As with any large city, New York has different sides and I like to explore them all. From the gritty urban landscape to the oases of green spaces to the tight-knit communities and neighbourhoods, I think of large cities in the developed world as having more in common than those cities compared with the small towns within the same political border. For example, the city of Quesnel, BC (pop. 10,000) has more in common with the small towns of Australia than it does with Vancouver, 7.5 hours to the south. Unlike in Quesnel, people in Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal, and Calgary are accustomed to seeing homeless people, paying for parking, and expecting to never see again the umbrella left behind in a coffee shop two days before. Such are the urban realities.
In terms of size, New York City, comprised of five boroughs, has 8.3 million people compared to 5.55 million in the Greater Toronto Area, comprised of six former municipalities. Both are the most populated cities in the country. In the USA and Canada, this is as urban as it gets.
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