Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
You are full of it. Your post is full of it! You emphasise the difference between Sao Paulo and Rio, but you under-play and overlook the huge geographical differences between Sydney (slightly hilly harbour city), Melbourne (flat river city), Brisbane (inland city), Hobart (nestled at the base of a mountain), Perth (flat, isolated, sprawl, freeways), Canberra (bush, leafy, inland, cold)...wait a minute. Have you ever been outside of America?
Either you go back and change your post, or you spend more time and use a keener eye in Australia please. What's diverse about Italy's cities? Why is the UK more diverse than Australia? Ugh, you're foolish.
They are not homogenous. A writer put it best: “The two big cities of Australia are tonally as distinct from each other as Boston is from L.A. or Lyon from Marseilles.”
I feel like my rankings were more than fair, thank you very much.
What indigenous architectural styles are unique to Australia? Besides Queenslander residential?
Australia's cities diverse in terms of architecture or construct? Lol. Don't make me laugh.
Australia's cities are very similar. The skyscrapers are done in a similar modern construct, with a few smaller buildings dedicated to Georgian or neo-gothic style. You don't have buildings constructed in different layouts, using radically different architectural vernaculars, you don't have a diversity of different colonial influences in your architecture, you don't use any indigenous Australian styles, if there were any...
Is that to say there's no differences whatsoever in Australia, city to city? No.
But the list was meant to emphasize that it had less than others. In some cases, much less. Boston and L.A. have COMPLETELY different architectural heritages, climate, and landscape. No city in Australia captures that difference.
I understand Australians have little dog syndrome, but you don't have to overstate so much. Talk about an exaggeration.
You're only naming geographic influences on different cities. That is a small part of the discussion at hand here.
Then tired skyscrapers, but nothing remarkable or iconic, just tall boxes. yawns
You're describing suburban residential elements and commercial elements that are present across the developed world. From Australia to Canada to the UK to Germany.
"Endless highways"...really? There aren't miles of motorways in Italy and France? There are no parking lots in the UK and Canada? There are no ugly council estates and boring, boxy suburban homes in Germany and the Netherlands?
If you're reduced to attacking the presence of expressways and parking lots, rather than focusing on the dynamism of cities, in your crusade against America, then you're clearly biased.
Your comment on residential housing in America is especially unearned, because I think it's pretty objective that modern suburban housing is far more architecturally diverse than what is found in European suburbs and their dystopian tower blocks.
McMansions aren't same-y country-wide, and the attacks on them usually stem from people who are jealous of their size.
You're a troll, spewing anti-American talking points that are just divorced from reality entirely, or absurd, hypocritical exaggerations that serve to attack America for things every other developed country has.
No, OP didn't say that. You're another insecure foreigner in the world of the "big bad superpower USA" whining that they (rightfully) "win at everything, whaaa".
You're singling out solitary buildings. Pretty buildings. But they don't serve to show that Australian cities are at all diverse from each other as a collective. You have far less indigenous and colonial architectural influences than either the US or Canada or Brazil does.
European cities have thousands of years worth of architectural diversity!! New world cities a couple of hundred at best! Yet we are supposed to think that it's New world cities that are unique! Rubbish!
Now-now Easthome.. enough of the *temper-tantrums* and stating the obvious.
Be careful here, otherwise soon enough you'll be accused of being "dismissive superficial and ignorant" and the rest of nonsense)))
No, OP didn't say that. You're another insecure foreigner in the world of the "big bad superpower USA" whining that they (rightfully) "win at everything, whaaa".
You're singling out solitary buildings. Pretty buildings. But they don't serve to show that Australian cities are at all diverse from each other as a collective. You have far less indigenous and colonial architectural influences than either the US or Canada or Brazil does.
Yep. There are two fallacies that these posters are making:
(1) Diversity of architecture within a city isn't the point of this thread. Yes, Melbourne and Sydney have a mix of modern skyscrapers, cookie-cutter residentials and Georgian/Victorian beauties that escaped the wrecking ball.
That doesn't show diversity between them. It shows both cities are similar!
Both cities have the same standard layout and architectural panache. A random shot of both cities that doesn't show the Opera House, Harbour Bridge or palm trees would be quite similar.
(2) Lots of pretty buildings is NOT diversity. Old German cities are gorgeous. But they are also of the same vernacular. Unless you had a keen eye, you'd struggle telling Rothenburg from the old part of Regensburg. Beauty does not equal diversity.
I'm not saying Europe is hideous. I'm saying that most European cities have the same built vernacular. There is a distinct Dutch architecture such that old Amsterdam looks similar to old Utrecht to old Haarlem.
