Lots of other places do too. That's why true city size should be counted as the metropolitan population, not just the city borders. In that case, Houston is 5th, beaten by Dallas/Fort Worth at 4th, which surprisingly means Texas has 2 metropolitan areas out of in the top 5 in the country.
This simply isn't backed by statistics. While Houston is the 4th most populous American city, it's only ~200th in density. If "Lots of other places [did] too," then they wouldn't be half as far down that second list.
I can't think a single reasonable metric that wouldn't net at least a couple of us cities among the top 20. In fact the only metric that I can come up with is "not in America because of my irrational hate for it ."
Public transportation, walkability, cycling infrastructure, and public spaces. Why are you so convinced I'm foaming at the mouth hating on america. I'm just a dude who thinks our cities suck.
It's just my opinion. A world class city imo should have excellent public transportation, cycling infrastructure, parks and public gathering spaces, and traffic calmed commercial districs. Basically a world class city should have a lot of things worth visiting and infrastructure that lets you visit those places easily and comfortably without relying on a car.
No north american city meets those standards in the way that some european cities do.
...so do you not believe there are any world-class cities, period? I can find exceptions for every single city in the list of requirements you laid out.
I'm still so pissed that Chicago dumps their sewage into the Mississippi instead of the lake where it belongs. New Orleans has enough shit thank you very much.