All cities with a population > 1000 or seats of adm div (ca 80.000)Sources and ContributionsSources : GeoNames is aggregating over hundred different data sources. Ambassadors : GeoNames Ambassadors help in many countries. Wiki : A wiki allows to view the data and quickly fix error and add missing places. Donations and Sponsoring : Costs for running GeoNames are covered by donations and sponsoring.Enrichment:add country name

In 2023, the most visited city in the United States by international tourists was New York, attracting just under nine million visitors. Miami and Los Angeles followed in the ranking, with roughly 4.4 million and 3.6 million international visitors, respectively.

The World Council on City Data (WCCD) awarded the City of Melbourne a platinum designation for its compliance with ISO 37120 (http://www.iso.org/iso/catalogue_detail?csnumber=62436), the world’s first international standard for city indicators. Reporting to the standard allows cities to compare their service delivery and quality of life to other cities globally. The City of Melbourne was one on 20 cities to, globally to help pilot this program and is one of sixteen cities to receive the highest level of accreditation (platinum). \r
Having an international standard methodology to measure city performance allows the City of Melbourne to share data about practices in service delivery, learn from other global cities, rank its results relative to those cities, and address common challenges through more informed decision making. \r
Indicators include: Fire and emergency response; Governance; Health; Recreation; Safety; Shelter; Solid Waste; Telecommunications and Innovation; Transportation; Urban Planning; Wastewater; Water and Sanitation; Economy; Education; Energy; Environment; and Finance.\r
City of Melbourne also submitted an application for accreditation, on behalf of ‘Greater Melbourne’, to the World Council on City Data and this resulted in an ‘Aspirational’ accreditation awarded to wider Melbourne. \r
A summary of Melbourne's results is available here (http://open.dataforcities.org/). Visit the World Council on City Data’s Open Data Portal to compare our results to other cities from around the world.

This table contains 45 series, with data for years 2014 - 2014 (not all combinations necessarily have data for all years). This table contains data described by the following dimensions (Not all combinations are available): Geography (1 item: Canada) Countries visited (15 items: United States; Mexico; United Kingdom; France; ...) Travel characteristics (3 items: Visits; Nights; Spending in country).

The number of international tourist arrivals worldwide rose sharply in 2023 compared to the previous year across all the most visited destinations in the world. Overall, France was the most visited country by inbound travelers worldwide in 2023, with 100 million international tourist arrivals. Spain, the United States, and Italy followed in the ranking that year. Has global inbound tourism recovered from the impact of COVID-19? In 2023, the number of international tourist arrivals worldwide totaled approximately 1.3 billion. While this figure represented a 33 percent annual increase, it remained below the peak in inbound tourist arrivals reported in 2019, the year before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. That said, international tourism receipts worldwide exceeded pre-pandemic levels in 2023, peaking at 1.5 trillion U.S. dollars. What are the most popular global regions for inbound tourism? When breaking down the number of international tourist arrivals worldwide by region, Europe has consistently reported the highest volume of inbound travelers, both before and after the impact of the health crisis. In 2023, this region alone accounted for roughly 55 percent of global inbound tourist arrivals. Meanwhile, Asia and the Pacific recorded the second-highest number of inbound tourist arrivals worldwide in 2023.

Overview

Empower your location data visualizations with our edge-matched polygons, even in difficult geographies.

Our self-hosted GIS data cover administrative and postal divisions with up to 6 precision levels: a zip code layer and up to 5 administrative levels. All levels follow a seamless hierarchical structure with no gaps or overlaps.

The geospatial data shapes are offered in high-precision and visualization resolution and are easily customized on-premise.

Use cases for the Global Boundaries Database (GIS data, Geospatial data)

• In-depth spatial analysis

• Clustering

• Geofencing

• Reverse Geocoding

• Reporting and Business Intelligence (BI)

Product Features

• Coherence and precision at every level

• Edge-matched polygons

• High-precision shapes for spatial analysis

• Fast-loading polygons for reporting and BI

• Multi-language support

For additional insights, you can combine the GIS data with:

• Population data: Historical and future trends

• UNLOCODE and IATA codes

• Time zones and Daylight Saving Time (DST)

Data export methodology

Our geospatial data packages are offered in variable formats, including - .shp - .gpkg - .kml - .shp - .gpkg - .kml - .geojson

All GIS data are optimized for seamless integration with popular systems like Esri ArcGIS, Snowflake, QGIS, and more.

