How Big is Atlanta, Really?

The week would not be complete without a trip over to The Atlantic and their Cities blog, and this piece on scale and context as it relates to the size of cities is definitely worth the click. We've never really spent much time comparing cities (both in terms of population and size) to other cities and assorted delineated geographic areas in a serious way, but it's pretty damn interesting once you get into it. For example, did you know that the city of Buffalo, NY is more populous than the entire country of Iceland? Or that the empty portion of Detroit is larger than the entire City of San Francisco? The authors use data to create all sorts of interesting juxtapositions. Using the awesome population data link they supply, one could spend hours matching Atlanta up with cities and countries past and present...a worthy pursuit for a rainy day, yes? [The Atlantic Cities]