Atlanta or Dallas?

Neither city is a beach destination. Both sit four hours or more from the coast, so swimming means a lake or a pool. Atlanta's Lake Lanier, about an hour out, has sandy swimming areas in clear wooded country. Dallas has several reservoirs closer in, but the water is muddy-brown, so families often head to the water parks in Arlington instead.

The two cities eat equally well, each in its own regional style. Atlanta is the place for Southern cooking: meat-and-three cafeterias, west side soul food, shrimp and grits and a serious Sunday brunch. Buford Highway gathers Korean, Vietnamese and Ethiopian kitchens along one long road.

Dallas is about Texan staples: brisket sold by weight, Tex-Mex with frozen margaritas, and a strong steakhouse tradition. Its Asian food is scattered across suburbs from Richardson to Carrollton. Both need a car, but Atlanta's BeltLine food halls give it a bit more eating on foot.

Each city offers about two days of sightseeing, and each is built around a defining moment in American history. In Atlanta that is the civil rights movement: King's birth home and Ebenezer Baptist Church on Auburn Avenue, plus the National Center for Civil and Human Rights. The High Museum and the Carter Presidential Library round it out.

In Dallas it is the Kennedy assassination, told at the Sixth Floor Museum overlooking Dealey Plaza. The Arts District has the advantage of putting three art museums within a few walkable blocks. Fair Park's 1930s Art Deco buildings have no real counterpart in Atlanta, which lost most of its old townscape in 1864.

Atlanta has the bigger name after dark. As a home of Southern hip-hop and trap, its large clubs draw a national crowd. Edgewood Avenue packs dive bars into a few blocks, and Midtown anchors one of the South's largest LGBTQ scenes.

Dallas is sociable but more ordinary. Deep Ellum is the scruffy, fun quarter and Uptown the polished patio-bar strip. Texas law ends the night at 2am. In both cities the districts are separate pockets linked by ride-hail.

Atlanta has much more to offer outdoors. A tall hardwood canopy covers the city, and within half an hour you can be on Stone Mountain's granite dome or the Kennesaw battlefield trails. Two hours north, the Blue Ridge foothills bring waterfalls, Tallulah Gorge and the start of the Appalachian Trail.

Dallas sits on flat blackland prairie. Its best green spaces are the White Rock Lake loop, the Katy Trail and the Great Trinity Forest, and the limestone escarpments of Cedar Ridge give the nearest real hiking. Summer heat pushes most of it into early morning.

Day trips are about as good from either city, but the best options differ. Dallas has one strong card in Fort Worth, a train ride away, with longhorn drives at the Stockyards and the Kimbell Art Museum in Louis Kahn's building. Past that, it is mostly courthouse squares and Waco.

Atlanta has no twin city on its doorstep. Instead it offers a spread of smaller places by car: college-town Athens, the gold-rush square at Dahlonega, Madison's antebellum houses and Chattanooga two hours north. Savannah needs an overnight stay.

Both are easy with children and have a similar line-up, with a theme park, zoos, an aquarium and a science museum. Atlanta's highlights are the whale sharks and belugas at the Georgia Aquarium, Fernbank's dinosaurs and the Center for Puppetry Arts. The Coca-Cola and children's museums sit together by Centennial Olympic Park.

Dallas puts Six Flags and a big water park side by side in Arlington, has the excellent Perot Museum, and fills Fair Park every autumn for the State Fair. Its summers are harsher, so outdoor days with small children are harder from June to September.

Both cities are built for the car, and most visitors will drive or use ride-hailing. Atlanta's MARTA works well along one line, from the airport through downtown and Midtown to Buckhead, and the BeltLine's Eastside Trail joins several neighbourhoods on foot. Dallas's DART light rail reaches more places, including both airports, Deep Ellum and Fair Park. The TRE train goes to Fort Worth, and a vintage streetcar runs through walkable Uptown.

Dallas is the better place to shop. Neiman Marcus was founded here in 1907, and the luxury trade grew up around it. NorthPark Center shows art among its labels, and Highland Park Village gathers European fashion houses in a 1930s Spanish-style setting. Western wear, from everyday boots to custom-made hats, gives Dallas a local speciality.

Atlanta's best shopping is in the twin Buckhead malls on Peachtree Road. These are well done but familiar. Little Five Points adds vintage clothes and records with a counter-culture edge, but there is nothing distinctly Georgian to bring home.

Costs are broadly similar, and Dallas is a shade easier on the budget. Both cities have hotels well below coastal prices, and both add tax, tips and car hire to every day. In Atlanta the good-value eating is Southern cooking and Buford Highway, the civil rights sites are free, and the big family attractions are the costly part. In Dallas, barbecue, tacos and largely free or low-cost museums save money, while Uptown hotels and steakhouses push the bill up.

The two cities are evenly matched for live performance, with different strengths. Atlanta leans towards popular music. As a centre of hip-hop, R&B and gospel, it draws major tours, with the Tabernacle and the 1920s Fox Theatre filling the middle ground. The Symphony, known for its choral recordings, and the Alliance Theatre cover the classical and drama side.

Dallas puts its formal arts in architecture worth seeing, including I. M. Pei's Meyerson Symphony Center and the Winspear Opera House. Deep Ellum's blues and jazz roots and the country dancehalls give a sound that is more Texan than Atlanta's.

Neither city is a place to unwind, and both have the same unexpected answer: Korean-style bathhouses. Atlanta has more of them, several large ones along its northeastern suburbs, some open round the clock. Dallas has one big bathhouse in the north. Beyond that, Atlanta's quieter pleasure is its shaded residential porches, while in Dallas it is a slow morning by White Rock Lake.