Dallas Ranks Among Smelliest Cities on the Planet

Posted on January 31st, 2012 3:14pm by Jason Heid
Filed under Lists of things, Media

That’s according to GQ. And “scent critic” Chandler Burr means “smelliest” in the best possible way:

Cities, like people, have their own smell, their own body odors and perfumes that take on personalities. Dallas is one of the strangest scents I have ever encountered. Highways of strip malls and gas stations and exit signs. Insanely wide streets. It’s very New World-smelling. It almost has a non-scent scent. Like many cities, you get concrete, car exhaust, and dust. If you really focus, you can pick up on the nearly undetectable Texas live oak. It’s best during thunderstorms, though. The crisp smell of lightning and rain and vast flat space pervades and takes on a three-dimensional quality.

God, I love the smell of the air before a thunderstorm. He’s got that right, but I never thought it peculiar to Dallas.

We’re No. 10 on the list. The best smelling place?  Los Angeles.

It’s a strange list. Mumbai ranks above us too.  Paris is singled out as the worst-smelling.

12 comments

  1. Paris?

    Has he ever been to new Orleans?

    @ 3:34 pm on January 31, 2012

  2. They are insane. I’ve been to Smell-A. The only place I’ve been that smelled worse was Mexico City.

    @ 3:41 pm on January 31, 2012

  3. @Obama’s Seat: New Orleans is actually No. 3 is on his “best” list.

    @ 3:47 pm on January 31, 2012

  4. Paris in the summer is unbearable. Unwashed and undeodorized masses from Europe converge in the buses and metro, leaving their aroma wherever they go.

    @ 4:35 pm on January 31, 2012

  5. Ok, the guy’s nuts.
    He says this “…the thick, penetrating scent of unfiltered motor exhaust…” about Mumbai and means it as a positive. How can you take him seriously after that?

    @ 4:38 pm on January 31, 2012

  6. I always noticed a light bouquet of botox with a slight hint of desperation, lingering, in the Dallas air.

    @ 5:36 pm on January 31, 2012

  7. Much of it can be attributed to the crap that spews from the mouth of Robert Jeffress

    @ 6:06 pm on January 31, 2012

  8. The “storm” smell isn’t just a Dallas thing. It’s called ozone. It’s kinda epic.

    @ 6:48 pm on January 31, 2012

  9. No way; I’d say Taipei is the worst smelling from where I’ve been; easily. Though I have to agree w Obama’s Seat… New Orleans is way up there …

    @ 12:16 am on February 1, 2012

  10. No where smells better than Rome: the sweet exhaust of sputtering motorini, cigarettes, the dank Tiber, dirt and sunlight. E “Quanto sei bella Roma quando Piove!”

    @ 8:31 am on February 1, 2012

  11. “New Orleans is actually No. 3 is on his “best” list.”

    He must like the smell of urine.

    @ 8:39 am on February 1, 2012

  12. I can’t be the only one here who likes the smell of exit signs.

    @ 10:35 am on February 1, 2012