Britain's booming cities are not immune to the social problems common to all western cities.

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To select the other booming cities, we had to reject some that appear to be bouncing off the bottom instead of showing steady growth.

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But in a world of intense competition from the booming cities of the East, as well as the more familiar rivalries with the likes of Paris and New York, London cannot rely on its inherent strengths alone.

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Unlike American cities, whose populations are growing slowly or are even in decline, Asian cities are booming.

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Trade is booming in the remote province of Xinjiang in China as cities turn their backs on years of isolation and encourage foreign traders to move in.

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"Booming" is a relative term: None of these cities would fog a mirror in China, where personal incomes have climbed at a steady 15% annual clip since 2000 and cities with millions of residents spring up practically overnight.

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Although land prices appear to be booming, prices nationwide are falling once sales in Japan's three biggest cities are stripped out.

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After years of growth in the major coastal cities, such as Shanghai and Beijing, interest has grown in the booming and vast interior of the country.

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Real-estate investment trusts and specialised private-equity funds, which have been scrambling to buy property in swanky districts of big cities, such as Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya, where prices are booming, also have lots of debt.

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