Some parts of the lower slopes at one time carried the name Fernhill, a term still occasionally encountered to refer to this area, arising from the name of the residence of an early settler, Captain Bellairs.

[4] Many of these buildings were built on money which flowed into the infant city at the time of the Otago gold rush of 1861–1862.

Notable houses include Threave (designed by Robert Lawson), Moata, and Colquhouns, among many others.

The suburb is bounded by the central city to the east and northeast, by Kensington to the south, and Mornington to the west.

Otago Boys' High School lies close to Stuart Street in the north of City Rise, and the original site of Otago Polytechnic (or, as it was at the time, King Edward Technical College) is also on the city rise side of Stuart Street.

The tramway was notable for being only the second of its type in the world (after the San Francisco cable car system).

The Catholic precinct has been unofficially designated the "Southern Vatican"[5] "It would be difficult to find such a concentration of buildings of one religious denomination in any other New Zealand town.

"[5] "From the corner of Rattray and Smith Sts, the impressive stone frontage of St Joseph's Catholic Cathedral has gazed patronisingly down on this southern seat of Presbyterianism, this New Edinburgh".

[5] Belleknowes is a smaller suburb, nestled within the Town Belt close to the points where City Rise, Mornington, and Roslyn meet.

A memorial seat dedicated to local historian Robert Gilkison[7] overlooks the golf course with a view across the southern end of Otago Harbour to the suburb of Anderson's Bay.

The main Trinity College site was occupied by St Paul's High School (for boys), founded in 1876.

[18] In 2011, Trinity Catholic College expanded its site when buildings and a carpark on the opposite side of Tennyson Street were transferred from Otago Polytechnic.