#livability

THE WORLD’S MOST LIVABLE CITIES?

On Tuesday, the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) unveiled its 2019 Global Liveability Index, listing the top 10 most livable cities in the world. Vienna remained the most livable city for 2019 out of 150 cities surveyed. Australia and Canada dominate the top 10 with three cities each, while Osaka, Tokyo and Copenhagen complete the list. 

The Economist’s index ranks 150 cities around the world, giving them a ranking across 30 factors, which is then used to created a weighted score between one and 100. To rank the cities living conditions, the index examined the quality of healthcare, education, infrastructure, stability, and culture. 

Of the 30 indicators of the composite rating, however, only four of them are quantitative. The rest of them are subjective ratings, so there little objectivity in this index. According to some experts, the index is really just a marketing tool to help executives to understand a city’s living conditions.

One wonders if that is why no U.S. city made it higher than No. 22, with Honolulu ranked as the nation’s top performer. What about Portland, Oregon or Austin Texas, medium sized cities reputed to have a good quality life? This map depicts the top 10 livable cities in 2019. 

Sources:  American Geographical Society, Guardian, Deutsche Welle, Reuters, CNN, FOX, Global News

Growing up in Downtown Atlanta 

If you can walk a half mile with a child from your home and arrive safely at an actual destination, you’re doing well. Atlanta needs work.

By October 2017, my wife and child and I will have lived in a two bedroom apartment in the Fairlie-Poplar district of Downtown Atlanta for seven years.

When our son was born, we were living in a condo in Virginia Highland, a few miles northeast of here. The experience of walking around that neighborhood’s busted sidewalks with a baby in tow — and trying to cross Ponce de Leon Avenue safely to get to the Publix grocery store — was frightening and maddening. The frustration of it all made me want to study urbanism and start writing about the city, spurring my ATL Urbanist blog.

We moved to Downtown to have better sidewalks and transit access, but living here ended up giving me a front row seat to some of the worst decision making (and frankly, abuses of power) the city has to offer, which got me interested in following politics. I fell in with some like-minded people and we formed ThreadATL, an advocacy group.

I write and photograph and advocate for a better city because our elected officials don’t seem to understand (or care) that it’s too damn hard to get around without a car and with a kid. In the suburbs you would expect that trouble. In the center of Atlanta, you expect better. And if it’s hard for my family — and we do actually own one car, but use it as little as possible — I can’t even imagine how awful it is for a family that truly can’t afford one and that lives in a less walkable, transit-served area of the city than the one we call home.

Atlanta residents: vote well in the city elections this November and never be shy about holding leaders to a standard that produces great urban neighborhoods for all ages and abilities. Children are the litmus test. If you can walk a half mile with a child from your home and arrive safely at an actual destination, you’re doing well. Atlanta needs work on that front and we won’t get results by just assuming our leaders will do the right thing.