Talk:List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits

Cities vs. metropolitan/intercommunal entities

The problem with the list in this article is that it sorely lacks a definition of what is exactly a city/town as an administrative unit. Therefore, the article is basically comparing apples and pears. Let me precise this: at first glance it may seem easy to say what is a city/town, and what is not, but actually, if you look at things in detail, the situation is extremely blurry. In many countries, there is no such thing as a clean-cut city/town that we can easily differentiate from other administrative units. A few examples: starting with English speaking countries first, in the UK and Ireland there are no administrative units that are called "city" or "town". In the UK there exist cities and towns, but they are not recognized as administrative units. "City" is a honorific title that is dearly sought in the UK, and granted by the queen, but it is not an administrative unit. For instance, Truro (19,000 inhabitants) is the capital city of Cornwall, and was granted city status by Queen Victoria in 1877. However, the city of Truro is not an administrative unit. Truro is located inside the district of Carrick (88,911 inhabitants), which is the lowest level of administrative division (Carrick is divided into wards, which are electoral units only). So here we have a city that is not an administrative unit.

Another example: Guildford is a town (failed to obtain city status in 2000) which is the county town of Surrey. The town of Guildford (66,000 inhabitants) has its own mayor, elected every year. However, the town of Guilford is not an administrative unit, but it is part of the borough of Guildford (128,944 inhabitants), which is much larger than the town of Guilford, and include other towns such as Ash for instance. The borough of Guildford is headed by a "Chief Executive", which is clearly distinct from the "mayor of Guildford". Again, the borough of Guildford is divided into wards that are only electoral units. There is not even a "Guildford ward", because the town of Guildford is the reunion of several wards of the borough of Guildford. So again we have another very blurry situation, where a town/city does not really correspond to any administrative unit.

Other examples across Europe: in Portugal there are no "cities" (cidade) either. The lowest level of administrative unit is the parish (freguesia). Above the parish is the "council" (concelho). Councils are quite similar to rural districts in England, or civil townships in the US. However, a few councils are very urban and more akin to what we think of as a "city". Above councils are districts (distritos), which are quite similar to English or US counties. Now, the figure given in the list for the city of Lisbon is in fact the council of Lisbon (564,657 inhabitants). The council of Lisbon has no mayor, but it has a president. Below the council of Lisbon are parishes with each their president of parish assembly. Above the council of Lisbon is the district of Lisbon (2,135,992 inhabitants), with a civil governor at its head. Does the city of Lisbon correspond to the council of Lisbon? or does it correspond to the district of Lisbon? Again a very blurry situation.

In Poland, there are powiats, which are like English districts or US townships. In very urban areas, some powiats were made municipal powiats, and the figures in the list for Polish cities refer to municipal powiats. However, in the case of Warsaw, the municipal powiat of Warsaw is headed by a president (not a mayor), and below it are several independent municipalities with each their own mayor. So here we come to an important point, we need to distinguish between a "city" properly speaking, and a metropolitan/intercommunal entity. The municipal powiat of Warsaw is clearly a metropolitan/intercommunal entity, made up of independent municipalities with each their mayor. Nonetheless, it was included in the list. On the other hand, the Brussels Capital Region, which is also a metropolitan/intercommunal entity with a minister-president at its head, and several independent municipalities below, with each their mayor, was not included in the list. So why was the municipal powiat of Warsaw (494 km²) deemed to be a city and included in the list, when the Brussels Capital Region (161 km²) was not? Here there is a total lack of coherence.

Another metropolitan/intercommunal entity is Greater London. Greater London is not a city properly speaking (despite it being headed by a so-called "mayor"), but it is a metropolitan/intercommunal entity called Greater London Authority (1,580 km²). The word "mayor" in itself means nothing. There are entities that are clearly cities but which do not have a mayor (such as Paris until 1975), and there are entities which have a so-called "mayor" but which are not cities properly speaking (such as Greater London or the municipality of Chongqing in China). Greater London is made up of independent municipalities, called boroughs, in exactly the same way as the Brussels Capital Region and the municipal powiat of Warsaw, and the London boroughs have mayors, and sometimes even city status (e.g. the Right Worshipful Lord Mayor of the City of Westminster). London boroughs even freely twin with other cities of Europe or the world, such as the borough of Croydon which is twinned with the city of Arnhem, Netherlands. Greater London, on the other hand, never twins with other cities, as it is not a city itself.

