Talk:Megacity/Archive 2

UN report states that 33 megacities instead of 43 (in 2018)?
Hi, I was wondering about the number of mega cities. In the UN Report "2018 Revision of World Urbanization Prospects" it states that there are 33 megacities in 2018 and that there will be 43 megacities in 2030. Here on the page it says that there are already 47 megacities. This seems to be a large difference... Could it be that both include different parts of the city (e.g., different definitions of metropolian area?) Full report: https://population.un.org/wup/Publications/Files/WUP2018-Report.pdf Page on megacities: https://www.un.org/development/desa/publications/graphic/world-urbanization-prospects-2018-more-megacities-in-the-future — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.132.127.164 (talk) 06:59, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Istanbul
It is a common misconception that Turks do things properly, so when you get figures from Turkish Bureau of Statistics (TUIK)’s Address-Based Population Recording System (ADNKS) you would think that is a proper estimate of population. Here are the problems with that: our current official definition of a metropolitan area is simply the entire province, including rural areas sometimes over 100km away from the actual metro area (this was done recently as a gerrymandering tactic by the current government which gets more votes from rural areas). This usually results in overestimation of metro areas. However, in the case of Istanbul there is another problem: Istanbul’s urban sprawl has spilled over to the neighboring provinces decades ago, but those bits don’t count in the official figures. This makes Istanbul underestimated. (plus I think the figure here are 2014, so that adds to the underestimation)

The data I provide below are the official Dec.2015 figures (in thousands) from Turkish Bureau of Statistics’ ADNKS as well, but I am using county-level data under the guidance of GoogleEarth as well as first hand knowledge.

Istanbul province 14657 (i.e. official figure for metropolitan municipality). Substract rural Şile and Adalar from this to get 14608.

Uninterrupted urbanization that conects to this: Çayırova, Darıca, Dilovası, Gebze counties of Kocaeli province and MarmaraEreğlisi county of Tekirdağ province. Total population 720, bringing the total of Istanbul “urban area” or “urban agglomeration” (as defined in the respective wiki pages of these terms) to 15328.

In addition to these, there are towns that have daily commuter relations with Istanbul: Başiskele, Derince, Gölcük, İzmit, Kartepe and Körfez counties of Kocaeli province; Çerkezköy and Çorlu counties of Tekirdağ province. Total population 1375, bringing the total of Istanbul “metropolitan area” (as defined in the wiki page of this term) to 16703.

So the correct figure is 16.7 million at the end of 2015.

Note: I'll post a copy of this to talk pages of other population lists in Wikipedia. Nkt777 (talk) 23:02, 6 May 2016 (UTC)

GLARING ERROR!!
Los Angeles greater urban area is NOT 179,000,000(sic!) in population, as currently listed!!!

Maybe 17,900,000 ? Sorry, I don't myself have the exact figures, but somebody needs to correct that error ASAP!!!

Bltzfflk (talk) 20:23, 11 May 2015 (UTC)User: bltzflk (talk) 21:22, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

Wrong numbers for sq miles / sq kilometers
Seoul total population is 30 Million. Total population of South Korea is 56-60 Million. South Korea population 50 Million mark has been surpassed 7 years ago!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Info2beaware (talk • contribs) 03:09, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

A square mile is more than a square kilometer so if you measure an area it will have a lower number of square miles than square kilometers. But in the list, many city areas have the opposite relation. Example: Tokyo	Japan Japan	Asia	34,800,000	2,629/km2 (6,810/sq mi). Which numbers are correct, the sq mi, or the km2? They cannot both be correct. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.191.185.251 (talk) 15:38, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Is this worth a mention?
The list of megacities is from only one source. I have found two other sources which consider three more cities to be megacities. Firstly which shows that both Shenzhen and Nagoya are cities with populations larger than 10 million and therefore a megacity. Secondly which shows the Rhein-Ruhr with a population over 10 million. Eopsid (talk) 15:30, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Madrid Megacity?
In the list appears Madrid, although Madrid is a big city it doesn't have Megacity Status. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Martins (talk • contribs) 00:08, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Contradiction?
In only section it states that there are currently 24 megacities yet later on the page 29 are listed?

New York Gone
Where did New York City go in this list? In the intro it's listed as one of the top megacities in the world, but it's not listed in the "Top 30" (which is actually only 29). Jon VS (talk) 05:33, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Pearl River Delta Economic Zone
A report by the World Bank, East Asia’s Changing Urban Landscape, on page 21, characterises the Pearl River Delta Economic Zone as the largest urban area in the world with a population of 42,000,000. What should this article say about that? Batternut (talk) 10:16, 2 July 2015 (UTC)

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Why is Delhi first???
It has a much smaller population than 15 cities on the list, it should be 16th.

70.27.107.185 (talk) 16:08, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

A wrong name of city
Shenzen should be Shenzhen. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 星の余韻 (talk • contribs) 12:35, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Sao Paulo
São Paulo "is the most populous city in Brazil, the Americas, and in the Southern Hemisphere. The municipality is also Earth's 12th largest city proper by population." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%A3o_Paulo. Nevertheless, it is not ranked in this article and should be.

