Melbourne’s top ranking, for the fifth year running, gives it an edge in the tourism and education markets.
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Melbourne’s reputation has been further enhanced after it topped a Global Liveability Survey as the world’s most liveable city for the fifth year in a row.
Vienna, Austria, has been ranked as the world’s second most liveable city, followed by Vancouver and Toronto, Canada, respectively.
European liveability has slumped particularly over the past five years, as Zurich is the only city in Western Europe where liveability has improved – if only marginally.
She said while Melbourne ranked well in both The Economist survey and a recent ranking by Monocle magazine – in which the city was in the top five – Melbourne still had much to do regarding “city-shaping infrastructure projects, maximising access to jobs… and making sure we remain a liveable city for everyone by providing more affordable housing”.
Kiev, hit by the political crisis in Ukraine, is now one of the ten least liveable cities in the world. A more stable outlook has also led to improvements in Abidjan in Côte d’Ivoire.
Escalations in hostilities in Libya have also prompted a sharp decline in livability in Tripoli as the threat to stability from IS continues to spread across the Middle East and North Africa.
The report lists 140 cities worldwide based on a variety of lifestyle issues such health care, education, culture, environment and infrastructure. Each factor in a city is rated as acceptable, tolerable, uncomfortable, undesirable or intolerable.
“This has not been the case in other parts of the world, with instability and unrest features undermining the scores of a number of cities globally”, said Jon Copestake, editor of the EIU survey.
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The scores are then compiled and weighted to provide a score of 1-100, where one is considered intolerable and 100 is considered ideal.
