AgegePulse Magazine
Vienna, Austria is rated as the most liveable city in the world in 2018.
For the second year running, Lagos made the cut as one of the world’s most liveable cities. Though still languishing close to the bottom of the pyramid of ranked cities at 138, the rating of the megacity, the only one ranked in Nigeria, improved from 36% in 2017 to 38.5% in 2018. Crime rate and seamless transportation system are some of the important factors used for the Economist Intelligence Unit’s 2018 ranking of the world’s most liveable cities.
Melbourne finally lost the title of world’s most liveable city after a seven-year reign. The Australian city came in second place on the list, missing out on the top spot by just 0.7%.
Japan‘s Osaka and Tokyo have now moved up into the top ten, coming in third and seventh place respectively.
Both cities achieved their highest ranking on the survey this year thanks to a decline in crime rates as well as improvements in public transportation.
“Osaka stands out especially, having climbed six positions, to third place, over the past six months, closing the gap with Melbourne,” the EIU’s annual ranking report summary says.
“It is now separated from the former top-ranked city by a mere 0.7 of a percentage point. Osaka’s improvements in scores for quality and availability of public transportation, as well as a consistent decline in crime rates, have contributed to higher ratings in the infrastructure and stability categories respectively.”
Hamburg and Helsinki, who held tenth and ninth place last year, have dropped out of the top ten.
This year’s ninth place spot went to Copenhagen, who achieved a score of 96.8%, making it the only other European city in the top rankings. And while Australia may have missed out on first place this time, three of its cities were among the best scoring, with Adelaide (96.6%) and Sydney (97.4%) coming behind Melbourne in 10th and fifth place.
Canada performed well as well, with Toronto tying with Tokyo for seventh position on a score of 97.2% and Calgary (97.5%) and Vancouver (97.3%) taking fourth and sixth place respectively.
Biggest improvements, falls
According to the report, global business centres tend to be victims of their own success. “The ‘big city buzz’ that they enjoy can overstretch infrastructure and cause higher crime rates,” it says.
For instance, New York (57th), London (48th) and Paris (19th) are all prestigious hubs with plenty of great recreational activities, but all suffer from higher levels of crime, congestion and public transport problems than are deemed comfortable.
That said, “they still sit within the highest tier of liveability, especially when contrasted with the worst-scoring locations.”
Meanwhile the French capital and the UK’s Manchester, whose rankings have fallen in previous years due to terrorist attacks, recorded the biggest improvements of the past 12 months in overall scores and stability ratings.
“Although they have been subject to high-profile terrorist attacks in recent years, which have shaken stability and led to cumbersome security measures, both cities have shown resilience in the face of adversity,” the report adds.
“Nevertheless, with such high scores already in place, the impact of these improvements has not been enough to significantly affect liveability in any of the top-tier cities.”
It was also good news for Hong Kong, which saw a dramatic fall in its ranking back in 2015. The Asian city achieved a score of 91.3% this time round, moving up to 35th place.
However, fellow Asian cities Kuala Lumpur, Kathmandu, Colombo and Dhaka didn’t fare as well, with all four listed among the nine cities whose liveability ranking has declined in the past year.
Puerto Rico’s San Juan, which was hit by two hurricanes in 2017, experienced the sharpest fall, dropping 21 places down the list to 89th place, with a score of 69.8%.
Unsurprisingly Syria’s war-torn capital Damascus continues to languish at the bottom of the list, with an overall score of 30.7%.
Bangladesh’s Dhaka and Nigeria’s Lagos were just above at 139th and 138th place, scoring 38.0% and 38.5% respectively.
On a larger scale, global liveability has improved for the second year in a row, increasing from 74.8% last year to 75.7% in 2018.
In 2017, Syria’s capital, Damascus, was also at the very bottom of the ranking, with an overall liveability rating of just 30.2, while Nigeria’s Lagos and Libya’s Tripoli were just slightly ahead, with scores of 36 and 36.6 respectively.
Top 10 Most liveable cities 2018:
1. Vienna, Austria
2. Melbourne, Australia
3. Osaka, Japan
4. Calgary, Canada
5. Sydney, Australia
6. Vancouver, Canada
7. (tie) Toronto, Canada
7. (tie) Tokyo, Japan
9. Copenhagen, Denmark
10. Adelaide, Australia
Source: www.makeitglobal.biz