So here is the point: we have to decide whether or not we include metropolitan/intercommunal entities in the list. If we do not include them, then we ought to delete Greater London and Warsaw from our list. If we include them, then we must not only include Greater London and Warsaw, but we must also include Brussels Capital Region, Urban Community of Lyon, Urban Community of Lille Métropole, and so on.
Now please express your opinion on this, but without threats or personal attacks. Thank you. Hardouin 15:56, 15 March 2005 (UTC)

A very erudite contribution Hardouin, which clearly shows that this list is meaningless - it's impossible to compare things properly without clear definitions of what you're comparing and as the countries in the EU have different definitions of "cities" (as you have amply demonstrated) the task is impossible.--62.140.211.130 13:42, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

It seems deeply wrong to me to compare French urban communities with something like Greater London. The former are just intercommunal organizations with no real authority. Greater London may not exactly be a city, but it's more like a city than it is like a French urban community. 150.250.188.180 (talk) 15:54, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Just passing by, like 16 years later... but... and with all do respect, you're very wrong about Portugal, and you're making several confusions. Yes, there are cities in the country. The ideia that Lisbon is not a city is, i'm sorry, just absurd, considering that in the 12th century royal documents called it a "civitatem". And Coimbra, a "civitatis", and so on. First of all, one should understand when the country was around in the 12th century, cities began to be the main place of one diocese, the seat of the bishopric, with its several parishes ("Freguesias"). These are the very first "Portuguese" cities", type of cities that wen can call "historical", or "head of a diocese".
Now, lets not make a confusion here. A city is not only where the bishop administrates a particular diocese, it's also a prestigious location, and later would be an official municipality, by royal chart, that bestowed to that particular place its internal organization (political, economic, civil life, privileges, laws, etc). I'm not going to talk about the long history of Portuguese municipalities. Now with time, other places were granted the rank of cities, like every other place could also be granted the second level of vila (town, i presume).
Like for example, Funchal, in Madeira, that by royal chart in August of 1508 the town was granted the top level of a city (cidade) - and quoting with bad fast translation and adapting its main text - "we hope with the help of Our Lord that the aforementioned town, that has grown and has many knights and nobles and with good service of their residents and commerce and bla bla bla by my (own) good will we (the King) by this letter from now on we made it a city and should have all the insignia and privileges, freedoms and bla bla bla of every other city of our kingdoms as long as they follow and respect this and that". This are what we can call a city by a decree. All this type of cities in Portugal, throughout history, has an official published text, either royal or later from 19th century on by government decree. Some cities have asked to the executive to be ranked as city or town, others like Funchal were recognized as you can see by royal decision.
It's true that in several different eras the municipalities were organized in different ways. By the 19th century, the Church organization of places was secularized, so freguesias (parishes) were civil parishes, within one particular municipality. This was the political, administrative organization of places. Districts were more about historical regions, and as we speak they have little to no interest. However, places themselves didn't lose their status of city or town, as you can see in the official flags of the municipalities.
What you have said in 2005 about the civil governors it was simply not true. They didn't have any true powers in each municipality, they used to run powers like police forces and that kind of administration in a different level. They were exctint few years later, because they lack any real meaning.
About Lisbon there is no blurry situation whatsoever. You're just making a lot of confusions, sorry. It's quite clear, actually. The municipality of Lisbon had an elected mayor in 2005, like today, or like in 1976. Mayors in Portugal are elected to run one municipality. Nothing more, nothing less. This is running for several decades. In Lisbon, like in every single municipality in Portugal, there are elected presidents of parishes with their own assemblies, an elected mayor, and an elected Parliament with deputees. ALL presidents of each parish, are also elected to each Municipal Parliament.
Now, the city of Lisbon didn't have official boundaries in the middle ages, but by reading the royal charts, the city was implied to be inside walls. With time, more walls were built as the city grew outside its walls, and with more time, charts defined the boundaries of each parish, especially from the late 17th century on. With modernity, decrees defined what parishes defined the city.
So, in conclusion, the limits of the city of Lisbon are very clear defined, like in other cities, and they correspond entirely to the municipality of Lisbon. The city of Lisbon is BOTH an honorific and an administrative unit. And like i said about Funchal, a city was granted few official privileges too. The administration could run alongside clear defined privileges by the actual urban rank of one place. Just because one read things here and there, that alone does not define what is the reality in one country. So there are half a million residents as we speak in the city of Lisbon. Clear as water. At this level, Portugal is well organized. Not our fault that foreigners don't understand it. Sorry for the bad English here and there, too late to be writing this --Good Hope Phanta (talk) 02:15, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

There are to COMPLETELY DIFFERENT levels in portugal. The civil status and the administrative status. A civil definition can classify a place as a City(cidade), village(vila) or even as a setlement(aldeia/povoado) but the oposite can occur since a borough/neighbourhood/parish can be at yhe same time a city/village and a borough of another city/vilage while they are divided into municipalities and/or parishes(freguesias) withour an direct correlation to their status as cities/villages/towns.

For example the entire municipality of Lisbon is THE city of Lisbon but Sintra (64th on the list) is a municipality in wich the center is the village of Sintra with roughly 200 inhabitants but the parish includes also the Penha with 14.000han and most oof the population lives on the cities of Agualva-Cacem with 80.000hab and the villages of Algueirao and a dozen others. Gaia also has a lot of villages around the city.

Portugal as a hole is very fractured due to having historically been run by the populace instead of a strong feudal system so there were always a lot of "free towns" and sall settlements instead of larger cities/vilages and these sall settlements all have city/village status even in the midst of larger metropolitan areas thus a municipality isnt a city but a group of 5-50 cities/towns crammed together. Sotavento (talk) 19:29, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

Lisbon metro area has some 30 cities in 20 diferent municipalities and 150 villages with roughly 2,5M-3M inhabitants in the metro area.