Why companies choose our map data

• Precision at every level

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Note: Custom geospatial data packages are available. Please submit a request via the above contact button for more details.

This layer presents the number of water sources (surface and non-surface) from which cities around the world harvest water. On average, cities retrieve water from 4 different sources. Note that if a city gets a small fraction of its water from surface water, there will be calculated values for this metric, but it is not particularly meaningful for a city's water risk or opportunity profile.For more information, access the Urban Water Blueprint report here: http://www.iwa-network.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Urban-Water-Blueprint-Report.pdfYou can also visit the Urban Water Blueprint website here: http://water.nature.org/waterblueprint/#/intro=true

The shape of urban settlements plays a fundamental role in their sustainable planning. Properly defining the boundaries of cities is challenging and remains an open problem in the science of cities. Here, we propose a worldwide model to define urban settlements beyond their administrative boundaries through a bottom-up approach that takes into account geographical biases intrinsically associated with most societies around the world, and reflected in their different regional growing dynamics. The generality of the model allows one to study the scaling laws of cities at all geographical levels: countries, continents and the entire world. Our definition of cities is robust and holds to one of the most famous results in social sciences: Zipf's law. According to our results, the largest cities in the world are not in line with what was recently reported by the United Nations. For example, we find that the largest city in the world is an agglomeration of several small settlements close to each other, connecting three large settlements: Alexandria, Cairo and Luxor. Our definition of cities opens the doors to the study of the economy of cities in a systematic way independently of arbitrary definitions that employ administrative boundaries.

Abstract

The household registration system known as ho khau has been a part of the fabric of life in Vietnam for over 50 years. The system was used as an instrument of public security, economic planning, and control of migration, at a time when the state played a stronger role in direct management of the economy and the life of its citizens. Although the system has become less rigid over time, concerns persist that ho khau limits the rights and access to public services of those who lack permanent registration in their place of residence. Due largely to data constraints, however, previous discussions about the system have relied largely on anecdotal or partial information.

Drawing from historical roots as well as the similar model of China’s hukou, the ho khau system was established in Vietnam in 1964. The 1964 law established the basic parameters of the system: every citizen was to be registered as a resident in one and only household at the place of permanent residence, and movements could take place only with the permission of authorities. Controlling migration to cities was part of the system’s early motivation, and the system’s ties to rationing, public services, and employment made it an effective check on unsanctioned migration. Transfer of one’s ho khau from one place to another was possible in principle but challenging in practice.

The force of the system has diminished since the launch of Doi Moi as well as a series of reforms starting in 2006. Most critically, it is no longer necessary to obtain permission from the local authorities in the place of departure to register in a new location. Additionally, obtaining temporary registration status in a new location is no longer difficult. However, in recent years the direction of policy changes regarding ho khau has been varied. A 2013 law explicitly recognized the authority of local authorities to set their own policies regarding registration, and some cities have tightened the requirements for obtaining permanent status.

Understanding of the system has been hampered by the fact that those without permanent registration have not appeared in most conventional sources of socioeconomic data. To gather data for this project, a survey of 5000 respondents in five provinces was done in June-July 2015. The samples are representative of the population in 5 provinces – Ho Chi Minh City, Ha Noi, Da Nang, Binh Duong and Dak Nong. Those five provinces/cities are among the provinces with the highest rate of migration as estimated using data from Population Census 2009.

Geographic coverage

5 provinces – Ho Chi Minh City, Ha Noi, Da Nang, Binh Duong and Dak Nong.

