Besides Hawaii/Alaska, what is the cleanest/healthiest state to live in? (allergies, air pollution)

[JDproAV]

I'm thinking great air quality ,very few landfills/incinerators, less water/soil problems, etc.

[Citykid3785]

As a former Twin Cities resident, I'd vote the Twin Cities. With a lot of Scandinavians, it's almost a "lite" version of how you picture the Nordic countries.

Highly educated
Best trails/parks in the country, highest park spending per capita
Clean water
A strong, health conscious populace

[papad622]

Great thread idea OP. Just posting to see this later

[Ivory Lee Spurlock]

I think the cleanest looking cities and states are in the West.They are newer cities and states and it's like they haven't had time to get dirty, like the Industrial Midwest, The South and the Northeast. I'm thinking Colorado Springs, Salt Lake City, Boise. Lake Havasu City, Arizona seemed like a very clean place when I was there about 15 years ago..

[arr430]

I once read an article arguing the cleanest sparlking water supports almost no life at all. For a rich varied healthiest ecosystem, look for the muddiest swamp/

[NJ Brazen_3133]

Montana, and Idaho, I am told.

[lovecrowds]

North Dakota, Nebraska, South Dakota, Wyoming

They may have their share of unhealthy residents, but overall they low air pollution and low stress

[arr430]

By "cleanest", do you mean long- or short-term. I once heard that for every bushel of corn that came out of Iowa, five bushels of Iowa topsoil went into the Gulf of Mexico. That's not coming back. But Iowans just quit raking and burning leaves, to improve air quality by half.

[fezzador]

Originally Posted by Ivory Lee Spurlock

I think the cleanest looking cities and states are in the West.They are newer cities and states and it's like they haven't had time to get dirty, like the Industrial Midwest, The South and the Northeast. I'm thinking Colorado Springs, Salt Lake City, Boise. Lake Havasu City, Arizona seemed like a very clean place when I was there about 15 years ago..

I was rather surprised to find out that SLC's air quality isn't nearly as good as I thought it would be. While it doesn't have a ton of heavy industry, automotive exhaust contributes heavily to the less-than-ideal air quality. This happens as the mountains to the east of the city partially block air coming from the west, and during inversion days (when warm air is trapped under a layer of cooler air, which is common around this time of year) the smog can be so bad that advisories are issued to keep people indoors.

[nadnerb]

Cleanest air quality state will be tough to find since there is a lot of variation within states.

As far as cities go, Tucson has excellent air quality which is kind of surprising because nearby cities Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas are known to have pretty poor air quality (relative to rest of US). I lived in Tucson until the age of 18, and I never had allergies growing up. The first time I experienced regular seasonal allergies was when I moved to New Mexico.