Lisbon municipality is 100% a city with some former vilages/cities downgraded to parishes and the urbanization continues to the neighbouring municipalities (borders randomly defined between municipalities)

Other cities in portugal are much smaller than their urban municipality or even isolated towns i n the middle of nowhere.

Any atempt to compare directly with spanish french or any other european urban division is meaningless ...Sotavento (talk) 19:34, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

Cities vs. metropolitan areas

Hardouin claims to have a great deal of knlowledge of demography yet fails to distinguish some major differences bewteen cities/towns and metropolitan areas. Hardouin doesn't realize that sometimes "less is more". I guess that's the way people in France work. In fact, the French concepts Hardouin uses are in no way, applied by a large majority of the World's statistical agencies.

NOW with regards to the list and Harouin's observations.

a:) the link provided by Hardouin from Insee is incomplete because it gives only partial information about the French cities as of 2003. It is BY NO MEANS a CENSUS ESTIMATE. As Hardouin might have realized it is based on a survey based on a really small percentage of the population ( 8 % ) and in itself claims to be inaccurate by at least 500 people. Also it gives imprecise information with regards to the total population of the city. That Insee survey is there to show the population city tends and not a census estimate. I believe it's not too hard to distinguish between a Census Estimate and a temporary, imprecise data with regards to the population of the cities. Hardouin, understand that this page deals with precise CENSUS ESTIMATES as such, not just showing the city trends with regards to its population as this INSEE publication does. If you could find a precise statistics from Insee I would be more than welcome to put it in.

b:) The English updates on this page are inaccurate because, in fact, they include metropolitan areas City of Bradford Metropolitan District and not the city of Bradford itself and/or the Largest Settlement of the City of Bradford Metropolital District. The same applies to Leeds and to other cities who had a major increase of their population onm the UK figures list. Furthermore, the same also applies to Leeds which is a city that is included in the Metropolitan Borough of the City of Leeds. I'd like to focus your attention of the fact that the "Metropolitan Borough of the city of Leeds" has no city rights, it is in fact a borough, while the city of Leeds does. I do believe London is a complicated case and maybe it should be divided into boroughs, yet against it are the facts that a:) London has a mayor for all of the metropolitan area, b:) no borough has the status of a city except for Westminster and the city of London "The Square Mile", c:) the residence of the Queen and parliament are actually located in Westmister yet London still claims to be a capital of the United Kingdom. d:) The Lord major of the city of London (square mile) has only ceremonial functions therefore it shows the ceremonial status of the entity, 2:) The mayor of London is yes, A MAYOR, an does not resided in either borough of the "City of London" (The Square Mile) or in Westminster.

c:) With regards to Belgium it's as clear as it gets. All the cities within the Brussels Capital Region have a status of a municipality including the city of Brussels itself as well as places like Ukkel, Anderlecht etc. The metropolitan area for Brussels can be included in Hardouin's western european "urban areas" list.

d:) Hardouin is totally confused with Poland and I mean totally. Hardouin, for your knowledge I have lived in Warsaw for 5 years and speak Polish. None of the Warsaw boroughs have ever had a status of a city or municipality except for Wesola (which was a separate city before 2001 and was never part of Warsaw before since Warsaw was created). The word gmina that Hardouin claims he knows the knowledge of is not equivalent of the French word "commune". I will say that in French because Hardouin fails to understand the simple English. Le mot "gmina" n'equivaut pas a une commune en France et aucun des gmina urbains de Varsovie n'a jamais ete une ville ou municipalite separee" The boroughs of Warsaw had a status of an urban gmina between 1990 and 1999 but by no means no urban gmina had a status of a separate town/city or municipality, neither on paper nor in practice. Gmina is in fact a subdivision of a powiat. Furthermore, Warsaw got rid of that system in 1999 and now each of its 18 subdivisions is called a dzielnica (borough) Another issue is a powiat. Hardouin fails to understand that powiat is a regional subdivision of a voivodship and that in fact, each of the 16 voivoships is divided into powiats. Some (larger) municipalities have a status of a "miejski powiat"(town powiat) and some don't. Those that do, include ALL and I repeat ALL the city limits within the miejski powiat. There is absolutely no exception to that in all of Poland. Furthermore, for his knowledge, miejski powiat and a rural powiat, for example that of Wroclaw, have 2 completly different powiat local governments. It's not that difficult to understand and in my minds seems clear-cut.

e:) Hardouin should know that Serbia & Montenegro and Croatia are not scheduled to enter the E.U. at this time and in fact only Croatia started any negociations. The only countries that are scheduled to enter it are currently Romania and Bulgaria. Furthemore, Hardouin managed to put that information back on the list yet failed to correct it in any way, for exemple he left Belgrade with a very imprecise number of 1.700 000 inhabitants (that's a very old data). Hardouin claims having a good demographic knowledge yet fails to understand its basic concepts, his knowledge is reflected well in not correcting the erroneous yet very obvious Belgrade data.