Analysis unit

Household

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

Sampling for the Household Registration Survey was conducted in two stages. The two stages were selection of 250 enumeration areas (50 EAs in each of 5 provinces) and then selection of 20 households in each selected EA, resulting in a total sample size of 5000 households. The EAs were selected using Probability Proportional to Size (PPS) method based on the square number of migrants in each EA, with the aim to increase the probability of being selected for EAs with higher number of migrants. “Migrants” were defined using the census data as those who lived in a different province five years previous to the census. The 2009 Population Census data was used as the sample frame for the selection of EAs. To make sure the sampling frame was accurate and up to date, EA leaders of the sampled EAs were asked to collection information of all households regardless of registration status at their ward a month before the actual fieldwork. Information collected include name of head of household, address, gender, age of household’s head, household phone number, residence registration status of household, and place of their registration 5 years ago. All households on the resulting lists were found to have either temporary or permanent registration in their current place of residence.

Using these lists, selection of survey households was stratified at the EA level to ensure a substantial surveyed population of households without permanent registration. In each EA random selection was conducted of 12 households with temporary registration status and 8 households with permanent registration status. For EAs where the number of temporary registration households was less than 12, all of the temporary registration households were selected and additional permanent registration households were selected to ensure that each EA had 20 survey households. Sampling weights were calculated taking into the account the selection rules for the first and second stages of the survey.

Mode of data collection

Computer Assisted Personal Interview [capi]

Research instrument

The questionnaire was mostly adapted from the Vietnam Household Living Standard Survey (VHLSS), and the Urban Poverty Survey (UPS) with appropriate adjustment and supplement of a number of questions to follow closely the objectives of this survey. The household questionnaire consists of a set of questions on the following contents:

• Demographic characteristics of household members with emphasis on their residence status in terms of both administrative management (permanent/temporary residence book) and real residential situation. • Education of household members. Beside information on education level, the respondents are asked whether a household member attend school as “trai-tuyen” , how much “trai-tuyen” fee/enrolment fee, and difficulty in attending schools without permanent residence status. • Health and health care, collecting information on medical status and health insurance card of household members. • Labour and employment, asking household member’s employment status in the last 30 days; their most and second-most time-consuming employment during the last 30 days; and whether they had been asked about residence status when looking for job. • Assets and housing conditions. This section collects information on household’s living conditions such as assets, housing types and areas, electricity, water and energy. • Income and expenditure of households. • Social inclusion and protection. The respondents are asked whether their household members participate in social organizations, activities, services, contribution; whether they benefit from any social project/policy; do they have any loans within the last 12 months; and to provide information about five of their friends at their residential area. • Knowledge on the Law of Residence, current regulations on conditions for obtaining permanent residence, experience dealing with residence issues, and opinion on current household registration system of the respondents.

Cleaning operations

Managing and Cleaning the Data

Data were managed and cleaned each day immediately upon being received, which occurred at the same time as the fieldwork surveys. At the end of each workday, the survey teams were required to review all of the interviews conducted and transfer collected data to the server. The data received by the main server were downloaded and monitored by MDRI staff.

At this stage, MDRI assigned a technical team to work on the data. First, the team listened to interview records and used an application to detect enumerators’ errors. In this way, MDRI quickly identified and corrected the mistakes of the interviewers. Then the technical team proceeded with data cleaning by questionnaire, based on the following quantity and quality checking criteria.

• Quantity checking criteria: The number of questionnaires must be matched with the completed interviews and the questionnaires assigned to each individual in the field. According to the plan, each survey team conducted 20 household questionnaires in each village. All questionnaires were checked to ensure that they contained all essential information, and duplicated entries were eliminated. • Quality checking criteria: Our staff performed a thorough examination of the practicality and logic of the data. If there was any suspicious or inconsistent information, the data management team re – listened to the records or contacted the respondents and survey teams for clarification via phone call. Necessary revisions would then be made.

Data cleaning was implemented by the following stages: 1. Identification of illogical values; 2. Software – based detection of errors for clarification and revision; 3. Information re-checking with respondents and/or enumerators via phone or through looking at the records; 4. Development and implementation of errors correction algorithms; The list of detected and adjusted errors is attached in Annex 6.