Xenon chile (talk) 21:23, 10 January 2017 (UTC)

Shanghai second?
The chart shows Shanghai #5 but the second paragraph says it's #2. This might simply be the difference between metro area and city proper, but it's not clear to readers why the chart and the lead don't line up. Why does the chart use a lower population number than the lead? Aristophanes 68  (talk)  20:00, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

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Moscow in top 20 for sure. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.25.177.230 (talk) 08:01, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

Rhine-Ruhr
Rhine-Ruhr had been removed from the list on the basis that it isn't a city, but a region, and thus does not belong on a list of mega cities.

The idea is that a mega city constitutes the metropolitan area, not just the city proper, which is why Keihanshin and (possibly) Rhine-Ruhr get included. Should it be added back or am I misled? ShockedCurve453 (talk) 00:30, 23 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Rhine-Ruhr has no single city as a centre and nowhere within the metropolitan area one get the feeling to stay in somewhat similar to a Megacity. It is in fact a dense populated region with numerous medium-sized and a handful of bigger cities. 46.79.65.78 (talk) 14:06, 8 April 2018 (UTC)

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Indiaonlinepages.com figures
Are Indiaonlinepages.com's estimated population figures OK for use in this article? Eg, Bangalore 12,339,447. Please discuss at WP:RSN. Batternut (talk) 09:14, 13 December 2017 (UTC)
 * That discussion at RSN received no objections to the use of Indiaonlinepages, and was archived here. Hence we consider Indiaonlinepages as RS. Batternut (talk) 23:09, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

Megacity definition
Where does the "usually including a city proper with over 5 million residents" requirement (that you just added) come from? Batternut (talk) 16:38, 24 March 2018 (UTC)
 * That wasn't a requirement but is typically ("usually") the case. In any case, I've slightly rephrased the sentence and placed the ref I forgot to add. Castncoot (talk) 01:35, 25 March 2018 (UTC)
 * @Batternut (talk): Thank you for your significant improvements to the lede. I believe this expansion was necessary. Best, Castncoot (talk) 21:10, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Prior 1825
So London was largest in 1825, but no mention of the city overtaken: article implies Angkor. Paris maybe?120.16.11.145 (talk) 16:00, 3 June 2018 (UTC)MBG
 * Beijing - according to List of largest cities throughout history MBG02 (talk) 11:57, 14 August 2018 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 19:58, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Lahore - panoramio - NAMMEWALLE (52).jpg

Semi-protected edit request on 24 November 2019
A megacity is a city with a population of over 10 million. So, if you go to the wikipedia page about New York City, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City, you'll find a population of almost 9 million. How does that work? Mamamia5x (talk) 04:16, 24 November 2019 (UTC)


 * ❌. It's not clear what changes you want to make. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon &bull; videos) 05:16, 24 November 2019 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 07:07, 28 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Nanjing Skyline 2012.jpg

