Talk:List of cities by surface area

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[edit] Cities to add to the list

I've added these as they both truely appear to be large cities governed by individual city councils. Factoid Killer 12:58, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] London

Somebody recently added London using statistics pertaining to Greater London. Greater London is made up of multiple cities/municipalities each with its own separate governing body. Greater London is a 'Metropolis', not a city. If you want to include London in this list you will have to find the stats for the area of 'London City' alone. I'm almost positive that would place london at the bottom of this list with a giant gap between it and the next largest city. Factoid Killer 14:15, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Further to this, I just looked up the size of the 'City of London'. It comes in at a whopping 2.6km². No wonder this subject has been quiet. Factoid Killer 15:32, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

London is governed by a central council and a single mayor. The boroughs are smaller administrative areas with councils responsibile for some aspects of their own areas. The city of london and city of westminster are old terms used because cityhood used to be granted due to the presence of a cathedral. Greater London is a single political entity for the most part as far as I'm aware - Pear

Greater london is a term to describe the boroughs of London combined, after the GLC (central London government) was scrapped by maggie thatcher in the 80s. (london not really being a single entity thereafter, but needing a term to describe the area formerly covered by the GLC) For about 20 years it was split into a group of councils as mentioned above. Ken is the first mayor of London under the new structure brought in by Blair (single authority blah blah) a few years back

City of London is technically (in modern terms) just a Borough. it is a city in the sense that it was granted a charter by a monarch for having a Cathedral (St pauls) just like Westminster is a 'city' for having it's cathedral. They're not cities in the modern sense though, the Lord mayor is largely hnonourary and both 'the city' and westminster are under the control of the new London Council and ken livingstone. Do what you like with the article though, just thought I might help with the whole 'city of london city within a city' thing - Pear

London is made up of 36 boroughs. Each borough has its own distinct borough council elected by its residents. Some of those boroughs are cities in their own right. That includes the city of London and the city of Westminster. While I agree that greater London itself has a governing authority in its own right, it is still a metropolis made up of multiple cities. As a metropolis it is not comparable to any of the other cities in the list. I say this because the cities in the list are equivalent to each of the individual boroughs of London in terms of their administration. Many of the cities in the list also make up part of a metropolis. If we were including metropolitan areas the numbers you see for surface area of many of these cities would be much larger.


Perhaps we could start another list for metropolitan areas. It would be difficult though because most metropolitan areas are only loosely defined as they have no impact on the administration of said regions. Factoid Killer 00:36, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sweden's huge municipalities...

These should be added to the list if the information can be sourced externally...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_municipalities_of_Sweden_by_area

Will do it when I get time but if someone else beats me to it that'd be great.

Factoid Killer 11:03, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Interesting, but what constitutes a city? Jokkmokk has approx 5500 inhabitants. Orcaborealis 13:50, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

This is a list of all the (present-day) cities in Sweden, taken from the The Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions. http://www.skl.se/artikel.asp?A=5471&C=445 . There aren't any special requirements for a city (such as having a cathedral). --Oami 12:36, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
See also City status in Sweden . --Oami 13:14, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure exactly what constitutes a city but we can't go wrong if we have a reliable source referring to the municipality of a city. I'd suggest Jokkmokk probably isn't one however, I do know that in the UK all it means is they have a cathedral. Factoid Killer 20:22, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

But at least the fact that it has a cathedral usually means it will be a city (St Davids goes against this rule though), and I have to agree, I don't think the Swedish municipalities count as city areas... TBH, I'm not sure whether this list is worthwhile at the moment due to the inconsistency in entries and the hazy grey areas surrounding the definition of city area, metropolis, municipality and such. I'm not saying this should be delted, but at the moment it constitutes a poor article in terms of encyclopedic info. Nikevs 12:24, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

The definition used here is far more specific than any of the other lists of 'cities' which are based on very vague definitions made up of multiple local authorities. This is more about the geographical areas controlled by single local governments than anything. Factoid Killer 12:02, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