Outlier detection methods The data team applied a popular non - parametric method for outlier detection, which can be done with the following procedure: 1. Identify the first quartile Q1 (the 25th percentile data point) 2. Identify the third quartile Q3 (the 75th percentile data point) 3. Identify the inter-quartile range(IQR): IQR=Q3-Q1 4. Calculate lower limits (L) and upper limits (U) by the following formulas: o L=Q1-1.5*IQR o U=Q3+1.5*IQR 5. Detect outliers by the rule: An observation is an outlier if it lies below the lower bound or beyond the upper bound (i.e. less than L or greater than U)

Data Structure The completed dataset for the “Household registration survey 2015” includes 9 files in STATA format (.dta): • hrs_maindata: Information on the households, including: assets, housing, income, expenditures, social inclusion and social protection issues, household registration procedures • hrs_muc1: Basic information on the

Abstract

The STEP (Skills Toward Employment and Productivity) Measurement program is the first ever initiative to generate internationally comparable data on skills available in developing countries. The program implements standardized surveys to gather information on the supply and distribution of skills and the demand for skills in labor market of low-income countries.

The uniquely-designed Household Survey includes modules that measure the cognitive skills (reading, writing and numeracy), socio-emotional skills (personality, behavior and preferences) and job-specific skills (subset of transversal skills with direct job relevance) of a representative sample of adults aged 15 to 64 living in urban areas, whether they work or not. The cognitive skills module also incorporates a direct assessment of reading literacy based on the Survey of Adults Skills instruments. Modules also gather information about family, health and language.

Geographic coverage

The survey covers the urban area of two largest cities of Vietnam, Ha Noi and HCMCT.

Analysis unit

The units of analysis are the individual respondents and households. A household roster is undertaken at the start of the survey and the individual respondent is randomly selected among all household members aged 15 to 64 included. The random selection process was designed by the STEP team and compliance with the procedure is carefully monitored during fieldwork.

Universe

The STEP target population is the population aged 15 to 64 included, living in urban areas, as defined by each country's statistical office. In Vietnam, the target population comprised all people from 15-64 years old living in urban areas in Ha Noi and Ho Chi Minh City (HCM).

The reasons for selection of these two cities include :

(i) They are two biggest cities of Vietnam, so they would have all urban characteristics needed for STEP study, and (ii) It is less costly to conduct STEP survey in these to cities, compared to all urban areas of Vietnam, given limitation of survey budget.

• The target population is not representative for the national urban population.

The following are excluded from the sample:

• Residents of institutions (prisons, hospitals, etc)
• Residents of senior homes and hospices
• Residents of other group dwellings such as college dormitories, halfway homes, workers' quarters, etc
• Persons living outside the country at the time of data collection

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

• The sample of 3405 households was selected from 227 urban Enumeration Areas (EAs) in Ha Noi (107 EAs) and Ho Chi Minh City (120 EAs). From each EA 15 households were selected, so the number of households selected in Ha Noi was 1245 HHs, and in HCM, 2160 HHs.
• The 2009 Population and Housing Census was used as a sample frame.
• Regarding PSUs (EAs), the sampling frame is the list of 15% of total EAs of the 2009 Population Census. Data items on the frame for PSU include provincecode, districtcode, commune code, and EA code; address of EA, number of households.
• Regarding ultimate sampling units (households), sampling frame is a list of (100) households in each EA. Data items on the frame for ultimate sampling units (households) include names of heads of households.

The sample frame includes the list of urban EAs and the count of households for each EA. Changes of the EAs list and household list would impact on coverage of sample frame. In a recent review of Ha Noi, there were only 3 EAs either new or destroyed from 140 randomly selected Eas (2%). GSO would increase the coverage of sample frame (>95% as standard) by updating the household list of the selected Eas before selecting households for STEP.

A detailed description of the sample design is available in section 4 of the NSDPR provided with the metadata. On completion of the household listing operation, GSO will deliver to the World Bank a copy of the lists, and an Excel spreadsheet with the total number of households listed in each of the 227 visited PSUs.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

The STEP survey instruments include: (i) a Background Questionnaire developed by the WB STEP team (ii) a Reading Literacy Assessment developed by Educational Testing Services (ETS).

