City "titles"

[Slartibartfast]

Was thinking about this today - does your hometown lay claim to any particular title?  I grew up in "The River City," which is a laugh because it was a small town and certainly not the only place with a river, but we were 45 minutes from "The Toilet Paper Capitol of the World" which I suspect is a distinction much less frequently claimed

I now live in "Rocket City, USA" - logical, because we have a big NASA presence here.  All the schools are also named after various space missions (Discover, Challenger, Endeavor, etc).

[BabylonSister]

I used to live in "the petunia capital of the world".

[jmarvellous]

I live in "The Live Music Capital of the World."

There are other nicknames but that's the most common one. And an overly boastful one, at that -- except in about two weeks!

I'm from Motown/The Motor City and The Bayou City/H-Town.

[Thipu1]

Not a city but a state.  New York is nicknamed the 'Empire State'.  This has led to a lot of confusion.  My FIL once said the NY could no longer use that nickname because other states had a larger population.  Bill Bryson wondered if NYS had overseas territories. 

Neither of these are true.  NY is the Empire State because of the Erie Canal.  In the early days of the USA, the region west of the eastern mountains was called the Inland Empire.  Before the Erie Canal, getting there was long and dangerous.  The canal made settlement much easier.  That is why NYS is called the Empire State. 

[camlan]

Boston has a lot of nicknames, perhaps because it's an older city.

Beantown
Athens of America
The Hub (of the Solar System) (there used to be a large bronze medallion in the street at an intersection in downtown Boston, just off the Common, proclaiming this)
The City on a Hill
The Cradle of Liberty

[Nibsey]

Well less so city titles than county titles;

So Dublin is: The big Schmoke, The Pale
Galway: City of the tribes
Limerick: Stab city, Treaty city
Cork: The rebel county
Kilkenny: The marble city
Waterford: The crystal county
Louth: The wee county
Kerry: The kingdom
My favourite is probably Mayo: 'Mayo, God help us'

Dublin doesn't have that many nicknames considering it's the capital. I suspose Dublinners prefer to nickname their infrastructure and statues rather than the city itself.

[drebay]

I live in the "Rose City" and we even have a Rose Parade.  Also two Rose Gardens, one that is filled with Roses, and one that we fill with fans of basketball, hockey, music and monster trucks.

[T'Mar of Vulcan]

Johannesburg is known as "the City of Gold" because its location is solely due to the gold mining industry. The Zulu nickname, Egoli (which means city of gold) was used as the title of a soap opera set here. The province it's in, Gauteng, means "place of gold" in Sotho.

Most English-speaking people call it Joburg (previously Jo'Burg but officially the shortened version now has no apostrophe). Most black people call it Jozi.

I call it home.

[Twik]

Toronto is often called "Big Smoke". Not that it has that much pollution - one pundit said it meant it had "a big reputation, not much to show for it - all smoke and no fire".

Mississauga, where I actually live, has no real nickname, except when people call it "Misterandmississauga".

On the far side of Toronto, there's Scarberia, I mean, Scarborough.

[GreenEyedHawk]

I live in Edmonton, the City of Champions, which may have been true back in the 80s when some of hockey history's legendary great players were part of our team and the Oilers were an intimidating force to be reckoned with, but not so much now.

It's also sometimes called the Festival City, and if you've ever been in Edmonton in the summertime, you'd know why.

[Bethczar]

My home town, Milwaukee, is "Cream City", not for the dairy industry but for the color of the bricks in the older buildings. The native clay produces cream-colored bricks. It is also know as "The City of Gemutlicheit" for it's German heritage, and the "The City of Festivals" for the ethnic festivals and Summerfest held on the lakefront.

[Hollanda]

Not sure whether this counts, but Nottingham's tagline on Trent FM (now Capital FM) used to be "The World's Best City".

Jo and Twiggy - possibly the most annoying (but funny) breakfast show presenters EVER. I miss them!!

[Danismom]

I used to live in Big D and before that I lived in the Metroplex.

[baglady]

I live near Saratoga Springs, N.Y., aka the Spa City (for the mineral springs) and the Racing City (for the track).

Also in this area: Collar City (Troy), Rug City (Amsterdam), Glove Cities (Gloversville and Johnstown) and Electric City (Schenectady), all named after what used to be their biggest industries. Troy also is proud of being the home of the real Uncle Sam.

I'm in Schuylerville, which used to be Old Saratoga, and every other business in the village is Old (or Olde) Saratoga Somethingorother. (There was a campaign to change the name back to Old Saratoga a few years ago, but it failed.) It's also known as the Turning Point (as in turning point of the American Revolution, because the Battle of Saratoga was fought here).

Then there are the less flattering names: Smallbany, Skankectady, Troylet, Amsterico (that last is because Amsterdam has a large Hispanic population. Hispanics were the last wave of immigrants to move there to work in the carpet mills before they closed).

The town I grew up in, Nashua, N.H., was the Gate City, because it was right on the Massachusetts border.

[readingchick]

My hometown is known as The Orthopaedic Capitol of the World, also known as Lake City (there are three lakes in the city limits).