Why and How did New York (Manhattan, specifically) become the greatest city on earth?

In My Humble Opinion
41

I love NYC and would move back in a heartbeat if I had the money or was once again young and stupid.

NYC is a magnet - it brings all cultures together in one tiny spot, bringing with it the amazing diversity of style, art, music, food, traditions - you name it, NYC has it. Just walking a few city blocks in NYC makes it abundantly clear you are not in Kansas anymore - nor are you anywhere else but NYC.

There is a “vibe” and personality in the city. I don’t really know how to explain it, but you really feel like you are surrounded by all of humanity - the good and the bad - and the best of the best rise to the top.

NYC is not for the timid or the mediocre - they don’t last long. NYC is brassy, loud, obnoxious and pushy; you have to walk fast, talk fast and grab opportunities quickly. For the city that never sleeps, you snooze - you lose.

NYC is not for everybody, but if you have ever lived there you know that is not a bad thing.

42

New York was the center of immigration. Baltimore was the only other city on the east coast to have a decent immigration wave, and that was nothing compared to NYC. Millions of immigrants came to NYC only to find the money ran out so they couldn’t go any father and they stayed.

NYC also had the great foresight to put it’s public transportation UNDERGROUND and did this early on before it became cost prohibative to do so.

This allowed Manhattan to build up far more than if it waited for the subways, such as Chicago did.

But NYC had declined, it lost it’s postioning to Chicago as the natinon’s leading manufacturing center in the 70s. (Chicago lost it to Los Angeles in the 80s and currently NYC is now third.). It was in financial crisis throughout the 70s and didn’t start to rebound till the late 80s.

NYC is now great because it’s so big. The biggness itself is the greatest factor. It’s doubtful any American city will overtake NYC. Los Angeles is the only realistic candidate for that and that could take another 75 years to do so. (I’m talking city limits not metro areas)

But it was the immigration that drove NYC. While Boston and Philly had their slums and such it was NYC that was notorious for having the worst of the worst. It was also Boston and Philly that had the “cream of society,” for most of American history.

In the south Baltimore had a decent sized immigration port but it was only a fraction of NYC and slavery had limited that. Baltimore was also limited by Washington DC. Baltimore got the manufacturing and port and such while DC was taking all the educated classes, so Baltimore, which at one time was the nation’s second largest city, could never achive it’s full potential.

So immigration and early public transportation were the two strongest keys to what made NYC the biggest and greatest American city

43

I cannot imagine why I included Vegas as a good place to live. That’s just idiotic.

44

No it isn’t. Vegas is a great place to live. Much better than SF, that’s for sure.

45

Having been to both places (and being born in SF), I’d choose SF any day of the week. But I love fog.

46

**Colibri **said it best.
Its ecological history can be seen in Manahatta, .written by Eric W. Sanderson and published in the city’s 400th year, 2009. It has impressive color plates juxtaposing current air photos with the same area as it looked 400 and fewer years ago. A fascinating read or reference tome. http://www.amazon.com/Mannahatta-Natural-History-York-City/dp/0810996332

47

Psh, LA is already greater than NYC. As for size, when more people realize they can go to the beach in December, they’ll get their asses over here. Not everyone considers the odds of dying in a snowbank to be that impressive :stuck_out_tongue:

48

Hey…I live in Las Vegas and love it here. As you can see from my location, I have lived in quite a few large cities, so I think I can speak from some experience.

I love the weather (yep, even when it is 115 degrees) and I love the endless sunny days and wide open expanse. You can go to The Strip and see world class entertainment - be it Vegas shows or touring acts. Great restaurants, clubs, shops as well as nature parks and lakes - even Mt. Charleston where you can go skiing in the winter is just 45 minutes drive from The Strip - whatever you want - it is here. And although the economy currently sucks big time - especially here - there is still a strong core of locals who live and work here and and come from all over the world.

As I mentioned upthread, I truly love NYC - and as far as that goes, I loved LA, Berlin and Chicago as well. I consider myself fortunate to have lived in some of the most exciting cities on earth - and I count Las Vegas as one of them.