All countries adapted and translated both instruments following the STEP Technical Standards: 2 independent translators adapted and translated the Background Questionnaire and Reading Literacy Assessment, while reconciliation was carried out by a third translator. The WB STEP team and ETS collaborated closely with the survey firms during the process and reviewed the adaptation and translation to Vietnamese (using a back translation). - The survey instruments were both piloted as part of the survey pretest. - The adapted Background Questionnaires are provided in English as external resources. The Reading Literacy Assessment is protected by copyright and will not be published.

Cleaning operations

STEP Data Management Process 1. Raw data is sent by the survey firm 2. The WB STEP team runs data checks on the Background Questionnaire data. - ETS runs data checks on the Reading Literacy Assessment data. - Comments and questions are sent back to the survey firm. 3. The survey firm reviews comments and questions. When a data entry error is identified, the survey firm corrects the data. 4. The WB STEP team and ETS check the data files are clean. This might require additional iterations with the survey firm. 5. Once the data has been checked and cleaned, the WB STEP team computes the weights. Weights are computed by the STEP team to ensure consistency across sampling methodologies. 6. ETS scales the Reading Literacy Assessment data. 7. The WB STEP team merges the Background Questionnaire data with the Reading Literacy Assessment data and computes derived variables.

Detailed information data processing in STEP surveys is provided in the 'Guidelines for STEP Data Entry Programs' document provided as an external resource. The template do-file used by the STEP team to check the raw background questionnaire data is provided as an external resource.

Response rate

The response rate for Vietnam (urban) was 62%. (See STEP Methodology Note Table 4).

Sampling error estimates

A weighting documentation was prepared for each participating country and provides some information on sampling errors. All country weighting documentations are provided as an external resource.

