4 ms·

This is neat. Some things I like about finland/helsinki: Happy down to earth citizens, socially liberal with far less echochamber/signalling/two-faced bs than

This is neat. Some things I like about finland/helsinki: Happy down to earth citizens, socially liberal with far less echochamber/signalling/two-faced bs than california for instance, tons of Finnish sauna, & great air quality for a big city.

hervature 6y ago
Helsinki is 600,000 people and 400/km^2. That's essentially the same as Oklahoma City. I know OKC has a basketball team and city is in the name, but most people wouldn't call OKC a big city and wouldn't be surprised by better air quality compared to places with millions of people.
- Mediterraneo10 6y ago
  Helsinki itself is only 600,000 people, but Helsinki has fused into a single big city with the neighboring municipalities of Espoo and Vantaa (and a bunch of smaller ones), and the total population exceeds one million people.
  - hervature 6y ago
    The OKC metro is also 1.5 million people. The two are very comparable by population/size. It doesn't detract from the point that Helsinki isn't a large city. I'm giving regional context to Americans that if you don't consider OKC large, you shouldn't consider Helsinki large.
    - asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago
      It's fair to bring this up, but it's also worth noting that a medium fish in a small pond has a different experience than a medium fish in a big pond. A third of all the people who live in Finland live in Helsinki.
- BurningFrog 6y ago
  Helsinki is the capital city and cultural center of a nation. The best of the best in Finland live, work, and perform there. For cities, as so many other things, it's not all about size.
  - hervature 6y ago
    For the great people of Oklahoma, the best of the best also live, work, and perform in OKC. OKC is also the capital (of Oklahoma). I won't touch culture because it's pretty pompous to assign culture to a single location. I'm sure the Sami people disagree with your location of the center of culture, I'm not comparing cities and I certainly am not implying OKC is the same as Helsinki. Merely pointing out that the OP's comment about Helsinki being a large city with clean air sounded as silly to me as saying OKC is a large city with clean air.
    - burntoutfire 6y ago
      > For the great people of Oklahoma, the best of the best also live, work, and perform in OKC. A lot of them live Oklahoma, since it's easy to move to the coasts for opportunities. A lot less people leave Finland (it's harder to do to), so Helsinki gets higher proportion of its country's best.
    - BurningFrog 6y ago
      I'm sure OKC is a great city in many ways, but the best artists in Oklahoma usually move to LA or NYC, engineers and entrepreneurs to Silicon Valley, political leaders to DC, etc.
- Jommi 6y ago
  Ure being diseingenius. Helsinki is 650k, but actually it's a tri-city with Espoo and Vantaa, going over 1M population. That's more than SF in a similar area.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    > Ure being diseingenius. Helsinki is 650k, but actually it's a tri-city with Espoo and Vantaa, going over 1M population. That's more than SF in a similar area. Helsinki alone is almost twice the area of SF, Vantaa is more than twice SF’s area, and Espoo is closer to three times SF’s area, so, yes, that tri-city is more people than SF, but, no, it's not “in a similar area”.
  - selfinvariant 6y ago
    SF Bay Area is about 7.7 million, which is higher than the whole Finnish population. I've been to Helsinki, it's a lovely place, but calling it a big city is misleading at best.
    - filleduchaos 6y ago
      Interestingly, the few times I've been there SF felt cozy (I live in a metro area of over twenty million). It's all relative, I suppose.
- sgustard 6y ago
  Oklahoma City is a huge sprawling area on an essentially infinite two-dimensional plane. Population density of Helsinki is 8x that of OKC, plus it has natural features, so it's really going to have a different feel.
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  Air quality is often driven by geography too; there are tons of cities that are notorious for their poor air quality due to being in a basin or an inconveniently placed mountain trapping car exhaust where the people are.
  - elevenoh 6y ago
    True. E.g. Salt Lake City
- elevenoh 6y ago
  2,934 people per sq km in Helsinki, 1.5M in the metro. 321.9 people per square km in Oklahoma city. IME helsinki these feels & has the dynamics of a big city. Oklahoma city feels mostly like a suburban sprawl.

hervature 6y ago

Helsinki is 600,000 people and 400/km^2. That's essentially the same as Oklahoma City. I know OKC has a basketball team and city is in the name, but most people wouldn't call OKC a big city and wouldn't be surprised by better air quality compared to places with millions of people.

