Eat it, everywhere else except Canada!

http://www.theage.com.au/travel/travel-news/melbourne-beats-sydney-in-worlds-most-liveable-city-rankings-20110221-1b29d.html

Vancouver topped the list of the world's most liveable cities for the fifth straight year, while Melbourne claimed second place from Vienna and Australian and Canadian cities dominated the list's top 10 spots.

Sydney was in seventh place.

In the annual survey by the Economist Intelligence Unit, the Canadian west coast city and 2010 Winter Olympics host scored 98 per cent on a combination of stability, health care, culture and environment, education, and infrastructure -- a score unchanged from last year.

*struts*

The top 10

1. Vancouver, Canada

2. Melbourne, Australia

3. Vienna, Austria

4. Toronto, Canada

5. Calgary, Canada

6. Helsinki, Finland

7. Sydney, Australia

8. (equal) Perth, Australia

8. (equal) Adelaide, Australia

10. Auckland, New Zealand

a lotta white ppl on that list

Tru that. Melbourne's pretty heavily populated with SE Asian and Indian people tho fwiw.

The interesting thing is the comments on that article - had it happened even five years back Sydney people would be all indignant and saying Melbourne sucks, but now they're all "why are we even in the top 10, sydney sucks".

Toronto and Van are not particularly white.

from same survey, bottom 10 cities:

1. Harare, Zimbabwe

2. Dhaka , Bangladesh

3. Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea

4. Lagos, Nigeria

5. Algiers , Algeria

6. Karachi, Pakistan

7. Douala, Cameroon

8. Tehran, Iran

9. Dakar, Senegal

10. Colombo, Sri Lanka

who makes these things? why wouldn't new york or london be in the top ten?

i've heard vancouver is not very livable ito everything being expensive & far, tho maybe i am operating under a diff definition of livable

is it really spelled livable? not liveable? autocorrect r u for real

who makes these things? why wouldn't new york or london be in the top ten?

cost of living maybe? also NY is hella overrated.

everyone i know wants to live in calgary

- ubiquity of heroin

If you are looking for some exciting holiday destinations, one of the many that would be suggested by friends and others would be a Calgary vacation. Calgary attractions form some of the most exciting adventure
holidays. Besides this, the fact that it is the biggest city in Alberta Province in Canada, with a population that is more than a million also makes a big draw amongst the tourists.

Calgary, located at the southern region of the Alberta province is full of exotic landscapes that have a mesmerizing effect on one and all. Some of the Calgary attractions are eco-tourism and a range of thrilling adventure sports. Although, the economy here relies heavily on oil industry, it has other industries too such as hi-technology, tourism and agriculture industries.

A Calgary vacation would have a rejuvenating effect that would last a lifetime. It offers a wide range of festivals and holidays besides the other tourist attractions.

"Besides this, the fact that it is the biggest city in Alberta Province in Canada, with a population that is more than a million also makes a big draw amongst the tourists."

Booking my flight now.

man vancouver is such a total shithole & toronto is lovable but sorta gross idgi

cote d'azur or bust imo

fuck they love australia

Interesting that Vienna is on this list. I'd love to live there.

Lamp why is Vancouver a total shithole? With the exception of the Downtown Eastside I thought it's supposed to be really really nice?

all those cities are absolute bores.

but GREAT PLACES TO RAISE CHILDREN

Vancouver is surrounded by superior niceness - but most of downtown is a cesspool.

- incredible poverty some of the worst in canada
- endemic homelessness & drug use
- really segregated by race/class
- no sense of place or history just mediocre glass & concrete yuppie fantasylands
- racist
- shitty art & music scene; there are basically 0 cool places for these things
- privatized public transit stops @ like 11/is bad (better than torontos tho lol)
- sprawl

the gov't spends a lot of money on weird beautification projects like imprinting leaves into the sidewalks but wont do anything for lower income familes/ppl. the city is a whore to developers & does nothing to fund or encourage arts/nightlife/culture. its a lousy place to live imo i couldnt last a month

the Toronto transit sucks - but seriously - not close to as bad as Vancouver dude.

i would agree with the rest except the racist part.

