Most beautiful and ugliest cities in the world?

[swbluto]

I haven't been to too many big cities, but I think Miami is one of the most beautiful out there. The cluster of pearly white buildings in the downtown area looks absolutely marvelous in the mid-afternoon sun.

Anyone know of any beautiful cities?

As for the ugliest, I would definitely say that Sana'a, Yemen qualifies. The buildings look like bunches of beige-colored ant-colonies; they definitely don't seem to know of the existence of color nor glass.

 

[Philistine]

Do you mean aesthetically or in an overall sense (eg including culture/people etc..)?

Houston doesn't look bad from a helicopter I am sure, but it is an awful shithole. Baton Rouge, Louisiana has to be up there in the shithole stakes too.

There is a mining town in Queensland, Australia called Mt Isa. I broke down there for a few days whilst driving around Australia and was forced to stay in a caravan park there for a few days. There are shirts for sale in Mt Isa that say "The best view of Mt Isa is in your rear view mirror"....

 

[The fingers]

Part two answer now 2 up in the index. Use the browser back button. :wink:

 

[SamTexas]

I don't know about Houston. But I'm sure whatever city Philistine is living in is the worst and ugliest city of all.

 

[e-biker]

Thats just his brothel Sam, You can not judge the whole city by just one business. :lol:

 

[nicobie]

Billings, Montana has to be close to being the asshole of America.

 

[Philistine]

I don't know about Houston. But I'm sure whatever city Philistine is living in is the worst and ugliest city of all.

:lol: :lol: :lol:

It is funny because it is true....

I have no redeeming features, and I really do belong in a war somewhere....

 

[SamTexas]

Seriously, the most beautiful city is the one you're currently living in and not willing to move out. For me, it's The Woodlands, a small town 30 miles north of Houston.

 

[e-biker]

That must be close to Conroe I use to fish there as a kid in the early eighties. And yes I agree with you that is very a nice area!

 

[swbluto]

Seriously, the most beautiful city is the one you're currently living in and not willing to move out. For me, it's The Woodlands, a small town 30 miles north of Houston.

Not too bad, lol. Almost looks like an upper-middle class kind of suburb, sort of like Fort Collins of Denver or Madison of Milwaukee. Lynnwood of Seattle's buildings are kind of like that, but it doesn't have any fancy lakes or water bodies.

 

[SamTexas]

That's it. But the pictures are not doing justice to this town. Anyway, center town is nice but the residential area and the many parks are much nicer, to me anyway. One of my most favorite feature is accessibility by bicycle. There is now over 160 miles of pathways and trails. You can get to any house, any business in town by bicycle (not always a direct route though).

 

[Nehmo]

The question must be about how the city looks from afar, or at least from a passer-through. If you allow subjective judgements, then any city can be the most beautiful or the most ugly. One's attitude toward a place, and thus, one's perception of its beauty, is entangled with one's feelings about their experiences in that place.

The new Chinese cities look pretty good to me.

 

[dnmun]

not really when you realize the entire area will eventually be under about 30' of water within a century. along with new york. the cave diving show on nova was showing how there was a previous warming episode where the sea lavel rose 30' in 50 years. but i think 30' in a century is a lock now and maybe 45 is feasible, maybe in as little as 80 years if the heating is faster than that previous episode.

 

[bowlofsalad]

To each their own I suppose, beauty is in the eye of the beholder and so on. This may defeat the purpose of stating things are beautiful or ugly. But, I find the phrase beautiful city to be an oxymoron. A sunset in northern Norway or sitting next to a river Alaska makes any city ever seem like a puddle of vomit we self important humans often congregate and multiply in.

We all can find beauty in all sorts of things, that is great, but my opinion of beauty isn't what you'll find in a city. I've been asking myself nearly persistently what beauty is, why I find certain things so wondrous and others extremely barren and repulsive. Is it nature or nurture? Who knows.

TL;DR Escape the city and there you will find beauty, all cities are ugly.

 

[swbluto]

The question must be about how the city looks from afar, or at least from a passer-through. If you allow subjective judgements, then any city can be the most beautiful or the most ugly. One's attitude toward a place, and thus, one's perception of its beauty, is entangled with one's feelings about their experiences in that place.

The new Chinese cities look pretty good to me.

Yeah. Among Asian cities, I really like Singapore, at least from the pictures.

Thinking there's little chance I'll ever be there, but at least it looks cool in the pictures. lol

Not a city in the modern sense, but it's one of my favorite citadels, if you will. The Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany.

And, oh, talking about palaces... there's one, I can't remember which, that looks exactly like one that I saw in a video game. When I saw it in the video game, I thought to myself "That'd be so awesome if this actually existed in real life", but it actually does!

 

[swbluto]

TL;DR Escape the city and there you will find beauty, all cities are ugly.

Are cities ugly or is it the people?

Methinks you're thinking of the people.

I just see the architecture, the frozen music.

