Western cities like New York, London, Sydney and Melbourne are great to wander in — they are all pretty safe, pedestrian friendly, and laced with public parks and waterfronts. But when Lifehacker sent a team to Tokyo to find the local hacks, damn was I jealous of the city planning. There are lots of touches that make Tokyo easier to navigate and a lot more pleasant to explore.

For me, it was the construction that finally did it.

Over the years, readers have given travel tips for cities all over the world. But some tips keep popping up for city after city and should be part of your general travel habits. Not every tip works for every city, but you should run through this checklist next time you're headed somewhere new.

"Melbourne is more like San Francisco, while Sydney is more like L.A." That's according to Lifehacker's US readers, who were recently asked to share their tips on visiting Sydney. Here's some of the best - and weirdest - advice about "the town that Britain's convicts built."

Most major cities around the world have an active forum on Reddit. And if you plan to visit any of these cities, you can learn a lot of tourism advice without even asking by digging through the archives.

Urban greening projects in Melbourne’s west are contributing to making the region cooler, more pleasant and healthier to live in and travel through. The key to this success is the Greening the West initiative. Since 2011 this has brought together 23 organisations that, by the end of 2018, will have collectively planted more than 1 million trees in Melbourne’s west.

The program’s efforts not only offer clear health and economic benefits for the region’s residents, but are also welcome news in the face of reports that tree canopy cover in Australian cities is generally declining.

Walking around your city, you might have noticed spray paint markings on the street and footpath. Clearly they're there to mark something, but what? Turns out, construction workers aren't just doodling for fun -- those marks are there to protect you.

Because I both work and travel, I choose destinations based on a few important things: Fast, reliable internet; food; general safety; culture; and foo -- oops, I said that already. One of the key resources I use for learning more about a place before I go is NomadList, a handy resource that's built for digital nomads or work-from-anywhere folks like myself.

If you've ever taken a walk to de-stress, you know the powerful effect getting outside can have on making you feel refreshed mentally, emotionally and physically. But if you live in a busy city, finding nature to help you recharge can be a challenge.

On Tuesday, The New York Times decided to reignite the age old debate of walking versus standing on escalators. And do you know what the paper concluded? "You shouldn't walk on escalators." This is a patently incorrect conclusion for at least four reasons.

Smartphones and GPS devices make it easy to get around, but they can also inhibit your natural sense of direction if you rely on them too much. If you want to be a master navigator of an area, you need to put the screens away.