Are These Really the World’s Best Places to Live?

Business Week has just published its annual list of the World’s Best Places to Live and both Australia and New Zealand placed fairly high in the rankings.  For example my home state Victoria, its capitol city of Melbourne placed 17th in the rankings.  However, in what will make most people from Melbourne unhappy is the fact that Sydney ranked higher then Melbourne by placing 10th.  For those reading this that don’t know, in Australia there is a huge rivalry between Melbourne and Sydney that goes back a long ways. 

View of downtown Melbourne from the Yarra River.

Personally both cities are really nice but I find Melbourne to be a much more livable city then Sydney simply because of the high cost of living in Sydney and the nightmare traffic congestion.  But if you are a millionaire with a house on the harbor and a boat then yes I could see how Sydney could be considered a better place to live then Melbourne.  However, most people are not millionaires which is why I think Melbourne is a better place to live for your average Australian due to its affordability, expanding job market, as well as its transportation infrastructure.  However, I do have to say that in both cities I sure do not feel all that safe walking around at night in the city centers because of the drunks and low lives.  Just take a walk down Sydney’s King Cross at night or Melbourne’s CBD to see what I mean.  Better yet you can just read the newspapers of all assaults and murders that happen in these areas. 

Downtown Sydney as scene from the harbor.

However, in what will assuredly upset people from both Sydney and Melbourne is the fact that the New Zealand city of Auckland beat them both by placing 5th in the rankings.  Auckland is another city I have spent time in and yes it is a nice city, but is it better then Sydney or Melbourne?  I don’t think so because I saw nothing that really made the city stand out ahead of either Sydney or Melbourne.  The airport was not very impressive, the local transportation I found inferior compared to Melbourne, and their harbor is not as scenic as Sydney Harbor and comparable to Melbourne’s Port Phillip Bay in my opinion.  I do have to say I felt safe walking around at night in Auckland compared to either Sydney or Melbourne. 

View of downtown Auckland from One Tree Hill.

So how did Business Week come up with their rankings then?  Here is how:

Consultants rated each city on a variety of factors including the level of traffic congestion, air quality, and personal safety reported by expatriates living in more than 600 cities worldwide. In the top 25, U.S. cities such as San Francisco, Boston, and Chicago were all edged out by Geneva, Switzerland, Vancouver, B.C., and Auckland, New Zealand. The highest-scoring U.S. city is Honolulu, which came in at No. 28. [Business Week]

It seems strange that these rankings does not take into consideration things like affordability and jobs that I mentioned before when considering what city is the best place to live, which leads me back to the point I made before that maybe these rankings are geared more towards the best places to live in the world for millionaires instead of common people?

Scene from Kyoto, Japan; one my all time favorite cities.

The other thing I did not like about these rankings is how all the cities listed are western cities and mostly European.  How come not one city in Asia made the list?  Singapore for example is an extremely clean city with little crime, good mass transit, and a high quality of living.  One of my all time favorite major cities is Kyoto, Japan which I would rank up there with any of the cities placed on this list.  Don’t even get me started with Honolulu listed at only 28th as well. 

View of downtown Honolulu, Hawaii; another one of my all time favorite cities.

There are a variety of problems with this list which leads me to believe that the term "World’s Best Places to Live" is not entirely appropriate for these rankings considering its major flaws.  Maybe the term "World’s Best Places to Live for Rich White Guys" would be more appropriate.