Gender of city's name?

The pronoun "she" is sometimes used to refer to things which contain people such as countries, ships, and cars, or to refer to machines. This, however, is considered a stylistically marked, optional figure of speech. This usage is furthermore in decline and advised against by most journalistic style guides such as the Chicago Manual of Style.[8]

Edited: Yes you can absolutely refer to a city as she. You can also use the word it.

I know what you mean, I did Span as a second language, and everything has a gender. It's not the same in English. Nouns don't have a gender, however, in some cases, instead of calling NY "it" it jsut sounds better to call it "she" you dont' have to but it's just something weird we do. But usually, if an objectis a "she", its usually cars, ships, and the sorts. As for naming something "he", a history teacher once told me submarines were referred to as "he". You don't just get sister cities, you an get sister schools, and etc... hope that explains it a little better...

In English it is customary to denote a female gender to inanimate objects (especially when it comes to men's toys such as cars, boats, golf clubs, etc).

But cities, states and nations are also "shes".

Giving this human quality to a lifeless thing is called "Personification". As you know, normally in English objects do not have gender at all (they are neutral).

In all technicality I guess you could say "he" instead it just isn't customary and flies in the face of tradition.