f:) I currently work at Statistics Canada and indeed the "urban zone" concept is a french concept and is not commonly used throughout the European Union. The so called list of "urban zones" Hardouin created and recently updated fails to include urban areas such as Tricity with over one million habitants. Please, Hardouin, correct your "urban zone" list because it leaves a lot to be desired. It also surprisingly divides the Ruhr Area into two?!? Sounds bizarre? I would say, very!

g:) The goal of this very list is to present PRECISE city/town/municipality CENSUS or CENSUS ESTIMATES, I repeat "census" or "census estimates" not any imprecise info with regards to the city population. If Hardouin will manage to find the precise French info, not based on an small percentage sampling ( 8 % ) and that does not say it may be wrong by more or less 500 people. I will be more than keen to include it.

h:) I, for once, am a believer in a concept that "Less is more" and managed to put up a perfect and a very comprehensive list to the public. It does deal with complicated issues in an uncomplicated manner. I do not believe that this list should have bureaucracy-like explanations. It has to be clear-cut and precise. I guess in France, bureaucracy is what makes things go around. :)

VicFromTheBlock 19:57, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

VicFromTheBlock, your answer is so crazy I feel a bit bewildered... First of all, will you please stop refering to French this, and French that. I am not even French myself for God's sake! I am English!! And yes, I lived in France for many years, like many English people do these days. So I find your nasty comments ludicrous.

Number two, there are so many erroneous things in what you say. I did not add Serbian or Croatian cities for one!! Someone else did, but not me. As for Belgrade, well, I am not in charge of verifying any single data in this list. I only correct things that I know, not things that I don't.

Number three, the concept of urban areas is not a French concept at all !! Here in England the UK National Statistics computes "urban areas", and officially so, and they have done it for a long time, maybe before even the French. In France they compute so called "unités urbaines", in other countries they have other names. Urban areas are well recognized all across Europe. Metropolitan area are not, not yet.

Number four, Tricity is indeed included in the list of urban areas of the European Union. Double-check. It's listed under Gdansk.

Number five, a lot of your data here are only very rough estimates, and not census estimates, for example Spanish or Italian data, or even English data. Since the last censuses in these countries, the estimates for following years are calculated only with small samples, exactly like in France. So either you delete all, or you leave all. You choose. Furthermore, France conducted its last census in 1999. There will be no more censuses after 1999. From 1999 on, the figures officially given by INSEE for big cities will only be estimates based on samples of population, so in your strange vision of reality, French cities will for ever keep their 1999 census figures. Now that's interesting!

Number six, the meropolitan borough of the City of Leeds DOES HAVE city rights. You should double-check your facts before making peremptory statements. I suggest you visit their website. The metropolitan borough of the City of Leeds is headed by a mayor, and behaves like a a city. There is no such thing as a "City of Leeds" existing inside the metropolitan borough of the City of Leeds. The metropolitan borough of the City of Leeds has 715,200 inhabitants. I don't know how you got your figures of 443,247 inhabitants for the City of Leeds. Probably by grouping some wards at the center of the borough, but then that's total nonsense. If you're not convinced, send an email to the City of Leeds, and ask them.

Number seven, you seem to believe that this article is YOUR article, and that anyone foolish enough to dare change something deserves eternal damnation. On Wikipedia, articles are nobody's property, and they can be edited over and over. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly and redistributed at will, do not submit it. Hardouin 22:27, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Out of Polish metropolitan areas, 2 are indeed polycentric. There is clearly no such a thing as Gdansk urban area. The urban is called Tricity and consists from 3 main cities and other urban areas. Certainly Gdansk is not the only center for this area. The same very applies to Upper Silesian Metropolitan Area that resambles Ruhr: tens of the cities and Katowice as the city with population of about 10% total doesn't earn the name for the area, especially that nobody even or ever called it this way. One may even consider including Krakow into it, as many people travel to work between those areas, now well connected via A4 highway. Cautious 01:19, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Brussels

The problem is that in this article, the population is given of the City of Brussels, which itself has a small population, similar to the City of London, which is quite small. However, when London is considered in this article, it included all of London (including its boroughs) which to me is accurate, however when Brussels was considered, the municipalities that make of what is considered Brussels are not.

To help illustrate the issue:

• City of London (roughly 10,000 residents)
• City of Brussels (roughly 140,000 residents)

However in this article, Greater London's figures were given (which includes all its boroughs). Though the 19 municipalities of Brussels WERE NOT included. That is why I feel there is a major issue here.

Also, I'm not advocating including the 'metropolitan' areas, which in London's case would soar to 12 million or more, and in the case of Brussels well over 2 million.

Therefore it should be:

Rank	City and country	Population	Date of census/estimate
16.	Brussels, Belgium	1,018,804	February 28 2007 (official)

Nja247 (talk • contribs) 10:11, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

You are comparing the City of London, which has a population of about 10,000, with the city of London, which has a population of 8.8 million. The City of London is a borough within London which has some aspects of its historical government.

