May 22, 2009 – With a 21 percent increase in traffic last month, skyscrapercity.com remained the most popular of 14 web sites with a Marina City connection.

Operated by Marina City resident Jan Klerks, the world’s largest architectural web site had 162,504 unique visitors in April, according to the web analytics company Compete, Inc., up from 134,715 in March. However, web site administrators concur Compete significantly under-estimates traffic, and so the numbers are useful only as a general indication of a site’s popularity.

“The numbers should be a bit higher,” says Klerks, as more precise measurement shows 3.6 million unique visitors to his site in just the past week. [While Compete claims 1,191 unique visitors to Marina City Online in April, Google Analytics reports 4,183.]

Klerks says his stats show “a nice, even growth for…past years.”

According to Compete, hotelsaxchicago.com lost 46 percent of its traffic in April but was still ranked second. bin36.com was ranked third, with traffic increasing 37 percent.

lynnbecker.com and marinacityonline.com both lost traffic in April, according to Compete, while chicagocarless.com gained traffic, rounding out the top six Marina City web sites.

There were also more unique visitors in April to 10pinchicago.com, architechgallery.com, marina-city.com, and amanochicago.com. Compete did not have enough data to quantify traffic to bertrandgoldberg.org, landmarkmarinacitynow.org, marinacitychicagogiftshopgallery.com, mymtca.com, and vpfalk.net.

Compete analyzes the daily web usage of more than two million people. Its rankings are often quoted in publications such as Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and USA Today.

Related story: World’s largest architectural web site run from Marina City