IntroductionClimate Central’s Surging Seas: Risk Zone map shows areas vulnerable to near-term flooding from different combinations of sea level rise, storm surge, tides, and tsunamis, or to permanent submersion by long-term sea level rise. Within the U.S., it incorporates the latest, high-resolution, high-accuracy lidar elevation data supplied by NOAA (exceptions: see Sources), displays points of interest, and contains layers displaying social vulnerability, population density, and property value. Outside the U.S., it utilizes satellite-based elevation data from NASA in some locations, and Climate Central’s more accurate CoastalDEM in others (see Methods and Qualifiers). It provides the ability to search by location name or postal code.The accompanying Risk Finder is an interactive data toolkit available for some countries that provides local projections and assessments of exposure to sea level rise and coastal flooding tabulated for many sub-national districts, down to cities and postal codes in the U.S. Exposure assessments always include land and population, and in the U.S. extend to over 100 demographic, economic, infrastructure and environmental variables using data drawn mainly from federal sources, including NOAA, USGS, FEMA, DOT, DOE, DOI, EPA, FCC and the Census.This web tool was highlighted at the launch of The White House's Climate Data Initiative in March 2014. Climate Central's original Surging Seas was featured on NBC, CBS, and PBS U.S. national news, the cover of The New York Times, in hundreds of other stories, and in testimony for the U.S. Senate. The Atlantic Cities named it the most important map of 2012. Both the Risk Zone map and the Risk Finder are grounded in peer-reviewed science.Back to topMethods and QualifiersThis map is based on analysis of digital elevation models mosaicked together for near-total coverage of the global coast. Details and sources for U.S. and international data are below. Elevations are transformed so they are expressed relative to local high tide lines (Mean Higher High Water, or MHHW). A simple elevation threshold-based “bathtub method” is then applied to determine areas below different water levels, relative to MHHW. Within the U.S., areas below the selected water level but apparently not connected to the ocean at that level are shown in a stippled green (as opposed to solid blue) on the map. Outside the U.S., due to data quality issues and data limitations, all areas below the selected level are shown as solid blue, unless separated from the ocean by a ridge at least 20 meters (66 feet) above MHHW, in which case they are shown as not affected (no blue).Areas using lidar-based elevation data: U.S. coastal states except AlaskaElevation data used for parts of this map within the U.S. come almost entirely from ~5-meter horizontal resolution digital elevation models curated and distributed by NOAA in its Coastal Lidar collection, derived from high-accuracy laser-rangefinding measurements. The same data are used in NOAA’s Sea Level Rise Viewer. (High-resolution elevation data for Louisiana, southeast Virginia, and limited other areas comes from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)). Areas using CoastalDEM™ elevation data: Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Corn Island (Nicaragua), Dominica, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, San Blas (Panama), Suriname, The Bahamas, Trinidad and Tobago. CoastalDEM™ is a proprietary high-accuracy bare earth elevation dataset developed especially for low-lying coastal areas by Climate Central. Use our contact form to request more information.Warning for areas using other elevation data (all other areas)Areas of this map not listed above use elevation data on a roughly 90-meter horizontal resolution grid derived from NASA’s Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM). SRTM provides surface elevations, not bare earth elevations, causing it to commonly overestimate elevations, especially in areas with dense and tall buildings or vegetation. Therefore, the map under-portrays areas that could be submerged at each water level, and exposure is greater than shown (Kulp and Strauss, 2016). However, SRTM includes error in both directions, so some areas showing exposure may not be at risk.SRTM data do not cover latitudes farther north than 60 degrees or farther south than 56 degrees, meaning that sparsely populated parts of Arctic Circle nations are not mapped here, and may show visual artifacts.Areas of this map in Alaska use elevation data on a roughly 60-meter horizontal resolution grid supplied by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). This data is referenced to a vertical reference frame from 1929, based on historic sea levels, and with no established conversion to modern reference frames. The data also do not take into account subsequent land uplift and subsidence, widespread in the state. As a consequence, low confidence should be placed in Alaska map portions.Flood control structures (U.S.)Levees, walls, dams or other features may protect some areas, especially at lower elevations. Levees and other flood control structures are included in this map within but not outside of the U.S., due to poor and missing data. Within the U.S., data limitations, such as an incomplete inventory of levees, and a lack of levee height data, still make assessing protection difficult. For this map, levees are assumed high and strong enough for flood protection. However, it is important to note that only 8% of monitored levees in the U.S. are rated in “Acceptable” condition (ASCE). Also note that the map implicitly includes unmapped levees and their heights, if broad enough to be effectively captured directly by the elevation data.For more information on how Surging Seas incorporates levees and elevation data in Louisiana, view our Louisiana levees and DEMs methods PDF. For more information on how Surging Seas incorporates dams in Massachusetts, view the Surging Seas column of the web tools comparison matrix for Massachusetts.ErrorErrors or omissions in elevation or levee data may lead to areas being misclassified. Furthermore, this analysis does not account for future erosion, marsh migration, or construction. As is general best practice, local detail should be verified with a site visit. Sites located in zones below a given water level may or may not be subject to flooding at that level, and sites shown as isolated may or may not be be so. Areas may be connected to water via porous bedrock geology, and also may also be connected via channels, holes, or passages for drainage that the elevation data fails to or cannot pick up. In addition, sea level rise may cause problems even in isolated low zones during rainstorms by inhibiting drainage.ConnectivityAt any water height, there will be isolated, low-lying areas whose elevation falls below the water level, but are protected from coastal flooding by either man-made flood control structures (such as levees), or the natural topography of the surrounding land. In areas using lidar-based elevation data or CoastalDEM (see above), elevation data is accurate enough that non-connected areas can be clearly identified and treated separately in analysis (these areas are colored green on the map). In the U.S., levee data are complete enough to factor levees into determining connectivity as well.However, in other areas, elevation data is much less accurate, and noisy error often produces “speckled” artifacts in the flood maps, commonly in areas that should show complete inundation. Removing non-connected areas in these places could greatly underestimate the potential for flood exposure. For this reason, in these regions, the only areas removed from the map and excluded from analysis are separated from the ocean by a ridge of at least 20 meters (66 feet) above the local high tide line, according to the data, so coastal flooding would almost certainly be impossible (e.g., the Caspian Sea region).Back to topData LayersWater Level | Projections | Legend | Social Vulnerability | Population | Ethnicity | Income | Property | LandmarksWater LevelWater level means feet or meters above the local high tide line (“Mean Higher High Water”) instead of standard elevation. Methods described above explain how each map is generated based on a selected water level. Water can reach different levels in different time frames through combinations of sea level rise, tide and storm surge. Tide gauges shown on the map show related projections (see just below).The highest water levels on this map (10, 20 and 30 meters) provide reference points for possible flood risk from tsunamis, in regions prone to them.