Huh, interesting. I know that the DTES is among the poorest neighborhoods in all of N. America but as far as I understood it's contained in a very small section of the city. I've obv never been but I just feel like you normally hear really good things.

yah e until you go there its hard to really get how comprehensive & invasive the homeless 'problem' is there - the dtes is the epicentre but using transit or even just walking around many other parts of the city you encounter it. & think it colors the way you feel about the rest of the city too - you get so habituated to ppl begging/scamming/strung out that it numbs you.

i mean i guess if you live in langley or w/e its different but its not like a quarantine

thermo moving back to toronto i was p shocked at how much ~worse~ the ttc had gotten. when i was a teenager here in the early 2000s the ttc was p good but now service is so much shittier & EXPENSIVE i mean srsly. the bay area has better transit cmon

whats wrong w/ bay area transit? subways, trolleys, buses, taxis. occasional holdup b/c of some guy having a real hard time parking on a hill but otherwise i never really thought i was stuck in horrible traffic all that often.

obv. i've zeroed in on sanfran

Calgary also has the legendary Hart House for anyone wishing to make a pilgrimage to the long-deserted site of a bunch of dudes being methodically tortured by a weird old yokel, but do remember to bring a third person with a camera if you want to make a photo montage of yourself doing the five moves of doom on your girlfriend.

- incredible poverty some of the worst in canada
- endemic homelessness & drug use
- really segregated by race/class
- no sense of place or history just mediocre glass & concrete yuppie fantasylands
- racist
- shitty art & music scene; there are basically 0 cool places for these things
- privatized public transit stops @ like 11/is bad (better than torontos tho lol)
- sprawl

the gov't spends a lot of money on weird beautification projects like imprinting leaves into the sidewalks but wont do anything for lower income familes/ppl. the city is a whore to developers & does nothing to fund or encourage arts/nightlife/culture. its a lousy place to live imo i couldnt last a month

― polymath & psychics club (Lamp), Wednesday, 23 February 2011 14:07 (1 hour ago) Bookmark

ya this is consistent w/ everything i've heard abt vancouver from ppl who moved here from there

SF sorta gets by w/ subpar transit cause it's so geographically small, the rest of the bay area has commuter rail and so-so buses. if you don't want a car your options are 'live in sf' and 'be an east bay bike hipster'. most of the bay area isn't any better off than LA.

I recently spoke to some people from Melbourne who suggested that Melbournians think all other Australians are disgusting savages. T/F?

xp re: vancouver
eah, same when i've passed through. i get to vancouver once a year and i go back and forth between thinking 'this is such a sterile facade of a city, there doesn't seem to be a damn thing authentic to it' to 'good god i don't know when i've seen a homeless/drug problem like this'

a lot of the homeless problems are an accident of geography, right? vancouver being the only place in canada (well, victoria too) where you can pretty much sleep outside year round?

I've lived in Vancouver for over ten years. I love it here and can't imagine living anywhere else. However, Lamp OTM. The problem is not with Vancouver, which like all cities has it good and bad points, but with these stupid lists/surveys which are bullshit.

the bay area has better transit cmon

are you still talking about vancouver?

ok - i was talking about toronto's transit vs vancouver's.

Melbourne and Sydney I get. But I hear Adelaide is boring and dull, and Perth - most Australians I know have never been to Perth, so it's got to feel pretty isolated.

Toronto and Van are not particularly white.

OTM.

Ottawa's got to beat Toronto for a number of those criteria.

yeah perth is super isolated xpost

Left England for Vienna ten years ago, and could never imagine living in the UK again...

Vienna always comes high on these lists.. not too sure why, probably something to do with the standard of living/crime rate/property costs...

The city isn't perfect (is any city?), but it suits me fine...

all those cities are absolute bores.

but GREAT PLACES TO RAISE CHILDREN

Eat it, kelpolaris!

not about to have kids fwiw

I recently spoke to some people from Melbourne who suggested that Melbournians think all other Australians are disgusting savages. T/F?

this is very true

lies

We think WE are savages as well, come on.

Perth is v isolated but the standard of living there is pretty beyond reproach and until recently it was SUPER affordable. Mining boom's blown that away a bit though.

will be a ghost town when all the minerals are gone

Its kind of odd there isnt more big city devlopment over that coast, its all very liveable land.

lies

you see the way he speaks to me? absolute proof

I recently spoke to some people from Melbourne who suggested that Melbournians think all other Australians are disgusting savages. T/F?

― Antoine Bugleboy (Merdeyeux), Thursday, 24 February 2011 06:27 (2 hours ago) Bookmark

pretty much.