This is more about the geographical areas controlled by single local governments than anything. I disagree strenuously with that statement. Local government in Australia consists of a lot of different bodies. Most are shires, which generally are rural areas. I don't think they should be in the article. Some are cities; these are the things you want in the article. Then you have municipalities (I say chuck them out) and towns (a toss up).
I think we better limit this list to areas which (in their own language) identify themselves as cities. For example, Thành phố Hồ Chí Minh (or as we know it, Sài Gòn) should be in the list; it it 2035 km squared, and the "thành phố" bit translates as "city". Don't include shires, don't include municipalities, and for the love of god, don't include American counties. Except when they are cities as well, such as the city and county of Honolulu. Otherwise, this list will be flooded with extraneous entries. --Tphcm 11:20, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Without categorising too much, we should try to use common sense to weed out the silly entrys, re: Sweden, large US counties, etc. Nikevs 23:42, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] China municipalities

Only Chongqqing seems to be in the list. The other province-level cities of China, namely, Shanghai, Beijing, and Tianjin, also have very large surface areas. I'll add them in later if nobody does it first. Polaron | Talk 21:45, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Basically most province-level and prefecture-level cities of the PRC are huge in terms of area. — Instantnood 20:07, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Kalgoorlie, Western Australia

The claim that it is the largest city in the world is created under a very false assumption. (a) That the name of the Local Government Authority in Western Australia is literal. There are many local government authorities in Western Australia with names that cannot be taken literally.

(b) That the Local Government Authority boundary of Kalgoorlie Boulder consititutes the boundary of a city does not take into consideration the finer points of legally constituted or recognised designated localities or townsites, and as to whether the local government authority actually entirely consists of its designated townsite! I think not for Kalgoorlie!

(c) The Local Government Authority of Kalgoorlie-Boulder is indeed large - but there are larger areas in western australia without the word "city" in their names.

All claims in this list need to be scrupulously cross-checked as it denigrates the reputation of wikipedia when such lists are formed on spurious foundations.... SatuSuro 03:10, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

To clarify, the "City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder" is very big, but it is not a gazetted city, despite its name. It is a Local Government Area. "Kalgoorlie" is a gazetted city, but it is nowhere near big enough to top this list. Snottygobble 03:14, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
We should have an article about city status in Australia to go with city status in the United Kingdom. By the way, the largest local government district with city status in the UK is I think the City of Carlisle, which has an area of just over 1000km². Morwen - Talk 06:32, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
It would appear, despite taking it off this list, that some still wish to reinstate Kalgoorlie with its inappropriate fale attribute :( SatuSuro 09:20, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Snottygale and SatuSoru - I don't understand what you mean about Kalgoorlie-Boulder not being a "gazetted" city. Not only does it proclaim itself as a city, it is recognized as such by the government of the state of Western Australia. The same holds for Mt. Isa, except that the state government in question is Queensland. They are both officially cities, and they meet the criteria of the article:

'This is a list of the world's largest cities in terms of their surface area. This list is limited to clear, unambiguously defined, political jurisdictions which (in their own language) identify themselves as cities. This is as opposed to a metropolitan area which may include multiple cities all under the jurisdiction of separate city councils.'

Put both K-B and Mt. Isa back in the list. --Tphcm 06:28, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

"Kalgoorlie-Boulder" does not appear in the Gazetteer of Australia. "City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder" appears, but as the name of a Local Government Area, not a city. The Gazetteer of Australia is THE authority on Australian place names. And it says that there is no city in Australia named Kalgoorlie-Boulder.[1] Be so kind as to leave Kalgoorlie-Boulder off the list until you can cite a source for your position that trumps the Gazetteer. Snottygobble 12:14, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
Is there any official designation to cities in Australia? Local Government Areas of New South Wales seems to have suggested that they are simply LGUs with the word city as part of their names. — Instantnood 22:16, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
In Australia, the word "city" has two distinct meanings. See City#Australia_and_New_Zealand. The problem here is that people have conflated the two meanings and come up with a ludicrous factoid. Hesperian 03:20, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
And may this subject rest in peace SatuSuro 03:29, 29 October 2006 (UTC) (until the next bright spark comes along I suppose... )
Which of the two meanings should be used for the purpose of this article regarding Australian cities? Or perhaps both? — Instantnood 21:28, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:List_of_cities_by_surface_area&action=edit&section=5

