Is Vancouver The Best City In The World??? (quality of life, living in)

[Jonotastic]

Originally Posted by VanHa

Then why is Vancouver always in the top 5 city in the world in witch to live in world surveys?

Who answers those surveys? I know I've never taken one. It's the same thing with best countries to live in and Iceland always gets top place. I know I wouldn't want to live there. Same thing with the top 10 best beaches and some beach in Florida such as Clearwater gets in the top 3, which I know is complete b.s. I can name 10 beaches just in Australia that I went to, which are nicer. My point being, surveys don't mean jack.

[chicken.or.the.nugget]

Originally Posted by XXclimberX

Vancouver has better skiing then either Colorado or Utah. The snow may have a higher water content, but you can ski year around here.

Cool you can ski on a glacer. Mountains in colorado and utah still have snow when they close, they just choose to close it because they have nice warm weather and people rather be biking. Warm weather is rare in coastal bc.

And if you like skiing year round california offers around 8 months...maybe more. Mammoth usually closes in early July.

[VanHa]

Originally Posted by chicken.or.the.nugget

Cool you can ski on a glacer. Mountains in colorado and utah still have snow when they close, they just choose to close it because they have nice warm weather and people rather be biking. Warm weather is rare in coastal bc.

And if you like skiing year round california offers around 8 months...maybe more. Mammoth usually closes in early July.

Chicken,

Please what city in Utah or Colorado would compare with Vancouver?! Where else can you have both mountains and ocean like this?!

[chicken.or.the.nugget]

Well you don't. But we were talking about skiing. And the ocean in BC isnt that usable. Most people think the beach in San Francisco is freezing, it only gets colder. Some people do go surfing though. In utah there is the great salt lake though. it's big and salty.

[movingwiththewind]

Originally Posted by mishigas73

there is one city that far and away beats out Vancouver and every other city in the world, and that's New York. ...the bottom line for me is that New York beats out every other city I've ever seen in terms of beauty, culture, people...

NYC the beautiful????! How about NYC beats Vancouver in the proximity to the great outdoors?!

Wow, how people can be different! Cannot wait until I get out of this dirty, stinky, overcrowded place called New York City. Very often, in a park, I don't know if that was a squirrel or a rat. Five looooooooooooong years! Hopefully, this year!

Sorry, Mishigas, but NYC is not the #1 IN ANYTHING, food, beauty, culture and any other things you can think of included. But yes, it's probably what people call a "world" city. Doesn't make me feel happy and proud, though.

[NewToCA]

Originally Posted by VanHa

NewToCa, what would some of those other cities be?

San Francisco, Denver, and Boston would be a few cities I prefer over Vancouver. I thought some of the Vancouver surrounding area, especially to the north, was very nice. We enjoyed hiking through Lynn Canyon in the mountain area just north of Vancouver. We also liked the Stanley Park area too. The natural landscape, to the north, is very impressive and a major asset for the area.

I think Vancouver is generally pretty nice, but I'll try to describe why I found it a little disappointing. Keep in mind, I'm focusing a bit on the negative here.

First off, the downtown area lacks much variety. Though the area has a lot of towers and good residential density, which I view as a plus, the towers generally look pretty similar to each other. Also, I found the downtown shopping Pacific Centre mall area, plus the huge mall in Burnaby, MetroTown, to be very sterile, lacking much in personality. It all seemed very minimalist, with little in the way of interesting architecture. The Yaletown area was nice, but just seemed to be pretty isolated to a few streets.

I also thought Chinatown was a bit shabby, and the Hastings St area, from Gastown towards the east side for a few miles to be inconsistent, and fairly shabby and trashy, with a lot of trash on the streets. This was a surprise to me, I've always found Canada (even massive Toronto) to be spotless. Gastown was pretty nice, but again it was a small area isolated to only a few streets.

Taking a look at the large residential areas, especially to the south and east of the downtown area, I found the neighborhoods to be a bit shabby, despite being rather expensive. I thought the landscaping was rather minimal too, little in the way of nice boulevards or other interesting and green areas.

Overall, I generally liked Vancouver, but have a few other areas I like a bit more.

[wilvan]

Vancouver trashy? Maybe you visited a year or two ago when the garbage collectors went on a strike.

[NewToCA]

Originally Posted by wilvan

Vancouver trashy? Maybe you visited a year or two ago when the garbage collectors went on a strike.

Last year, I believe it was around the end of August or early September. Specifically, I was referring to Hastings.

[mishigas73]

Originally Posted by VanHa

Then why is Vancouver always in the top 5 city in the world in witch to live in world surveys?

I just had this discussion with my boyfriend, who lives in Vancouver. We came to this conclusion...there's no conceivable reason why Geneva should be in the top 5 of that list, while New York is 49th. It's apparently a list of the most "livable" cities, not the "most living" cities.

Seriously, though, this list is of the "most livable" cities, which includes a lot parameters which may not be important to everyone. I've already made my own points regarding NY vs Vancouver in this thread, so I won't rehash those. What I will say though, in regards to this list, is that I've been to all of the top 5 cities and simply don't see it.

[mishigas73]

Originally Posted by movingwiththewind

Sorry, Mishigas, but NYC is not the #1 IN ANYTHING, food, beauty, culture and any other things you can think of included.

And, as they say, "that's what makes horse racing". If we all liked the same things, life wouldn't be as fun, would it?

We could go by these bogus "most livable cities" surveys, or simply us our own brains, and go with what we like. For me, I'd gladly give up being able to see the snow-covered mountains on the way to work to actually be in a place that has a pulse...and a passion. If others dig something else, cool. They just have to learn not to get all uppity when reasonable people don't agree that their city is the "best city in the world".