49

Tokyo would be the greatest city on earth except that it keeps on being destroyed by Godzilla.

Seriously though, I find it very fascinating to compare Tokyo and NYC. They are so similar yet so very, very different. I’ve never lived in Tokyo for longer than a few months at a time, so I’ll let somebody more knowledgable speak up first. If nobody does then I’ll open my baka mouth.

50

I would apply the same description to London. To be fair, I think London and New York are very similar cities in many ways – they are both much closer to each other in culture than they are to their respective countries. I could happily live in either and get the same from life.

51

This method of comparision seems a little bit idiotic.

First, it has nothing to do with what the OP originally wrote. Unless you’re one extremely powerful individual that belongs to The Powers That Be, the place your city has in international politics has little to nothing to do with your life as an average city dweller (in that case, is Brussells the most powerful city in Europe? Hmm…)

Second, only two non-Capital cities, for all the others their influence is of course totally linked to the fact they’re where the main institutions of their countries are located (not that they dont have influence of their own, but when you say Paris you think French government, when you say London , you think Brit Government, and so on). Mixing the two in the same Top 5 is proof of my following point 3.

Third, this is the typical bull you’ll get in any economic or foreign policy magazine with pretenses of seriousness (or pompousness), their panel/Top 5/ our magazine’s list of is the exact equivalent of the supreme diet method you’ll find in your women magazine. It’s out of the ass, unsubstantiated except by the firm convictions of the editor (“Hey, I went to Honk Kong last April, this city rocks. It got me a chance to work on this new miracle diet I’ve discovered too by the way. Ain’t life amazing in the magazines?!”). In short , I would wipe my ass with it were it no preemptively made of shit.

Now, to the OP subject, nope NY probably aint the greatest city in the world, it probably lacks a millenia or two to even make it to the top 5. Sorry, that’s always gonna be a crucial factor in assessing who’s part of that select club. And N-Y doesnt cut it in terms of history, at the very least. In terms of architecture (heavily linked to the history clause, obviously), I could cite a dozen cities that top N-Y any day.
It’s probably a great place to live in, got a lot of influence for/as a non governmental city, is very present in our movie influenced culture, and could be included in a top ten I guess. But here you’re just showing on a local level what Americans are so famoulsly known to do, no matter what: establishing home country/city/county/neighborhood/floor/favorite room in your flat as the best in the world while having little to no experience of anything else to compare it to.

Come back when you’ve traveled. Try non Western cities.

52

Part of it may be the ‘promise of america’ and that NYC was the gateway that many immigrants had to use.

53

Hot pastrami.

54

Well that settles in then

55

That and the fact that Buenos Aires is the greatest city on earth.
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What?

56

You got it. From S J Perelman’s Westward Ha. Perelman and Al Hirschfeld sail into Hong Kong, and stare at the magnificence of the city. Al says “You know what I’d do if that were mine?” He answers himself: “I’d trade it all for a hot pastrami sandwich.”
My mother’s favorite line when we lived in the Congo.

57

My answer: immigration. New York was the gateway for immigrants from Europe, from Ireland, from Germany, from Italy, from Russia where my ancestors came from. That hotbed of diversity made the city great.
I like San Francisco, but when I went back to NY for 3 weeks 2 years ago I was energized again. Everyone moves faster. Such a diversity of entertainment, art, museums, stores. I love cities, I’ve been to lots and lots of cities, but New York is still tops.

58

How? Because London forgot to send in the $20 application fee one year and just gave up after that.

59

One thing I can answer is how NYC overtook Philly which was #1 in the US in 1800. It was the Erie canal.

But there is really something different about NY. I lived there for two years in the early 60s and I would go back in a minute. Why don’t I? One thing: health care. Canadian medicare is so far superior to anything in the US that you cannot compare them. No copay, no doughnut hole, you pay your taxes and you get your care.

60

New York’s greatness is a rumor perpetuated by Chicagoans to keep their city from getting too crowded…