This map presents the percentage of population with sustainable access to an improved water source for the last collected values in world cities during the period 1990 to 2006. It also provides information for older data up to 1990. For more information, visit: http://urbandata.unhabitat.org

This map presents the percentage of population with access to improved sanitation for the last collected values in world cities during the period 1990 to 2007. It also provides information for older data up to 1990. For more information, visit: http://urbandata.unhabitat.org

In 2023, the number of international tourists visiting Istanbul peaked at 17.4 million. The number of foreign tourists arriving in Istanbul reached the second-highest value in 2019, at almost 15 million. Due to travel restrictions during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the number of foreign tourist arrivals in Istanbul fell dramatically in 2020, decreasing by a third compared to the previous year. Air travel in İstanbul After four years of construction, Istanbul Airport officially opened on October 29th, 2018, having replaced the Atatürk Airport from 2019 onwards. The airport also serves as the hub for Turkish Airlines. In 2023, Istanbul Airport saw approximately 76 million passengers pass through, which made it the second-busiest airport in Europe that year. The first place was taken by Heathrow Airport, located in London. In the same year, the second-busiest airport in the city, Sabiha Gökçen Airport, counted over 37 million air travelers, of which almost half were domestic passengers. Most visited museums Considered as the economic, cultural, and historic capital, İstanbul offers numerous cultural activities for visitors. Hence, the largest city recorded the highest number of museums among all provinces in Turkey, with 86 public and private museums in 2022. That year, the Galata Tower became the most visited museum in İstanbul, welcoming over one million visitors. Built as a watch tower in the Byzantine period for the first time in the 13th century, the Galata Tower has been included in the UNESCO World Heritage Temporary List since 2013.

In 2023, the average number of employees in tourism industries in Catalonia, Spain amounted to 296 thousand, which represents a significant increase of around 5.6 percent versus the previous year.

In 2022, the New Orleans-Metairie, LA metro area recorded the highest homicide rate of U.S. cities with a population over 250,000, at 27.1 homicides per 100,000 residents, followed by the Memphis, TN-MS-AR metro area. However, homicide data was not recorded in all U.S. metro areas, meaning that there may be some cities with a higher homicide rate.

St. Louis

St. Louis, which had a murder and nonnegligent manslaughter rate of 11.6 in 2022, is the second-largest city by population in Missouri. It is home to many famous treasures such as the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team, Washington University in St. Louis, the Saint Louis Zoo, and the renowned Gateway Arch. It is home to many corporations such as Monsanto, Arch Coal, and Emerson Electric. The economy of St. Louis is centered around business and healthcare, and in addition is home to ten Fortune 500 companies.

Crime in St. Louis

Despite all of this, St. Louis suffers from high levels of crime and violence. As of 2023, it was listed as the seventh most dangerous city in the world as a result of their extremely high murder rate. Not only does St. Louis have one of the highest homicide rates in the United States, it also reports one of the highest numbers of violent crimes. In spite of high crime levels, the GDP of the St. Louis metropolitan area has been increasing since 2001.