Mediterraneo10 6y ago
Helsinki itself is only 600,000 people, but Helsinki has fused into a single big city with the neighboring municipalities of Espoo and Vantaa (and a bunch of smaller ones), and the total population exceeds one million people.
- hervature 6y ago
  The OKC metro is also 1.5 million people. The two are very comparable by population/size. It doesn't detract from the point that Helsinki isn't a large city. I'm giving regional context to Americans that if you don't consider OKC large, you shouldn't consider Helsinki large.
  - asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago
    It's fair to bring this up, but it's also worth noting that a medium fish in a small pond has a different experience than a medium fish in a big pond. A third of all the people who live in Finland live in Helsinki.
BurningFrog 6y ago
Helsinki is the capital city and cultural center of a nation. The best of the best in Finland live, work, and perform there. For cities, as so many other things, it's not all about size.
- hervature 6y ago
  For the great people of Oklahoma, the best of the best also live, work, and perform in OKC. OKC is also the capital (of Oklahoma). I won't touch culture because it's pretty pompous to assign culture to a single location. I'm sure the Sami people disagree with your location of the center of culture, I'm not comparing cities and I certainly am not implying OKC is the same as Helsinki. Merely pointing out that the OP's comment about Helsinki being a large city with clean air sounded as silly to me as saying OKC is a large city with clean air.
  - burntoutfire 6y ago
    > For the great people of Oklahoma, the best of the best also live, work, and perform in OKC. A lot of them live Oklahoma, since it's easy to move to the coasts for opportunities. A lot less people leave Finland (it's harder to do to), so Helsinki gets higher proportion of its country's best.
  - BurningFrog 6y ago
    I'm sure OKC is a great city in many ways, but the best artists in Oklahoma usually move to LA or NYC, engineers and entrepreneurs to Silicon Valley, political leaders to DC, etc.
Jommi 6y ago
Ure being diseingenius. Helsinki is 650k, but actually it's a tri-city with Espoo and Vantaa, going over 1M population. That's more than SF in a similar area.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > Ure being diseingenius. Helsinki is 650k, but actually it's a tri-city with Espoo and Vantaa, going over 1M population. That's more than SF in a similar area. Helsinki alone is almost twice the area of SF, Vantaa is more than twice SF’s area, and Espoo is closer to three times SF’s area, so, yes, that tri-city is more people than SF, but, no, it's not “in a similar area”.
- selfinvariant 6y ago
  SF Bay Area is about 7.7 million, which is higher than the whole Finnish population. I've been to Helsinki, it's a lovely place, but calling it a big city is misleading at best.
  - filleduchaos 6y ago
    Interestingly, the few times I've been there SF felt cozy (I live in a metro area of over twenty million). It's all relative, I suppose.
sgustard 6y ago
Oklahoma City is a huge sprawling area on an essentially infinite two-dimensional plane. Population density of Helsinki is 8x that of OKC, plus it has natural features, so it's really going to have a different feel.
ashtonkem 6y ago
Air quality is often driven by geography too; there are tons of cities that are notorious for their poor air quality due to being in a basin or an inconveniently placed mountain trapping car exhaust where the people are.
- elevenoh 6y ago
  True. E.g. Salt Lake City
elevenoh 6y ago
2,934 people per sq km in Helsinki, 1.5M in the metro. 321.9 people per square km in Oklahoma city. IME helsinki these feels & has the dynamics of a big city. Oklahoma city feels mostly like a suburban sprawl.