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Biggest City by Body of Water

For each body of water, name the most populous urban area which lies along its shores.
In some cases where the it is debateable, two different answers are allowed
Quiz by Quizmaster
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Last updated: May 26, 2023
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First submittedOctober 13, 2011
Times taken36,732
Average score60.0%
Rating4.45
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Body of Water
City
Lake Michigan
Chicago
Irish Sea
Dublin / Liverpool
Arabian Sea
Mumbai
Sea of Marmara
Istanbul
Gulf of Finland
St. Petersburg
Botany Bay
Sydney
Red Sea
Jeddah
Persian Gulf
Dubai
Lake Victoria
Kampala
Lake Superior
Duluth / Thunder Bay
Body of Water
City
Chesapeake Bay
Baltimore
Puget Sound
Seattle
Adriatic Sea
Venice / Bari
Long Island Sound
New York City
Lake Pontchartrain
New Orleans
Lake Ontario
Toronto
Aegean Sea
Athens / Izmir
Caspian Sea
Baku
Bay of Bengal
Chennai
Java Sea
Jakarta
+1
Level 59
Dec 28, 2012
Quizmaster: Kampala is not on Lake Victoria. The city of Entebbe where Uganda's main airport is on the lake shore, but Kampala's quite a way north.
+14
Level ∞
Dec 31, 2012
Just looked at the map. Many parts of Kampala touch the lake, and the city center is only 2 miles from the lakeshore. So the quiz is correct.
+1
Level 75
May 16, 2019
The city limits extend to the lake
+3
Level 68
Jun 6, 2023
As a professional Kampalan resident, I can confirm that Kampala is indeed on the shores of Lake Victoria, and you do not need to go very far to reach there.
+1
Level 33
Nov 3, 2013
Is Botany Bay a river?
+4
Level 92
Mar 28, 2014
No, Botany Bay was Khan Noonien Singh's ship.

Seriously, though, it's an inlet (or bay) on the east coast of Australia, just south of Sydney. If memory serves the Georges river flows into the bay.

+2
Level 73
Dec 30, 2016
Farewell to your bricks and mortar, farewell to your dirty lies

Farewell to your gangers and gang planks

And to hell with your overtime

For the good ship Ragamuffin, she's lying at the quay

For to take oul Pat with a shovel on his back

To the shores of Botany Bay

+4
Level 66
Jul 9, 2014
My globe spells Jeddah as Jiddah. Could that be a possible answer?
+1
Level 86
Jul 15, 2014
If you use a globe, then you're cheating ;).
+17
Level 51
Sep 7, 2017
Not cheating to use a globe to learn these things in the first place. :P
+5
Level 61
Jul 10, 2014
DULUTH!!! MN represent!
+1
Level 89
Sep 28, 2019
Fargo Season 1, Duluth's only claim to fame.
+4
Level 84
Nov 27, 2019
Played a round of golf in Duluth back in '95. Was having an epic round until the final hole. I just couldn't get the ball into the clown's mouth. :-P
+1
Level 75
Jul 10, 2014
I spent the last of my time mentally running through every US city along Lake Ontario. Just remembered Toronto when the time ran out. Sorry, Canadians!
+4
Level 67
Dec 30, 2016
You do know Toronto's about as big as Chicago right?
+3
Level 66
Jan 10, 2017
Bigger now, actually.
+1
Level 89
Sep 28, 2019
Here we go.
+3
Level 59
Aug 20, 2021
Where are we going?
+1
Level 51
Jul 11, 2014
Can we accept Djakarta for Jakarta?
+1
Level 58
Jul 18, 2014
And Djeddah for Jeddah?
+8
Level 84
Sep 9, 2014
I kept trying Dnew York City and Dtoronto but couldn't get it to work.
+6
Level 84
Nov 27, 2019
Djust stop.
+8
Level 88
Jul 19, 2015
You bet your Djibouti!
+4
Level 32
Aug 29, 2015
Cut him some slack guys ;)

'Djakarta' is the old, colonial era spelling. The current spelling of Jakarta is relatively new. (It was changed in the 60s, I think)

+3
Level 77
Jan 7, 2016
I thought it was called Batavia in the colonial era?
+4
Level 32
Mar 29, 2016
The city of Jakarta was originally named Sunda Kelapa('Coconut of Sunda'), a city which rose to prominence under the kingdom of Padjajaran in the 13th century.

In the 16th century, the kingdom of Demak managed to conquer the city from the Portuguese and renamed it to Djayakarta('The City of Victory').

About a century later, the Dutch came, razed the city, and rebuilt it with the new name Batavia(named after the Batavi tribe which is an old germanic tribe living in the Netherlands)

After the independence, Indonesia renamed it to 'Djakarta', a shortened form of 'Djayakarta'.

