[jerlam]

NYC is so different than any other US city that it defies comparison. It has no equals in terms of population, population density, and public transit. Its population exceeds most entire US states.

The definition of big cities is also pretty arbitrary. The first city mentioned, El Paso in Texas, has a lower density than the suburb I grew up in, but it's classified as a "big city" because its borders are simply larger. The suburb I grew up in is adjacent to multiple other suburbs, and if you add them all up it meets the article's definition of "big city" - 500k people. There are various definitions of urban area (CSA, MSA, etc) which are the correct methods of comparison.