Which source should we use for all of the megacities' population count?
I think we all can agree that we must use one source of data for consistency, rather than the sixteen sources that are currently use, all of which use different time frames and methodologies. The only question is, which source it should be? I'm in favor of using the latest revision of the UN Urbanization Prospects for the amount of data it provides. It provides a clear methodology, provides sources for cities from every country, and extrapolates the data so it fits the same time frame. We could alternatively use the OECD's or citypopulation.de's data, but we have to have a consistent source, and I think that's final. Abbasi786786 (talk) 14:28, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Sorry, but there's a lot of flaw and inconsistency in that UN source. You can't rank cities if the city definition used is not the same. The UN source use the metropolitan area for Tokyo, Delhi, Sao Paulo, but only the city proper for cities such as Jakarta, Seoul and Tehran. This is completely unfair. Jakarta metropolitan area has a population of over 34 million according to official figure. Seoul is not even considered a megacity by the UN, when in fact Seoul metropolitan area has more than 25 million residents. Bluesatellite (talk) 15:12, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Sorry about the changes I made after, I didn't see those and was going to undo my own change, but you luckily did that for me. OK, so do you have any ideas on alternate sources we could use? You have to admit that the current situation doesn't work very well either.Abbasi786786 (talk) 15:27, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Does OECD even publish figures for other cities worldwide? I think List of metropolitan areas in Europe is a fine example.Bluesatellite (talk) 15:32, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
 * This article as is is confusing for readers. A single source should be used. Having briefly looked at the UN one and tried to find one by the OECD I would suggest using the UN source. As Abbasi786786 says the UN publication has a clear methodology and provides sources. Using multiple sources leads to confusion and may fall foul of WP:SYNTH. As editors we are not experts in statistics or assessment of urban areas - we should just be reporting reliable sources. Where multiple sources conflict the most reliable should be preferred - namely the UN. A clear introduction explaining the limitations of any table showing megacities will suffice. It may be okay to mention specific examples that stand out due to definitional issues about the urban area such as Jakarta but using various sources for different cities suggests using sources to favour the cities placement in the table instead of reporting the source despite its limitations. At the moment the article is of limited usefulness. Robynthehode (talk) 17:16, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
 * UN source does not have clear methodology, as I have proven above. Do you think Statistics Korea and Statistics Indonesia are a joke? UN doesn't even do census, they collect sources from respective countries. This isn't WP:SYNTH at all, if it is then a lot of, I mean tons of, Wikipedia lists are WP:SYNTH as well. I think we should remove the ranking, and place them alphabetically. This article is about Megacity definition, not which city is bigger than that city. Keep the latter to List of largest cities. Bluesatellite (talk) 00:18, 1 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Bluesatellite. You haven't proved anything. You have merely asserted that there are issues with the UN report which they admit to anyway. So you're an expert in statistics and population data? No I don't think other sources for statistics are a joke just that using one source is preferable due to the issues I already highlighted. I didn't say that this article is guilty of WP:SYNTH. Read my statement more carefully. Using multiple sources and the information from them can lead to original research from editor synthesis. I was only mentioning it to make sure this article does not do that. Mentioning that other articles may also be counter to WP:SYNTH is not an argument to why we should not follow Wikipedia policy. If we do use multiple sources in this article then it needs to be made clear the problems with the conclusions each main source states. We already have statements that say there are 33 (UN) and 47 megacities in the article. Robynthehode (talk) 06:59, 1 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Here are some of reliable sources The Guardian, The Japan Times, CNN, and The New York Times. All of them called Jakarta a "megacity" of over 30 million. This is the official source from the government of Indonesia which reported a population of 33 million for Greater Jakarta. We can't rely solely on the UN source, when it's proven inconsistent and invalid. The UN putting Los Angeles way above Seoul is laughable. Seoul is very densely populated, while LA is more like a large suburban sprawl. Bluesatellite (talk) 07:19, 1 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Have you actually read the UN report? Or at least the sections on methodology and the limits regarded the data supplied by countries? The UN report says "Definitions and criteria to delimit cities and urban areas vary across countries.** Population data on urban residence for a given country may include geographic areas that would not fall within the urbanized territory according to standards applied by other countries. For example, the “city proper”, defined by administrative boundaries, may not include suburban areas where a substantial portion of the population working or studying in the central city resides. Furthermore, in some cases, although governed by different local authorities, two or more adjacent cities may form a single urbanized area. For this report two supplementary concepts have been used to improve the comparability of information about city populations across countries and over time. “Urban agglomeration” refers to a contiguous territory inhabited at urban levels of residential density, while “metropolitan area” comprises an urban agglomeration and surrounding areas at a lower settlement density but with strong economic and social linkages to the central city."
 * Regarding your reliable sources the Guardian says: "the population of Jakarta has more or less stabilised, at 9.6 million, with roughly 30 million in the greater urban area."; the Japan Times talks only of Greater Jakarta; CNN does not define what area is covered (Jakarta or Greater Jakarta); and the NYT says "(Jakarta) with a population of about 10 million (and) when combined with the neighboring cities of Bekasi, Tangerang and Bogor, it forms a vast, teeming megacity of more than 30 million people". So you are cherry picking which version of the Jakarta area to use even using your sources. You nor I are experts (although you seem to assert you are by making statements such as 'The UN putting Los Angeles way above Seoul is laughable.' and 'We can't rely solely on the UN source, when it's proven inconsistent and invalid'. How have you determined these two assertions? What is your methodology? What sources have you used?. And you do realise that news organisations themselves use various sources that may use certain criteria and editorial decisions to report the figures they do? This is a minefield but making unsubstantiated assertions and cherry picking sources that agree with your POV is not the way forward. Let's try to clarify and report what reliable sources say. One possibility is to come to consensus to use two main sources and report the figures for each in the table and let the reader decide by following relevant links. Thanks. Robynthehode (talk) 09:45, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

You missed my point, but it's alright. I have already even provided (above) official sources from their respective governments for both Seoul and Jakarta that largely contradict the UN so-called urban agglomeration figure. What can I say? Okay, so here's my proposal:

I adopt the table of List of metropolitan areas in Europe and list the megacities alphabetically. It would definitely solve the debate "this city is bigger than that city". Let the readers sort the ranking based on available (and comparable) sources. If OECD figures are available for all cities worldwide, then we could add another column as well. Thoughts? Bluesatellite (talk) 11:05, 1 April 2020 (UTC)


 * I like this idea! Thanks for considering my problems with the current style! Abbasi786786 (talk) 20:47, 1 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your efforts to come to a compromise. Maybe I did miss your point. I think your solution is a good one due to the conflicting information from the sources. Please go ahead and change the table and we will see what other editors say. Robynthehode (talk) 11:18, 1 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Done! Bluesatellite (talk) 15:17, 1 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for all your hard work. I think this is better than previously, giving both the information about the cities and populations but also clarifying the way various organisations interpret the data. Robynthehode (talk) 15:24, 1 April 2020 (UTC)