The most livable cities • Hacker News Board

Re: The most livable cities

#201

Post by dragonwriter » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:03 PM UTC

andsoitis wrote: post #195

martindbp wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how all of the diverse cities of the USA Have you perhaps considered that they're not very diverse? NYC and SF are a bit different yeah, but other than that they're all remarkably similar. Honestly it's a significant factor in why I decided to move back to Europe. It always bothered me when Americans claim that the US states are as diverse as separate countries in e.g. Europe. No, just no. You are blinded by the fa…

Los Angeles is way more diverse, on just about any front, than San Francisco.

> Los Angeles is way more diverse, on just about any front, than San Francisco.

LA has greater concentration of a single dominant ethnic/racial group (Hispanic, 48%) than San Francisco (non-Hispanic White, 40%).

Re: The most livable cities

#202

Post by stjohnswarts » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:13 PM UTC

"... according to one magazine"

Re: The most livable cities

#203

Post by mushbino » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:15 PM UTC

enw wrote: post #156

lbrito wrote: post #152

Affordability doesn't seem to count in this list. On average housing expenses (rent or mortgage) are around 60% of income in Vancouver metro. I won't even get into weather: the first few days of blue skies just started this week after a year of bleak gray-on-blue. Depressing is an understatement.

And health care in Canada is a joke. Unless you have terminal cancer or close to death, good luck getting any specialist’s attention. You’ll wait for a year on a waitlist for someone to care. Doesn’t matter if you have money either, no way around it.

I've spent $50k out of pocket so far this year on medical expenses that weren't covered by insurance. That doesn't even include other copay expenses. Had to cash out some 401ks early. Also, 44,000 Americans die every year due to lack of access to healthcare. I would gladly wait for over a year in a heartbeat for a cheaper and more fair system.

Re: The most livable cities

#204

Post by jl6 » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:18 PM UTC

thrwy_918 wrote: post #164

nonrandomstring wrote: post #53

Some factors rapidly changing in UK cities are - Empty offices since the pandemic - Disappearance of the high-street due to Amazon - New "In-between" builds Most British cities still have empty or skeleton-crewed office buildings. That can't be sustainable. Surely these will be sold off as housing. Shops are vanishing at a terrifying rate. Some city centres are boarded up and only charity shops, Tesco minimarts and t…

>sold off to developers to "fill in" with profitable (but in my reckoning totally unneeded) housing I have no idea what "unneeded" housing is. Are these units sitting empty? YoY house price growth in the UK is running at around 10%. I am not aware of a glut of "unneeded" housing.

Yeah, every extra unit contributes to increasing the supply of housing and therefore decreasing the cost, which at this point has reached crisis levels.

Re: The most livable cities

#205

Post by jdgoesmarching » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:21 PM UTC

dzogchen wrote: post #148

This list is a complete joke, evidenced by the fact that they use a definition of livibility that puts cities that are barely walkable in the top 10.

These listicles always suck because by design they make huge assumptions about priorities. Including some simple weight sliders would make these way more useful, even if the methodology was a little shaky (it always is).

Re: The most livable cities

#206

Post by thehappypm » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:22 PM UTC

Ekaros wrote: post #192

xadhominemx wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything north of the alps is pretty gloomy, especially compared to North America

Northern North America doesn't look too great... Dark and cold... Not some very lovely place to live. The south is horribly hot on other hand. Also horrible.

What do you mean by “Northern” exactly? Vancouver? New York?

Re: The most livable cities

#207

Post by justinpowers » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:22 PM UTC

AndrewUnmuted wrote: post #179

dzogchen wrote: post #148

This list is a complete joke, evidenced by the fact that they use a definition of livibility that puts cities that are barely walkable in the top 10.

Whether or not a city is "walkable," is not necessarily an improvement upon livability. In areas of Chicago and Baltimore, for example, the streets are "walkable," however the frequent violent & property crimes that take place in these areas make a casual stroll down the block an unsafe proposition. I grew up in Harlem during the time it was emerging out of the 1980s crack epidemic. As a child, the streets were easy…

Most “walkability” scores either directly or indirectly account for crime. For instance, residents rate walkability and are specifically asked to consider crime and safety. Or, conversely, walkability is measured based on the number of actual walkers and the number of walk-accessible amenities in a given area.

High crime areas would naturally have fewer walkers and fewer amenities.

I can’t speak to Baltimore, but in Chicago, crime and scarcity of amenities go hand-in-hand. I can’t think of a single pedestrian-focused area that has both amenities and a significant crime problem (one must understand that Chicago crime is not nearly as prevalent or evenly dispersed as the media and non-Chicagoans enjoy imagining).

Re: The most livable cities

#208

Post by groby_b » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:27 PM UTC

As a German: Any "livability" classification of cities that has Frankfurt in the top 10 has definitely some issues. It's a place to pass through, at best.

Re: The most livable cities

#209

Post by Ekaros » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:29 PM UTC

thehappypm wrote: post #206

Ekaros wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Northern North America doesn't look too great... Dark and cold... Not some very lovely place to live. The south is horribly hot on other hand. Also horrible.

What do you mean by “Northern” exactly? Vancouver? New York?

North of Polar Circle to start with and maybe somewhat south from there.

Re: The most livable cities

#210

Post by peoplefromibiza » Sat, Jun 25, 2022, 6:34 PM UTC

hartator wrote: post #173

peoplefromibiza wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Mass shootings are rare Yeah, but... Typical (Median) Annual Death Rate per Million People from Mass Public Shootings (U.S., Canada, and Europe, 2009-2015) United States — 0.058 Albania — 0 Austria — 0 Belgium — 0 Czech Republic — 0 Finland — 0 France — 0 Germany — 0 Italy — 0 Macedonia — 0 Netherlands — 0 Norway — 0 Russia — 0 Serbia — 0 Slovakia — 0 Switzerland — 0 United Kingdom — 0 Using the median analysis, th…

It seems a misdirection to use median across years as we have averages available. It's more precise and more readable but probably doesn't align with the policies you want to push: Norway — 1.888 Serbia — 0.381 France — 0.347 Macedonia — 0.337 Albania — 0.206 Slovakia — 0.185 Switzerland — 0.142 Finland — 0.132 Belgium — 0.128 Czech Republic — 0.123 United States — 0.089 Austria — 0.068 Netherlands — 0.051 Canada — 0…

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Many statisticians believe the reason the CRPC study's results seem so counterintuitive is that they are incorrect. One of the more detailed analyses appeared on the fact-checking website snopes.com and concluded that the CRPC report used “inappropriate statistical methods” which led to misleading results.