[PacificNW]

http://www.bizjournals.com/portland/stories/2007/05/07/daily4.html?jst=b_ln_hl



Portland Business Journal - 12:39 PM PDT Monday, May 7, 2007

The Portland area is the nation's third-best place to live in the country, according to an annual ranking of cities.

Gainesville, Fla., is the nation's No. 1 city to live in, according to "Cities Ranked & Rated, 2nd Edition," written by Bert Sperling and Peter Sander, which was released this week. No. 2 on the list is Bellingham, Wash.


The authors said they looked at more than 400 metro areas in the United States to come up with their rankings. Cities are ranked by 10 criteria: economy and jobs; cost of living; climate; education; health and health care; crime; transportation; leisure; arts and culture; and overall quality of life.

Filling out the top 10 are Colorado Springs, Colo.; Ann Arbor, Mich.; Ogden-Clearfield, Utah; Asheville, N.C.; Fort-Collins-Loveland, Colo.; San Luis Obispo-Paso Robles, Calf.; and Boise City-Nampa, Idaho.



:yes: :cheers:

[PDX City-State]

With the exception of PDX, This list should be renamed "Best Places to Live for Evangelicals."

[PacificNW]

⬆ :worship: :banana: :haha:

[OhioGuy]

I doubt Ann Arbor is overly evangelical considering it's the home of a fairly liberal major university. And I thought Ashville was a very popular location for artists and lesbians? lol :)

Portland is the only truly large city in the top 10 rankings. I think that speaks highly of how well it's developed as the population has increased quite steadily. For me, it's the only city in that top 10 list that I could ever see myself living in (I need a city with a large population... not a medium or small city).

[PDX City-State]

You're right--Asheville is actually very cool. This list doesn't seem too impressive. Portland isn't a huge city, but it's considerably larger than any other place on the list.

[Dougall5505]

WOOHOO now lets build a new tallest!

[pdxman]

^^^Agreed!! Drop the height limits in DT, CBD and LLoyd!

[PeterSmith]

Any list of best places to live topped by Gainesville, FL is highly suspect in my opinion (nothing there except drunk college kids), but congrats to Portland anyhow. I don't think you could have a list like this and not have Portland somewhere on it.

[Drew-Ski]

If you want some interesting reactions about this list, place this artical on the " city discussions" forum.

[65MAX]

Wow, that's a very diverse list of small and mid-sized cities, then one large city (PDX). It seems like their criteria for "best" cities is skewed in favor of small towns, and Portland just happens to have a lot of "small town" qualities.

[ltsmotorsport]

With the exception of PDX, This list should be renamed "Best Places to Live for Evangelicals."

Not sure where San Luis Obispo-Paso Robles fits into that description, but ok. :shrug: