The seven urban wonders of the world: Beirut, Havana and Doha beat European hubs

From glowing skylines to a city perched 12,000 feet in the air, these cities are among the seven most incredible urban hubs in the world. Beirut, in Lebanon, the Cuban capital of Havana and La Paz, in Bolivia, have been named among the seven most incredible cities in the world. The winners include also Vigan (the Philippines), Doha (Qatar), Durban (South Africa) and Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), the Daily Mail reports.

The honour comes courtesy of the New7Wonders Cities – an initiative to identify the top urban centres on Earth – and follows the campaign to find the seven modern wonders of the world as well as the seven natural wonders.

Created by Swiss-born filmmaker, Bernard Weber, the campaign hopes to encourage debate about how cities to respond to challenges of the future.

Weber hoped that the voting process, from which 28 cities were whittled down to 7 finalists, would create a ‘forum for discussing everything from urban planning to metropolitan governance, from tourism to architecture.’

This is the third time Weber has set out to find the seven ‘best.’

In 2007, he received over 100 million votes when he asked which seven world wonders were the greatest.

In 2011, he began the hunt for the best natural wonders.

Voting for final seven cities first began in October 2013, when 28 finalists were voted down to 21.

From July 2014 until October 2014, the 21 were further reduced to 14 – with the final 7 announced on December 7, 2014 in Dubai.