AsimovtheCat (talk) 15:32, 15 April 2019 (UTC)

I noticed it too. This is a problem. You know there is a List_of_cities_in_Belgium? Population Brussels = 176,545. Same problem. I live in Brussels and I think we have to put the population of the "Brussels Capital Region" = 1,191,604. And I think we have to follow the wikipedia principle "be bold" and I'm going to put that number. :) SvenAERTS (talk) 02:18, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

I also changed the template so it is now autonumbering :) SvenAERTS (talk) 03:06, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

This was already discussed before. There is a clear difference between the city and the metropolitan area. It would also cause inconsistency with other city lists, for example that one you cited.

Autonumbering is not appropriate for this table. It prevents the Rank from being ranked along with the other columns and from being quickly reset. FromCzech (talk) 06:15, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

Things have been solved by the making more lists so people can see the differences. They are in the "See also section":

• List of cities in Europe by population within city limits
• List of metropolitan areas in Europe
• List of largest cities in the European Union by population within city limits
• List of urban areas in the European Union
• List of larger urban zones (metropolitan area)
• List of cities in Europe by country
• List of European cities proper by population density
• List of European city regions
• World's largest cities SvenAERTS (talk) 08:46, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

Lack of consistency

The article suffers from a lack of consistency. It explicitly states that it deals with population within city limits yet immediately takes a different approach to London by including a much larger area than than just the City of London. While I agree that the population of City of London in no way matches the real population of London, this is hardly something unique. We have an exact match in Brussels, yet Brussels is not on the list and I have no doubts that the same applies to several other cities. We can deal with this is different ways, but not in the current way of having one approach for one city and another approach for another city. We can discuss different ways to improve the article and which approach to adopt, but in the meantime I'm changing the figure for London to match the situation for other cities, but I also add a paragraph to the start of the article to exlain why cities such as London and Brussels are not accurately presented.Jeppiz (talk) 19:20, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

A user included London and Brussels in the list without discussing the topic or explaining his/her reasoning. I welcome a discussion of it, but not unexplained changes. If we talk explicitly about city limits, I don't quite see how we can decide to ignore those city limits for cities and not for others. Brussels and London were just mentioned as two examples, so including both of them, rather than just one, still doesn't solve the problem here.Jeppiz (talk) 19:12, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

I think it's very silly to pretend that "the city limits of London" refers only to the City of London, which is really nothing more than a borough of London. Likewise for Brussels. The point of the "population within city limits" rule is to exclude areas in greater metropolitan areas (e.g. the London commuter belt or the Greater London Urban Area) that aren't part of the city administratively, such as Epsom or Staines. Think of it this way: if you asked someone who lives in the City of Westminster, "Do you live in London", he'd say yes; if you asked someone who lives in Epsom or Staines the same question, he'd say no. +Angr 07:02, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

I agree with you, I also find it silly. But we would need to have proper definitions, not doing as had been done before on this list, putting all of London in and ignoring the issue for other cities.Jeppiz (talk) 17:42, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

The "City of London" is essentially one part of London. It has city status, but it is similar to the many different boroughs in London. Westminster is technically the City of Westminster, but it is still a part of London. The same situation occurs in New York City, and all 5 boroughs count as part of the city limits. I don't live in London, but just as general questions, if you live in Westminster, do you pay taxes that are specific to London? are you not under the jurisdiction of the London Metropolitan Police Service? and isn't London the postal city of your mailing address? I believe this article needs to be changed back to how it was previously. London is London. It is not just the historic core of the "City of London". All of London should count as the city proper. Superflush (talk) 13:42, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Here is the role of the Mayor of London at the London Government's website [1]. The Mayor of London is responsible for all of London, not just the "City of London". As the Mayor of New York is responsible for all of New York City, not just Manhattan. Additionally, here is the FAQ on the London Government's website [2]; here they state that the City of London is the "the central business district" of London. Does this not give you any indication of how the structure of London is set up. We need to change this article back to how it was, counting all of London. Superflush (talk) 13:51, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

While I agree with much of what you say, the fundamental question remains: How is any of that different from other cities? If you live in Ixelles or Schaerbeek, you live as much in Brussels as you live in London if you live in Westminster. Ask anyone living in Montrouge or Gentilly where they live, and they'll tell you Paris. We could, and should, discuss definitions here, but I'm rather skeptic of the approach of "Keep London in and ignore the rest!" that some users seem to advocate.Jeppiz (talk) 14:29, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

I don't think the test is where people would say they are from if they are from a suburb. Rather, I think the test if how the local government treats the city. I feel that the "City of London" is kept that way for historic reasons, and that the current city is an expanded city, and simply called London. I think the test would be to inquire with the government about how it is considered. From everything I read on the government's website, it makes me believe that London is the whole London and that the governmental agencies cover all of London. Similar to New York City being all five boroughs and not just Manhattan. Superflush (talk) 20:25, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

I agree with everything you say. Although not an expert on London, that is also my understanding. The same thing definitely applies for Brussels as well. So for London and Brussels, I know that the definition is problematic and not correctly represented in this article. I believe there are other cities for which the same thing applies, even though I'm not aware of it. However, it would not be correct to change the definition based just on how we feel. If you ask me for my personal opinion, this list could just as well be deleted. Wikipedia has countless of lists for the largest cities in the EU already, and I must say that this list is the most problematic and the least useful. Needless to say, both London and Brussels are found where they should be on the other lists. Perhaps we should just redirect this article to one of the similar lists that already exists?Jeppiz (talk) 20:54, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Just to build on my point above, Wikipedia already has the following lists on cities in the EU:

