gonna disagree with you here. Chapel Hill is a great place to live and you can always find interesting events every night of the week, but I don’t think it rises to the level of !Exciting!. In fact one of its attractions is the option of a slow paced life. It’s a great place to be a slacker.
I think you may have misunderstood the OP.
Hands down, it would have to be Manhattan.
Nah, Westwood Village is dull these days. There’s a little action at the north end near the remaining theaters, but it’s pretty subdued. Third Street in Santa Monica is more lively.
The locals are going through the biggest housing market crash in the country right now. That’s pretty exciting.
I don’t really see what’s exciting about Manhattan/NYC. For the most part, it’s indistinguishable from any other global city.
Chicago sounds like a good bet from Oak’s description but I’ve never been there.
Definitely Manhattan. When I lived there, I was never at a loss to find something exciting to do . . . especially venues in the arts or sports or restaurants. But there are also some quiet(er) areas of Manhattan. I’ve been to other major U.S. cities, and they really don’t compare.
What other global cities are there in North America?
Seriously, if you want to sample the cuisines of a hundred different nations, NYC is your place. And they’re all within walking distance, or at worst a short subway ride, of one another. Ethnic neighborhoods of Lord knows how many ethniciities. I’m familiar with DC and LA, and neither one is a ‘global city’ in the way NYC is.
This can’t be done as a #1 thing; way too many variables. in any order you want,
(places I can verify first hand)
NYC
DC
New Orleans
Vegas
Atlanta
Boston (before 5pm)
(places Dopers I trust have glowed about for years)
LA
Chicago
Seattle
Boston (after 5pm)
As you can see from my location, I have lived in some fairly exciting places.
Hands down, Manhattan is number one.
However, unless you have a boatload of money, NYC is far less exciting…“cheap thrills” are few and far between. To make Manhattan really fun and excting, you need to have a really fun and exciting bank account. Otherwise, it is sad and boring. Yeah, if you are young and dumb, you can find the occasional cheap(er) thrills, but for anyone over 30 who does not earn a decent chunk of change, Manhattan can be pretty dismal.
Chicago is woefully underrated when it comes to fun places to live - it really does have it all - food, theater, music, arts, etc. The problem is, the weather pretty much sucks year round…freezing in the winter and humid and crappy in the summer. You would think there wouldn’t be much difference between NYC and Chicago weather, and you would be wrong; Chicago is the King Of Weathersuck.
Los Angeles gets a bad rap - and yes, it really is 27 suburbs in search of a city…but once you get the lay of the land, there are some really cool places to go and plenty to do. Traffic is a nightmare, but with gorgeous weather and water and beaches and “Hollywood!” and pretty people, boredom is seldom a problem. Then again, if you aren’t pretty and young, you are sort of invisible there…and like NYC, it helps to have a healthy bank account, but you can get away with a little less in LA and still have fun. You do NOT want to live in LA without a car.
Las Vegas has the best of both worlds - you can go to The Strip and go nuts - shows, restaurants, concerts, nightclubs - or you can live like a local and just go to the local casinos for restaurants/buffets (cheaper) and movies and smaller concerts, or you can just live like in the 'burbs and hang out with friends. All budgets pretty much work well. Granted, a bit of heat to consider, but I like it hot and compared to Chicago 85 degrees with 85% humidity, I will gladly take the 110 degree heat with zero humidity here!
Not in the US, but I would rank Berlin as being about equal to fun and excitement of NYC, and cheaper to do so.