Which side is the city on my flight?
City views happen in two short windows: the first few minutes after take-off and the last fifteen to thirty minutes before landing. That is where we put the weight.
Runway direction decides it
A skyline sits in one fixed place, but the aircraft can approach from either end of a runway, which flips the view to the other side. We estimate the likely active runway from wind and runway geometry, then place the city relative to that path.
Air traffic control can change runways at any moment, so a city-view answer always carries lower confidence than a sun answer. We say so rather than pretending to know.
Approach views worth planning for
Some arrivals are famous for a reason: Manhattan into New York, the Bay into San Francisco, the North Shore mountains into Vancouver, the Thames into London. On these routes the difference between sides is large enough to be worth choosing deliberately.
Mixing priorities
If you tick both sunset and city views and they disagree, we still give one answer, and the result page tells you which category preferred the other side so the trade-off is visible.