• Larger Urban Zones in the European Union
• Largest population centres in the European Union
• Largest urban areas of the European Union

Add to that the list Largest European cities and metropolitan areas, and one really starts to wonder about the need for so many articles.Jeppiz (talk) 20:58, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Well the Largest population centres in the European Union article has London's city proper at 7.5 million. So there definitely is some lack of consistency. Superflush (talk) 21:42, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

How can we have these crazy inconsistencies. The London article states the population of London as 7,556,900. Surely there can't be this one article that conflicts with everything else on Wikipedia. Superflush (talk) 21:45, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

The Eurostat database for city populations [3] only has data up to 2004 but at least one can determine which definition Eurostat is using for the administrative city. The 2004 population of Brussels is listed as 999,899 while that of London is 7,429,200. By using the Eurostat concept, at least we don't have to make any judgment calls as to how to define the administrative city. --Polaron | Talk 22:55, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Polaron, that is a good idea. By using Eurostat, we solve the problem with London and Brussels and rid ourselves of the risk of only solving London and Brussels. I still think that this list could be merged with Largest population centres in the European Union, but using Eurostat is a convenient way out of the mess.Jeppiz (talk) 00:14, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

For France, data is not accurate. First, we have to understand the difference between Communes, Urban communities, Arrondissements. What we need here is data for Communes, which are roughly equivalent to incorporated municipalities/cities in the United States. Definitely, the guys from Eurostat did not understand it (and also that table misses some cities). Or, may be the interpretation from here is wrong. See: General presentation of city statistics collected in the Urban Audit. Also, what they say about Paris and London: "Finally, for Paris and London, a "kernel" was created in order to facilitate comparisons between these two big cities."
(Rgvis (talk) 21:29, 13 October 2009 (UTC))

For France we have this link, with official data: List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants (2006 census);
For England there is this list: List of English districts by population, but we have to take into consideration only entities defined as city.
Also, we have to pay attention to Eurostat table, as long as they use urban areas too which are not part of this article. One more thing about Eurostat, this is not an exhaustive study:
"All in all, 237 cities in the European Union (EU-25) and 21 cities from Bulgaria and Romania took part in the Urban Audit 2003/2004 project. There are cities that did not take part in this study (for Romania, these are: Iaşi, Constanţa, Galaţi, Braşov)"
And also there is data from 2006/2007:
"Eurostat revised the spatial units for the 2006/2007 collection of Urban Audit data. This involved agreeing with the Member States on 63 additional cities in the EU-27".
(Rgvis (talk) 10:08, 14 October 2009 (UTC))

Corrections:

Lyon: moved from 14 to 57 Eurostat has only "Urban Area" Data, useless for us, so only INSEE is our provider of data.

Marseille: the same, moved from 18 to 21 (anyway, Marseille is considered the second largest city in France);

Toulouse: no data from Eurostat, only from INSEE (437,715), moved from 35 to 64;

Nice: the same, 347,060 inhabitants, moved from 55 to 83;

Moved-out: Lille (the population of the city (INSEE) is 226,014); Bordeaux with 232,260 inhabitants for the city; Nantes: INSEE 282,853; Strasbourg: INSEE 272,975; Montpellier: 251,634; Toulon: 167,816; Grenoble: 156,107; Rouen: 107,904; Rennes: 209,613; Saint-Etienne: 177,480; Aix-en-Provence: INSEE 142,534;

For more informations see: List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants (2006 census).

For England (see: List of English districts by population), cities taken in consideration, only those which have this status (of city):
Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield, Bradford, Manchester, Liverpool, Bristol, Wakefield, Coventry.

I also reintroduced cities not included in Eurostat: Mannheim, Coventry, Iaşi, Timişoara, Constanţa, Utrecht, cities with over 300,000 inhabitants.

(Rgvis (talk) 19:26, 14 October 2009 (UTC))

Copenhagen

In this table only the city of Copenhagen is presented - It's like The City of London (borough) has only about 5000 inhabitants. The danish capital consists of three parts Copenhagen, Frederiksberg (wich lies like an "island" all surrounded by Copenhagen municipallity) and Gentofte, the norhern part of the capital. Together they have about 760.000 inhabitants 2010 at a surface of 117 sq.km. London consists of more then City of London borough and Copenhagen consists of more then Copenhagen municipallity. But the reason for that just Copenhagen municipallity is used here is probablly that Denmark now have found that the inner urban city limits have grown to 1.35 million (and the metropolitan district 1.9 million at 2750 sq.km.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by AviatorPontus (talk • contribs) 11:16, 22 May 2010 (UTC)

For the record, the numbers for Copenhagen are not correct since it contains four different municipallies. The population is 640k in Copenhagen Municipality. Entropia42 18 jan 2022 CET 22:49 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Entropia42 (talk • contribs) 21:51, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Cities without city limits