Before the 20th century, the Dutch used to spell anything with 'j' as 'dj' (ex: 'Jan' becomes 'Djan'), and Indonesia just kinda went along with it until 1972 when we decided that it was ridiculous spelling and changed the entire Indonesian dictionary, replacing every instance of 'dj' to 'j'

+1
Level 74
Dec 30, 2016
So does Batavia lettuce come from Netherlands or Jakarta? It's a shame the Indonesians didn't go the whole hog and roll it back to its original name. Sunda Kelapa sounds quaint ... and Coconut of Sunda priceless.
+2
Level 72
Mar 27, 2020
^eyes..: "the Dutch used to spell anything with 'j' as 'dj'". That's not really it. The Dutch (and others) still use the letter "J" for what in English is a "Y" sound - see Jugo- versus Yugoslavia. So if you are Dutch and you want to indicate a sound like an English J, (which they don't have in their own language) you will feel tempted to place a D before the J.
+2
Level 84
Jan 7, 2016
While some of the spelling changes people complain about are recent, Indonesia adopted the current standards, which changed Djakarta to Jakarta, in 1972. Seems like 40+ years is enough to learn the new rules. But apparently, Djibouti still hasn't gotten the memo!
+1
Level 85
Dec 30, 2016
The Germans have been using "Munchen" for much more than 40+ years. So why are we still using "Munich"?
+4
Level 47
Dec 30, 2016
Same reason people speaking non-English languages don't call it United States?
+1
Level 41
Dec 25, 2017
Munchen? I know not of Munchen, only München.
+4
Level 86
Jul 15, 2014
Why are there those three pairs Dublin/Liverpool, Venice/Bari and Athens/Izmir ? It should be possible to tell which one is the biggest. Or is there a problem with the definition of those seas ?
+3
Level 74
Dec 30, 2016
Yes, please explain - I was wondering the same myself. Fascinating quiz BTW.
+1
Level 86
Dec 30, 2016
Two and a half years later, still no answer to my question...
+4
Level 86
Jun 3, 2018
If QM is using citypopulation.de as his source, they round off the urban area population, which could explain the ties. If the cities are close enough to be rounded to the same number, it seems reasonable to accept either as correct.
+4
Level 60
Jan 23, 2019
Probably to avoid all the "Actually, XY is biger than YX." comments.
+3
Level 43
Feb 13, 2015
In answer to the one on Lake Superior, shouldn't Thunder Bay, Ontario also be accepted?? It lies on the same shore of Lake Superior as Duluth, about 180 miles northeast. Thunder Bay's population is 109,000 versus Duluth's 86,000, according to Wkipedia.
+2
Level 73
Jun 17, 2015
Urban areas ;)

Duluth urban area is around 120,000 compared to Thunder Bay 109,000, since the latter is a very remote city

+1
Level 66
Mar 25, 2020
And Thunder Bay is more of a district with the land area being over 103,719 square kilometers.
+4
Level 78
Nov 2, 2015
Jiddah should work
+1
Level 77
Jan 7, 2016
For Long Island Bay I was guessing "Manhattan" and took me a while to figure out why it didn't work..
+6
Level 82
Sep 26, 2016
I am only now realising that Kolkata does not actually touch the Bay of Bengal. My Indian geography is poor.
+4
Level 74
Dec 30, 2016
It's as good as my Bangladeshi geography - after Kolkata, I tried Dhaka ... just assumed Chennai must be bigger than them both
+1
Level 81
Dec 1, 2016
Very interesting quiz!
+1
Level 82
Dec 30, 2016
wow.. Duluth... if you swapped Superior for Erie the answer would be a lot easier.
+1
Level 86
Jun 3, 2018
Could be worse. Could be Huron :)
+1
Level 89
Sep 28, 2019
I'd have to say Sarnia / Port Huron, which just barely touches the very southern tip down near all the other cities in Michigan.
+2
Level 68
May 5, 2020
Could have been even worse. Great Bear Lake.
+1
Level 41
Dec 25, 2017
Is Kolkata not on the Bay of Bengal? It's larger than Chennai in terms of urban area.
+1
Level ∞
Dec 25, 2017
It's not on the Bay of Bengal.
+3
Level 77
Apr 15, 2019
I'm surprised that so few people knew the Botany Bay answer.
+1
Level 61
Jun 4, 2023
Maybe most of them refer on Botany Bay in US (me too)
+1
Level 57
Aug 31, 2019
I dont think Duluth is the largest city on Lake Superior. I believe that Thunder Bay is much larger
+1
Level 59
Aug 20, 2021
well you would be incorrect
+1
Level 58
Oct 10, 2020
Chesapeake is finally on a global quiz! and it has 56%!
+4
Level 56
Nov 23, 2020
Just getting to the point where I'm starting to get really narked off by the way I lose points by not knowing, for example, what body of water the 30th-largest city in the USA is on, whereas I could have a reasonable stab at the largest town on the Bay of Biscay, the North Sea, the Yellow Sea etc. etc.

Anyway, it's not as if I have to do quizzes here. Breathe...

+1
Level 78
Feb 12, 2021
I learned about Duluth as a port distributing iron ore in Geography when I was 14. In the UK.
+2
Level 66
Jun 4, 2023
Almost lost beacuse i thought Kolkata and Dhaka touched the bay.
+3
Level 72
Jun 4, 2023
Kolkata is pretty forgivable since the Bhagirathi looks like it almost maybe counts as part of the bay, but you should really learn where Dhaka is if you think it in any way touches the bay.
+3
Level 66
Jun 5, 2023
Just looked at a map and Dhaka is basically the center of the country i was so wrong lol
+4
Level 58
Jun 4, 2023
soo muuuchh USA...
+1
Level 61
Jun 4, 2023
Clueless about city / town near Lake Superior, and type minneapolis many times. Dunno if this quiz include little city / town because all answer are big cities
+1
Level 46
Jun 5, 2023
Jidda and Jiddah should be accepted as type-ins for Jeddah.