The European countries with distinct cities have architectural outliers: Roman Rome, Baroque Lecce, Modern Milan, Renaissance Florence, Gothic Venice, Hapsburg Trieste, German Bolzano. That is diversity!
Sydney and Melbourne are remarkably similar in built form and Adelaide, Brisbane and Perth are nothing special.
Last edited by manitopiaaa; 05-05-2020 at 04:30 PM..
Yep. There are two fallacies that these posters are making:
(1) Diversity of architecture within a city isn't the point of this thread. Yes, Melbourne and Sydney have a mix of modern skyscrapers, cookie-cutter residentials and Georgian/Victorian beauties that escaped the wrecking ball.
That doesn't show diversity between them. It shows both cities are similar!
Both cities have the same standard layout and architectural panache. A random shot of both cities that doesn't show the Opera House, Harbour Bridge or palm trees would be quite similar.
(2) Lots of pretty buildings is NOT diversity. Old German cities are gorgeous. But they are also of the same vernacular. Unless you had a keen eye, you'd struggle telling Rothenburg from the old part of Regensburg. Beauty does not equal diversity.
I'm not saying Europe is hideous. I'm saying that most European cities have the same built vernacular. There is a distinct Dutch architecture such that old Amsterdam looks similar to old Utrecht to old Haarlem.
The European countries with distinct cities have architectural outliers: Roman Rome, Baroque Lecce, Modern Milan, Renaissance Florence, Gothic Venice, Hapsburg Trieste, German Bolzano. That is diversity!
Sydney and Melbourne are remarkably similar in built form and Adelaide, Brisbane and Perth are nothing special.
Pretty much. Australia does have some diversity as do most countries, but it is nowhere near as pronounced as what it would be in the US, let alone European countries, which I still think of as the pinnacle in terms of architectural diversity.
As easthome pointed out, it's ridiculous to expect New World countries to match the diversity of societies that have been around for thousands of years.
Pretty much. Australia does have some diversity as do most countries, but it is nowhere near as pronounced as what it would be in the US, let alone European countries, which I still think of as the pinnacle in terms of architectural diversity.
As easthome pointed out, it's ridiculous to expect New World countries to match the diversity of societies that have been around for thousands of years.
Pretty much. Australia does have some diversity as do most countries, but it is nowhere near as pronounced as what it would be in the US, let alone European countries, which I still think of as the pinnacle in terms of architectural diversity.
As easthome pointed out, it's ridiculous to expect New World countries to match the diversity of societies that have been around for thousands of years.
I don't think age has to do with it. Many cities in Europe were still developed using similar architectural styles, it doesn't matter how old it is. I think a number of New World countries do match a number of "Old World" countries in terms of architectural diversity. Diversity being the key term. Diversity isn't correlated to age.
Age alone doesn't make a culture more rich. That's a viewpoint that only Europeans protect, because, well...it's allows them to feel superior about something, I guess.
The Paris suburb here looks like a slightly nicer version of Detroit or Cleveland. The Marseille one looks like a run-down part of Los Angeles while the Toulouse suburb looks like a regular commercial district in Los Angeles. The Lyon suburb looks like it could be in Eastern Europe. The French skyscraper district looks like it could be in Atlanta.
The Paris suburb looks worse than anything I've seen in Cleveland or Detroit, unless you're including an area of urban decay where no one lives...
That just sort of solidified what I meant, by residential areas of European countries being ugly and same-y.
I don't think age has to do with it. Many cities in Europe were still developed using similar architectural styles, it doesn't matter how old it is. I think a number of New World countries do match a number of "Old World" countries in terms of architectural diversity. Diversity being the key term. Diversity isn't correlated to age.
Age alone doesn't make a culture more rich. That's a viewpoint that only Europeans protect, because, well...it's allows them to feel superior about something, I guess.
Not quite. Diversity becomes more apparent with age, because you've got a larger pool of civilizations to choose from. Countries like the US and Australia are legacies of the British Empire. They also have the disadvantage of not having much left over of their native heritage, relatively speaking. Mexico, on the other hand, has a ton of architecture from the pre-Colombian era, with a number of Aztec, Mayan... sites found around.
What you say about Europeans feeling superior about their culture has some merit to it, but it's also due to them taking more proactive measures to protect their legacy, despite having some of it destroyed by war as well.
Just so you know, I'm not in the least bit anti-American. If you go over my posts, you'll find that I'm one of the most pro-US people on this site.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.