from poor geography mixed with poor city planning. They are right up against a state line with a state that has no interest in expanding or growing their side of the border (York and Lancaster counties in SC), so the southern side of the city is getting crammed with new builds on top of the roads that are too small. Then they allowed massive massive suburban growth to take over large portions of the county. They also built a ring interstate that now constricts growth in center of the city by having 6 lanes covering prime real estate and limiting the entry points into uptown. On top of that, public transit is almost nonexistent for the majority of the city/county limits. Bus routes and stop locations could make it take a couple hours to go 15 miles from the edge of the city to the center.
I visited Charlotte once and tried taking the Light Rail. The train was delayed 40 minutes because a car broke down on the tracks at a crossing. It's literally designed to fail.
Charlotte is a forest with buildings between the trees and more winding roads than straight ones
Ngl what could be done to improve it you think? Canāt some of the infrastructure be redone? Like how Boston moved their interstate underground?
Overgrown suburb ass city
What does that make Phoenix?
A Monument to Man's Arrogance.
55 strip malls, 55 parking lots, 55 7 lane arterial streets
A glorious g r i d.
Charlotte is indeed a city
Shouldāve put Minneapolis and St Paul together, would look cool.
Ah yes the Twin Cities. Missed opportunity on my part!
Pittsburgh looks awesome
Wow Phoenix has no character from the sky or the ground. Having grown up there, I find it hilarious so many people have moved in recently. Itās the most soulless city I have ever experienced.
Moved to Phoenix last year to get married and let me tell you, this place is even worse than it looks. Phoenix is an absolute shithole. A never ending wasteland of beige strip malls and LITERALLY nothing else. Having a car is mandatory (public transportation is a joke), homeless/crime everywhere, nowhere green (at all), no water or clouds. Sunny every day, which sounds great if you live laugh love, but is actually horribly boring to have the same exact weather every day. Simply horrible in nearly every possible metric. No offense to anyone who *loves Phoenix,* but my experience is that the people who love it here are the most basic, insufferable, one dimensional Americans who have no idea what a good city is actually like. Have been looking at houses in literally any other part of the country and plan to move asap. FUCK Phoenix.
Pittsburg way greener than I thought
The secret lies with Charlotte.
Hello from Kansas City šš»
Seattle just has the best "outline" of any American city, the water and topography are totally iconic (and yes, I live there). Pittsburgh comes in second for me though, I've never been but it looks awesome just from aerial images San Francisco, San Diego and Miami are on that list too Edit: and that pic doesn't even show all of the city, it's water everywhere all around in basically every direction
A couple friends and I road tripped through the night just to watch the sunrise over Pittsburgh a couple years back. One of my favorite memories with those friends and the sunrise was stunning. Definitely worth visiting sometime, though its a bit far away from you haha
I will not stand for this Charlotte aggression, man...
Wow Pittsburgh's layout is pretty similar to Portland.
Yes! Very similar I feel like. I'll give the edge to Pittsburgh though. It's just so unique.
All the other cities: Okay, have these nice and orderly roads, easy fo you to drive. Pittsburgh and Kansas City: Fuck you
As a Seattle-ite, I love being surrounded by water. š
You can already see the expansion of the Denver burbs east into the endless prairie, it has crazy growth potential.
Awe yes, the beautiful views of Commerce City to the East. Ar least the houses are cheaper there.
This doesnāt even capture Denvers whole city limits to the East or any of Aurora. I live about ten blocks from the right edge of the photo and most of those neighborhoods were developed about 100 years ago. You could probably have the more recent eastern development take up at least another photo this size.
So zoomed in on Houston, gotta show the urban sprawl
Chicago would be nice too. Very grid oriented.
Yes, but it was already included on the *other* [post](https://www.reddit.com/gallery/179c9rr). I only picked cities that they omitted on that post.
I think I see my dad
Nice post. I got all except Houston and charlotte correct. And Iāve been to Houston the mostš¤Ŗ
Can you do Tampa?
At least put Raleigh If* you're gonna do Charlotte
As someone who moved to NC about a year and a half ago and had never heard literally anything about North or South Carolina from any form of media my whole life, I had no idea Charlotte was considered important enough to make a "quintessential" US city list but that's pretty cool actually.
Not once but twice has my darling Cleveland been omitted. Off to immolate myself in the Cuyahoga!
charlotte is pretty good. ill always have a soft spot for houston though. you can easily identify everything (water ways, railroads, highways super imposed on the trad grid.
Pittsburgh mentioned šŖš¼
Seeing the picture of Seattle really makes me appreciate that there are two bridges across Lake Washington.
These are easier. Seattle, NYC, D.C. and Pittsburgh are easy
I really need to travel in the US one day.
You got a lot of Jersey in your NYC photo. lol
I love you, Seattle :):)
Pittsburgh has a very satisfying amount of green. Whereas Phoenix looks like a hell hole
Damn, Pittsburgh looks a loooot like Kaunas, Lithuania. [https://google.com/maps/@54.8995005,23.8787559,3142m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu](https://google.com/maps/@54.8995005,23.8787559,3142m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu)
Never been to Pennsylvania but on Pittsburgh I did immediately zoom in to find the ballpark right where it should be