The Black Death was the largest and deadliest pandemic of Yersinia pestis recorded in human history, and likely the most infamous individual pandemic ever documented. The plague originated in the Eurasian Steppes, before moving with Mongol hordes to the Black Sea, where it was then brought by Italian merchants to the Mediterranean. From here, the Black Death then spread to almost all corners of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. While it was never endemic to these regions, it was constantly re-introduced via trade routes from Asia (such as the Silk Road), and plague was present in Western Europe until the seventeenth century, and the other regions until the nineteenth century. Impact on Europe In Europe, the major port cities and metropolitan areas were hit the hardest. The plague spread through south-western Europe, following the arrival of Italian galleys in Sicily, Genoa, Venice, and Marseilles, at the beginning of 1347. It is claimed that Venice, Florence, and Siena lost up to two thirds of their total population during epidemic's peak, while London, which was hit in 1348, is said to have lost at least half of its population. The plague then made its way around the west of Europe, and arrived in Germany and Scandinavia in 1348, before travelling along the Baltic coast to Russia by 1351 (although data relating to the death tolls east of Germany is scarce). Some areas of Europe remained untouched by the plague for decades; for example, plague did not arrive in Iceland until 1402, however it swept across the island with devastating effect, causing the population to drop from 120,000 to 40,000 within two years. Reliability While the Black Death affected three continents, there is little recorded evidence of its impact outside of Southern or Western Europe. In Europe, however, many sources conflict and contrast with one another, often giving death tolls exceeding the estimated population at the time (such as London, where the death toll is said to be three times larger than the total population). Therefore, the precise death tolls remain uncertain, and any figures given should be treated tentatively.

In 2023 Zurich was both the leading smart city based on the IMD smart city index as well as the city with the highest human development index score, making it one of the premier places on earth to live in. Notable exceptions to the HDI to IMD index score were Beijing, Dubai, and Abu Dhabi. Beijing is a notable outlier because although it ranked 12th on the digital smart cities ranking it was nearly 90 points lower than Zurich on the HDI score. This is compared to Munich, Germany, which was the 20th digital city but had a HDI score of 950.

Smart tech is watching.

CCTV cameras powered by artificial intelligence have become a significant growing market in the modern city. These are predominantly residential, with half the market catering to residential applications of CCTV cameras. However, commercial and business-related CCTV cameras have also seen significant growth, with the market reaching over 800 million U.S. dollars in 2023.

Digital cities need data and data needs infrastructure.

The leading issue with AI infrastructure is data management. AI is a strong influence on how digital cities work and requires a considerable amount of infrastructure to be effective. Storage of AI software is a minor concern, accounting for less than ten percent of challenges globally in 2023.

In 2025, the degree of urbanization worldwide was at 58 percent. North America as well as Latin America and the Caribbean were the regions with the highest level of urbanization, with over four-fifths of the population residing in urban areas. The degree of urbanization defines the share of the population living in areas that are defined as "cities". On the other hand, less than half of Africa's population lives in urban settlements. Globally, China accounts for over one-quarter of the built-up areas of more than 500,000 inhabitants. The definition of a city differs across various world regions - some countries count settlements with 100 houses or more as urban, while others only include the capital of a country or provincial capitals in their count. Largest agglomerations worldwideThough North America is the most urbanized continent, no U.S. city was among the top ten urban agglomerations worldwide in 2023. Tokyo-Yokohama in Japan was the largest urban area in the world that year, with 37.7 million inhabitants. New York ranked 13th, with 21.4 million inhabitants. Eight of the 10 most populous cities are located in Asia. ConnectivityIt may be hard to imagine how the reality will look in 2050, with 70 percent of the global population living in cities, but some statistics illustrate the ways urban living differs from suburban and rural living. American urbanites may lead more “connected” (i.e. internet-connected) lives than their rural and/or suburban counterparts. As of 2021, around 89 percent of people living in urban areas owned a smartphone. Internet usage was also higher in cities than in rural areas. On the other hand, rural areas always have, and always will attract those who want to escape the rush of the city.

In December 2022, India recorded over 9.6 million foreign tourist arrivals into the country. This was a significant increase from around 3.1 million in the same month of the previous year. Tourism was one of the hardest hit sector by the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. Incredible India 2.0
People from world over have been traveling to India to experience the country’s rich diversity. India’s famous landmark, the Taj Mahal, located on the outskirts of the historical city of Agra was the most visited monument in 2018. That same year, the government of India launched the Incredible India campaign 2.0 to further promote various destinations and tourism products among foreign tourists. It mainly focused on promoting niche tourism products such as spiritual, medical and wellness tourism on digital and social media. No more long waits In 2014 the government launched the electronic tourist authorizations, more commonly known as e-visas resulting in a huge success. E-visas emerged as the top choice for travelers and became a popular choice for foreign nationals choosing to visit India on a short notice. As of June 2019, over one million tourists have opted for the e-tourist visa.