Brisbane is v butthurt it got beaten by Adelaide and Perth too.

it's true that vancouver is boring if you don't know anyone or only know boring people - it's a hard place to crack. i thought about moving back recently but montreal is too rad.

poverty and drug addiction and related criminal activity is present in every big city, just way more obvious on the streets year round in vancouver and victoria. it ain't pretty, that's for sure. but i lived there until 8.5 yrs ago and was involved in community organizations with a focus on 'marginalized populations' and didn't find it depressing or soul-crushing - it's a huge issue, there are systemic problems to overcome, it's sad and scary, but it's part of life everywhere in the world as far as i can tell. i left the west because i needed a change. if anything, vancouver can be oddly lulling...

of course, vancouver is also boring if you have no interest in hiking, skiing, snowboarding, biking, going to the beach, swimming, camping, picniking, sailing, skimboarding, birdwatching, dogwalking, making your own party, making your own music, making your own art, making yourself actually do things because no one else is going to do it for you, walking over bridges, looking at mountains, blahblahblah. those are pretty awesome things. it's not a place for everyone. but what place is.

vienna would be totally unlivable

unless you're like a billion years old

vienna is my grandmother's favorite city

its like the most expensive retirement home

of course, vancouver is also boring if you have no interest in hiking, skiing, snowboarding, biking, going to the beach, swimming, camping, picniking, sailing, skimboarding, birdwatching, dogwalking, making your own party, making your own music, making your own art, making yourself actually do things because no one else is going to do it for you, walking over bridges, looking at mountains, blahblahblah

lol @ the tone of your post. w/ a couple of exceptions im p interested in all of these things & have no doubt that id could have done them in vancouver. but ime it was a lot harder to do fun stuff in vancouver bcuz of how ltd the options were. also being a p small, closed community its p insular ime but i mean thats probably not a universal

i mean i can see how someone who grew up out there cld really love it & its def a beautiful city but idk i have hard time w/ the idea thats it a great place to move to

my tone wasn't meant to be condescending or anything - i mean, i find vancouver boring, is the thing, or maybe stagnating is a better word, and i love all these activities. but i also love other things. i meant it's EXTRA boring if you don't have a love for "lifestyle" living or whatever van tourism is calling it these days. i guess i wasn't clear enough, writing fast. i'm pretty cynical about vancouver, and the last time i was back there, briefly in the spring, i felt like i was moving through molasses. but much appealed to me too.

yeah, it definitely has insular communities that unless you have an 'in' are hard to break into. but that seems common to a lot of places, no matter where you move, you either get lucky falling immediately into a social group, by way of school, roommate or some kind of insta-social thing that happens, or, more likely, it takes a year or two to create a satisfying social life.

there is something about living near the ocean though.

oh man i was so excited about spending a couple of days in vancouver on our roadtrip in may and you fuckers have all brought me down THANKS LAMP

dude, no, it is an AWESOME place to visit!!

haha sorry justine - it is really beautiful & clean & fresh - its one of the only cities that smells good? & there is lots of fun tourist-y stuff idk also sorry rrrrobyn i was just defensive bcuz i was sour about my own xps

also drinks there are SO CHEAP so i mean

has anyone mentioned Stanley Park? it is giant park with forests and a rose garden and an aquarium and all kinds of things like swans n' ducks n' some beavers hidden somewhere and it's all right next to downtown and it is surrounded by ocean!

i miss taking a bus up the mountain after work to go night snowboarding, gotta say, and i'm not even a great snowboarder

also: so much good inexpensive sushi - i cannot stress this enough

vancouver film fest is the best film fest, imo, really varied

if vancouver drank a few drops of the lovable-freakshow kool-aid that is montreal, then i wld go back

it has a skytrain! a train in the sky! it goes to the airport even! and to the suburbs

it looks like caprica

the only thing i like in rrrobyn's list is "making your own party" but you can do that anywhere.

the pictures of Vancouver that i've seen do look interesting from a geography/natural setting point of view, wouldn't mind spending a few days there

the thing that struck me most the last time i was there happened while i was standing on the sidewalk outside a cafe up on Main Street, in this area that's gone somewhat upscale since i lived there, and i looked north down the street and the mountains, all topped with fresh snow, seemed to rise straight up out of the city centre, glittering in the sun like no feat of architecture, no matter how much glass is involved, ever could.
it's painfully humbling and it's mind-shatteringly beautiful.

then i ran into a friend/ex i hadn't seen in years, in town from toronto, and we went for a drink and were both like 'aaagh, vancouver! i just don't know...'

Destroyer is from Vancouver!

oh lots of rad ppl are from vancouver!!!

i will say the one thing i love abt toronot contra the other big cities is that there isnt the same defensive boosterism ppl here are like 'yah its kinda a dump but we have a good time' which is nice, i think.

my how ive ruined this thread!!! apols australians

apols australians

http://i.somethingawful.com/forumsystem/emoticons/emot-australia.gif

Hahah well in fairness it WAS canada who won the poll, so.

Is that a fucking crying kangaroo on a flag!?

hahaha

actual lol

Man there should totally be animated gif flags on the real.

it looks like caprica

― obliquity of the ecliptic (rrrobyn), Thursday, February 24, 2011 12:07 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

Have not been to Vancouver since I was v. young, but this sounds like a reason to go back in and of itself.