 

[swbluto]

That's it. But the pictures are not doing justice to this town. Anyway, center town is nice but the residential area and the many parks are much nicer, to me anyway. One of my most favorite feature is accessibility by bicycle. There is now over 160 miles of pathways and trails. You can get to any house, any business in town by bicycle (not always a direct route though).

Wow, holy smokes. Is that one of those 'up-and-coming' yuppie magnets that lay down bicycle paths everywhere?

I've noticed a few cities like that. Of course, not *my* city *pouts*, but I've noticed quite a few tech hubs seem to have a thing for well-designed and well-placed bicycle paths, like Seattle (Other cities include Omaha, Nebraska, Fort Collins, Denver and Madison, Wisconsin). Most other American cities seem to make them an afterthought and just lay them out wherever they'll cause the least convenience - i.e., wherever they'll be the least convenient and useful. (i.e., my city. They're still pretty cool for getting to the nearby towns and I suppose they have recreational value for weekend bikers.)

Anyway, you've convinced me to add your city to my bicycle trip. (I was planning on visiting Houston, but had no idea what paths I'd bicycle there. Now I have a good idea, lol.)

 

[swbluto]

Sanaa, Yemen. Ugly, Ugly, UGGGGLY.

They're currently experiencing overpopulation and civil war, and they're looking at increasingly limited resources with dwindling oil production, which is about their only source of wealth. Their future doesn't look too bright...

 

[swbluto]

Do you mean aesthetically or in an overall sense (eg including culture/people etc..)?

Houston doesn't look bad from a helicopter I am sure, but it is an awful shithole. Baton Rouge, Louisiana has to be up there in the shithole stakes too.

There is a mining town in Queensland, Australia called Mt Isa. I broke down there for a few days whilst driving around Australia and was forced to stay in a caravan park there for a few days. There are shirts for sale in Mt Isa that say "The best view of Mt Isa is in your rear view mirror"....

Holy crap, you can definitely tell the city wasn't designed around aesthetics. lol

 

[Nehmo]

... you can definitely tell the city wasn't designed around aesthetics. lol

Some cities weren't designed; they simply grew. Boston was a bunch of cow paths that evolved into roads. But even without the benefit of initial design, the city looks decent by American standards.

 

[swbluto]

... you can definitely tell the city wasn't designed around aesthetics. lol

Some cities weren't designed; they simply grew. Boston was a bunch of cow paths that evolved into roads. But even without the benefit of initial design, the city looks decent by American standards.

I know some cities were built more around functionality and whatever-works than aesthetics; in the case of a pure mining town, I wouldn't expect anything less.

In the case of Boston, as wealth accumulated overtime and the population grew (And people didn't flee as they did with Detroit), investments in gentrification made possible the pretty nice architecture you see in Boston today. According to the google streetview imagery, however, it seems like the roads and sidewalks could use some work and quite a few buildings are showing their age.

 

[dnmun]

none of it matters if it is on a coast. i have been driving a car since i was 13, 54 years, and within another 54 years all those big buildings on fudong will be under water, along with the majority of the world's coastal seaports. this is not a joke.

no icebergs, no ice as far north as 81' 41" this year. i think the greenland ice sheet has started into an uncontrolled melt down that could happen in as short as a decade back to bare tundra from almost a mile of ice. fukashima could be underwater before they can recover the melted cores if it takes them 50 years to finish decommissioning.

 

[swbluto]

Now this palace, the Reggia di Caserta, looks awesome. It's exactly the kind of building and expansive courtyard that I saw in a video game that I thought didn't exist in real life.

 

[dnmun]

just a representation of human slavery that once existed before the french revolution.

you are the one all excited about modern "wage slavery" which still offers people the chance of advancement and mobility.

it is hard to comprehend how hard life was for serfs before the modern democratic traditions were started with the french revolution. the explosion of knowledge as the masses were allowed to study and learn is what drives the modern scientific basis of all our culture.

imagine an average life span of 34 years.

 

[swbluto]

just a representation of human slavery that once existed before the french revolution.

you are the one all excited about modern "wage slavery" which still offers people the chance of advancement and mobility.

it is hard to comprehend how hard life was for serfs before the modern democratic traditions were started with the french revolution. the explosion of knowledge as the masses were allowed to study and learn is what drives the modern scientific basis of all our culture.

imagine an average life span of 34 years.

Ehhh, times were different back then, no doubt. Modern times definitely offer better living standards on several fronts even though, at the moment, it's degrading before our eyes in the USA.

However, back then was a fine example of what happens when the nation's wealth is concentrated into the hands of the few and workers are dirt cheap. They can construct marvelous buildings and estates! So, there's plus and minuses to any given level of wealth inequality. On one hand, you have the common people living like slaves, on the other, they're slaving away building magnificient buildings for the royalty that modern people can admire.

Talking about the wealthiest technology company in the USA, have you heard of Apple's new campus? Supposed to be huge. Doesn't look nearly appealing as the chateuxs of antiquity with their greco-roman influences, however. Just a fine example of what's architecturally possible when a group of people have much of the nation's wealth.