The city of Copenhagen consists of several municipalities. For instance is municipality of Frederiksberg located as an enclave with 100.000+ inhabitants whithin Copenhagen municipality. The urban area consists of a dozen municipalities and has 1,2 million+ inhabitants. While f.i. Berlin city limits covers agricultural areas and forests. I removed Copenhagen from this list since the "city limits" was interpreted as the municipality of Copenhagen only (which only covers around 75 km²). No incorporations of new territory to Copenhagen municipality has been done since 1902 ! I suggest we make a list of European cities based on urban area insted (not to be confused with the list of metropolitan areas) This list isn't comparable. Different standards between the different countries makes this list disenlightning for our readers Boeing720 (talk) 04:29, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't disagree with any of that, but for a list of this kind to serve any purpose, it has to build on a source. That source is the Eurostat report about population figures in cities in the EU. I don't think it's perfect, and there are other errors apart from the one you list. Still, we cannot randomly delete or add figures as we want (see WP:OR). If you have an alternative source to use for the article, I'm sure that would be well received as long as it fulfills WP:RS.Jeppiz (talk) 13:09, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

That Eurostat source is from 2003–2006, making it clearly outdated. Besides, the link appears to be dead in any case. --Jaakko Sivonen (talk) 21:50, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

Brussels

The municipality of Brussels has 177,849 inhabitants. Using the population of the Brussels Region is an error. I know what many people would say: there is the case of Greater London. But this is an error:

• if in the British case the administrative structure is not standardized, this is not the case of counties in continental Europe adopting the Napoleonic administrative pyramid. In these cases (France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Switzerland....) the commune (comune, gemeinde...) is the municipality without doubt and, more, without exceptions.
• using the Region to identify Brussels is an error because the Region has not the powers and the role of a municipality, but of a US state. The Brussels Region has the same powers of Flanders region or Wallonia Region. So if we use Brussels Region, we should use the Flanders and Wallonia Regions too!
• the Mayor of Brussels rules only the municipality. The Mayor of London rules all Greater London. More, the case of Greater London is an unique case in Britain, so it can be used without POVS. As said, this is not the case of Brussels Region.
• nl.wiki and fr.wiki, significantly, both consider the municipality of Brussels as "Brussels".

Really, there is a case which is very similar to Brussels (an urban area much larger than the municipality but without a general mayor) and is not the case of London but the case of Athens. And Athens is shown in this list (correctly) as a municipality of 664,000 inhabitants, even if the real Athens (Athens Prefecture) is a city of 3,000,000 inhabitants.--79.6.141.205 (talk) 15:50, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

"Brussels-Capital Region" is official name, with a population of 1,138,854. Subtropical-man talk
(en-2) 21:08, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

Exactly... one of the three Regions of Belgium, which are similar to a US state or a Province of Canada. Definetely not a city.--79.6.141.205 (talk) 21:49, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

I see your point and I totally agree with you. After all, the title of this page is "List of largest cities of the European Union by population within city limits" and so, by definition, Brussels should not be included in the list.--Kingston28 (talk) 13:56, 31 March 2015 (UTC)

These kind of discussions are rather meaningless as long as the so-called "list" is just a random collection of cities put together by Wikipedia users ignoring WP:OR. Any list need to be based on a source, and then follow what the source says. The lack of proper sourcing is exactly what discussions like this one arise.Jeppiz (talk) 21:40, 31 March 2015 (UTC)

I agree it's a mistake to use the population figure for the entire Brussels Region. The city of Brussels had a population of 175,534 in 2015. I also agree with Jeppiz that this article is a complete mess. — 37 ^(talk) 10:58, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

Being a local of the "Brussels-capital Region"; I could say that it is the Brussels-capital region which is generally considered part of what is considered "Brussels"; which is itself subdivided into 19 "communes", one of which bearing the name of Brussels. If you want to make a parallel with the US, the equivalent would be "Washington D.C." which has some characteristics of a U.S. state but not entirely. I think that nobody will question the real boundaries of "Washington D.C.". I think the real question that we need to answer is "is there an administrative entity corresponding to what is perceived as the city by the local?" Clearly the answer to this question for Brussels is the "Brussels-Capital Region". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.246.197.50 (talk) 09:55, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

What is perceived as a city is not an administrative area though. The Brussels-Capital Region spans a conurbation, with multiple urban centres (albeit, Brussels being the main one). Other towns in the Brussels-Capital Region have distinct identities, and are described as "suburbs". Similarly, parts of Paris' urban area in the Petite Couronne "Inner RIng" are always described as Paris' suburbs, and form part of the identity of Paris. We don't consider the Paris and the Petite Couronne the city limit of Paris. Like I said in my post below, I think we should list both. This is a list of city limits, and evidently some cities have more than one area that could be considered the city' limit. Rob984 (talk) 17:12, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

I do think that we have to consider "the" administrative area. After all it's that we do for countries. Had the Scottish voted for their independence, this would have immediately changed the population of the UK without anyone having moved; but that does not means that listing the population of the UK is nonsense. Usually the territorial limit of a country poses less problems though (although some special oversea territories might sometimes poses problems too but that's an other question). Now that's true that sometimes it is unclear which administrative limit have to be taken into consideration. For Brussels, both the city center and the "Brussels-Capital" region bears the name of Brussels and are candidate. My point is that the Brussels Capital Region that should be considered to be Brussels and the 19 "communes" being the equivalent of the Paris "arrondissements". Note that the local population of Brussels do not call any of 19 communes the suburb (périphérie). What is called the suburb is the territory outside the 19 communes (but within the broader much less well defined metropolitan aera or urban aera). This is an error we see sometimes in Foreign media. As an anecdote I remember the Begian TV (RTBF) complaining that the French media called "Molenbeek" (one of the Brussels commune) the Brussels suburb when it was not. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.246.197.50 (talk) 21:25, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

Cities with more than one city limit?

