Report: New York a Global Leader—Except in Livability, Air Quality, Housing Costs, Crime, Transit, Etc.
By Eliot Brown March 18, 2010 7:17 pm
reprints
The Partnership for New York City and PricewaterhouseCoopers have a new study out measuring global cities, and New York scores high, leading many categories with cities such as London, Tokyo and Paris.
The report, which does not rank overall but rather ranks cities on an array of different categories, is worth a read, as it tries to quantify a long list of qualities that add to a city’s global strength.
While New York scored at or near the top in categories such as air travel, tourism and top university concentration, it lagged in many others, particularly those categories pertaining to livability. For instance, the report gave New York a score of seven out of a highest-possible 21 on congestion management, four on cost of living, three on commute time, nine on air quality, and 12 on crime.
Livability concerns have been a particular focus of urban planners and economic development advocates, as issues such as transit and green space are relatively easy to control through policy and investment (compared with, say, the number of hotel rooms or number of top-MBA schools), and can easily distinguish cities from their competitors. Many of those cities that ranked highest in the livability categories were not the traditional global powers (for example: Sydney and Stockholm were leaders on sustainability and other livability measures).
Full report here.
