Editorial — Living in a place with good neighbours

SATURDAY MORNING EDITORIAL — Kamloops didn’t make the top 10 most liveable cities in the world, according to a report in The Economist, but there was lots of good news, if you put stock in “Best Cities” lists.

According to the Economist, Melbourne, Australia is the most liveable city on the globe, followed by Vienna, Austria. But here’s the good news — Vancouver is third, followed by Toronto, then Adelaide, Australia, and then Calgary.

So three of the top 10 are in Canada. And, in total, seven of the 10 are in either Canada or Australia, with another in New Zealand. Helsinki, Finland, is there, too. Those are pretty nice places.

It says something about this country, and, by extension, the part of the country we live in. Already, of course, some people are wondering what Toronto is doing on the list but, overall, it has some credibility. Factors like health care, culture, environment, stability, education, transportation, crime rate and infrastructure were considered.

There’s some consistency in the list; the three Canadian cities have been on it before, and so have several of the others. It’s interesting that no cities in the U.S.A. or most of Europe are represented.

On the Least Liveable list are cities like Harare in Zimbabe, Karachi in Pakistan, Lagos in Nigeria and Damascus in Syria. That’s the stability factor talking.

So, we can bask in the glow of Vancouver, Calgary and even Toronto. We didn’t win a prize but we have nice neighbours.