London and Brussels both have two areas that could be considered "city limits". Each have one area with city-status: the City of London and the City of Brussels, and another administrative area: Greater London region and Brussels-Capital Region. By no means do I think every city with some kind of outer city-region should have two figures, but in these cases there is clear ambiguity in what is considered the "city limit", so why not just list both? The title specifies "city limits"–of which they both are. To be clear, I think they should remain in the same entry, with the position determined by the larger figure, eg "8,538,689 / 7,375"; and a note explaining the two areas. Rob984 (talk) 17:47, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

Which "city limits" ?

This list is very misleading, as the rules for city limits differ extremely much between different countries. Some examples - Paris is together with London and Moscow, the largest cities in Europe. For Copenhagen is only its tiny municipality value shown, another city, Frederiksberg is located totally inside Copenhagen. And 150 year old parts of Copenhagen (like Hellerup) are located in what may look like suburban areas, but which isn't. This comes down to local politics, Denmark doesn't want more than a third of its population to live in one city, on the paper. Amsterdam is more or less built together with Hague and several other cities, Dortmund is just a smaller part of the Ruhr-conglomerate. While Berlin includes huge areas of woods and other green areas but is built together with Potsdam. In some cases are there no city limits at all. I've already mentioned Copenhagen, but neither Stockholm has any city limits. I would like to change this list to urban areas instead. At least for cities which lacks city limits. This ought to be the case for Paris regardless of any possible city limits. Point is, as of now , this list cannot be used for any purpose. Boeing720 (talk) 22:24, 30 March 2017 (UTC)

Discrimination Athens-Brussels

What’s the difference between Athens and Brussels? Both the cities cover the urban center only, but Athens is counted in its City limits, while Brussels in its regional metro limits. Such a discrimination is not objective.--Utente provinciale (talk) 15:36, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Land Area

It strikes me that since the entire second paragraph seems to be a disclaimer for the figures that it more than worth it to add the land area to each entry in the table. I find these articles of city limits useful, as it's the only consistent way to compare cities (though other measurements are certainly worthwhile). But if we're going to to get into any detail about how some city/local government boundaries span vast territories and others don't, perhaps we should show that, too.--Criticalthinker (talk) 10:22, 12 September 2021 (UTC)

Brussels is missing

Brussels should definitely be on this list and it is not. According to official numbers, it has a population of over 1M people. And it is know as Belgium’s most populous city. Antwerp, which is 2nd, did make the list. 24.4.177.254 (talk) 07:32, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Agreed! Reidlos (talk) 17:23, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

You are missing Brussels

You are missing Brussels 94.109.158.234 (talk) 10:34, 10 July 2022 (UTC)

Bucharest

Hi, in the table it says Bucharest is number 4 in population with over 2.1 million. If you check out the Bucharest Wikipedia page, it only displays a population of 1.8 million.

Which one is wrong? 213.225.35.89 (talk) 08:42, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

The source is cited, you can compare it yourself. FromCzech (talk) 09:33, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

Municipal Boundaries vs City boundaries

Revision 1139886260 by @FromCzech. The fact is that a Municipal boundary certainty isn't universally used in the current list presently. Should the other data that uses precisely the comparable City data be updated to the same standard as Aarhus?

My second question is how can you justify using the whole Municipality with rural parts, other towns, townships, when a city limits are defined in the same statistical source? Respublik (talk) 11:14, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

See https://www.statbank.dk/BY3 by Map for what a change it is between the City and the Municipality data. This isn't a case of a City limit boundaries. Respublik (talk) 11:17, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

You're including all the data beyond red. Respublik (talk) 11:31, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

From what I can see, the data for the LAU1 level is used for all countries. Which countries exactly do you think do not use them? FromCzech (talk) 12:01, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Utrecht

Where is Utrecht ? 5.173.159.10 (talk) 18:34, 5 November 2023 (UTC)

Photos in table

The photos are nice, but they could appear along the table, instead of inside it. They make the table four times as long as it needs to be, and only 8 entries can be viewed at once (on my screen), instead of ~30.

Any excess photos could be placed in a gallery at the bottom of the page. Or, really, they could be removed. This isn't a list of photos. Wizmut (talk) 09:53, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Imho they can be removed. They are more illustrative than adding value to the table. No other option than to keep the current state or remove them makes sense to me. A photo of Berlin as the largest city next to the lead can be preserved. FromCzech (talk) 13:15, 17 December 2023 (UTC)