According to the article:
This list is limited to clear, unambiguously defined, political jurisdictions which (in their own language) identify themselves as cities. This is as opposed to a metropolitan area which may include multiple cities all under the jurisdiction of separate city councils.
So City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder is a valid candidate for this list (if it's big enough), but Kalgoorlie, Western Australia is not.
On that note, this list badly needs cleaning up if that is its listing criterion. For example, Melbourne is on this list, but it is a metropolis. In this case, the "clear, unambiguously defined, political jurisdiction which identifies as a city" is the City of Melbourne, an inner-city local government area that is tiny.
Hesperian 00:22, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
Is there any institutions for Melbourne or Sydney, with jurisdiction over the LGUs in each of the metropolises (like the Greater London Authority over the boroughs and the Square Mile)? — Instantnood 09:15, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
In fact the Sydney and Melbourne articles are already telling. Shall we remove them from this list? — Instantnood 16:55, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
Re Sydney and Melbourne, their areas are huge if one considers the whole metropolitan area and thus would be high on such a list. This list however clearly states areas must be defined by political boundaries. Melb and Syd cities are relatively tiny areas in the centre of vast Metro areas, and thus should be removed. Probably unfair, but accurate. IN many ways, the definition thus makes this list meaningless. --Merbabu 03:29, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree. The real problem here is the unintuitive listing criterion. Hesperian 03:37, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

Hesperian - I was the person who wrote the listing criterion:

This list is limited to clear, unambiguously defined, political jurisdictions which (in their own language) identify themselves as cities. This is as opposed to a metropolitan area which may include multiple cities all under the jurisdiction of separate city councils.

Can you think of a better listing criterion? I deliberately excluded metropolitan areas, as it is hard to give a precise area. (It's often a little fractally at the edges.) Where exactly do you draw the boundary? Do you use the standards of the country involved? What if the country doesn't have any standards?

You are right - it may be seen as unintuitive. It results in the inclusion of Brisbane - whose area includes the whole of Moreton Island and parts of Brisbane Forest Park; both these areas are virtually uninhabited. Neither of these areas are urban. But they are officially part of the City of Brisbane.

Can you think of a better criterion?

Snottygobble and SatuSuro: KALGOORLIE-BOULDER, CITY OF. Sounds bloody official to me. It's there. The Gazeteer hath spoken. Tphcm 07:06, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Look at the Feature code: "DI" = "Agricultural area, County, District, Local government area, Parish, Region". No mention of the word City there. —Moondyne 07:13, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
Tphcm: Hesperian and Snottygobble are the same user; I changed user name.
Did you read the bit above where I said
"Kalgoorlie-Boulder" does not appear in the Gazetteer of Australia. "City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder" appears, but as the name of a Local Government Area, not a city.
? Hesperian 10:40, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
Tphcm seems to be wishing this list can be expanded so as to include items with really big numbers just so it can be like the Guinness Book of Records and sit alongside a table of records for the number of live goldfish swallowed in five minutes. I cannot help but feel that the basis of this lists existence is flawed and that it has no place in an encyclopaedia. On the surface the criteria is clear, but in practice its rubbery and meaningless and any comparison between list items is meaningless also. Most of the first dozen or so items are not cities as most people understand the term, but vast regions with low population densities which have been given the moniker "city". —Moondyne 14:17, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
Tphcm's attempt to define criteria for inclusion is laudable. I have no objection to the list's existence, but I think the title is inappropriate. Most people would come to this page expecting a list of the big metropolises. Many of them wouldn't even bother to read the criteria. I think this article should be moved to something like List of local government areas by surface area (in which case Shire of East Pilbara would be at number one); and perhaps a new list started at List of metropolises by surface area. Hesperian 21:52, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
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