Centre for Liveable Cities

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LiveableCities

insights
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About In this edition

CLC Insights features original articles by CLC Various city rankings have named Singapore the most
researchers on how to make our cities more liveable liveable and happiest Asian city, as well as the most
and sustainable. expensive. What are the shortcomings of these city
rankings, and how can we use them?

WHY CITY RANKINGS DESERVE LIMITED

ATTENTION

Introduction

Urban liveability is difficult to measure. But, that has not deterred consultancies, magazines
and social scientists from trying. In the first three months of 2016 alone, several rankings
measuring quality of life, happiness and cost of living — all of which shape urban liveability
— have been published. So far, Singapore has been ranked as the city with the highest
quality of life and level of happiness in Asia. It has also been given the unenviable title of
the being the most expensive city in the world for expatriates, for the third consecutive year
(see Figure 1).

Mercer’s Quality of EIU’s Worldwide Cost of UNSDSN’s* World Happiness

Living Survey 2016 Living Survey 2016 Report 2016
# ranked 230 cities 133 cities 157 countries
Ranking 1. Vienna 1. Singapore 1. Denmark
2. Zurich 2. Zurich & Hong Kong 2. Switzerland
3. Auckland 4. Geneva 3. Iceland
4. Munich 5. Paris 4. Norway
5. Vancouver 6. London 5. Finland
6. Dusseldorf 7. New York 6. Canada
7. Frankfurt 8. Copenhagen & Seoul & Los 7. Netherlands
8. Geneva Angeles 8. New Zealand
9. Copenhagen 9. Australia
10. Sydney 10. Sweden
Figure 1: Top 10 cities or countries, [...] [...]
and Singapore’s position. 26. Singapore 22. Singapore
Note: *UNSDSN stands for United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network, which is an international
panel comprising economists, psychologists and public health experts.

As the year progresses, we will be confronted with more of such rankings. In this paper, we
explain some of the shortcomings of city rankings that measure urban liveability and quality
of life. We will discuss two broad groups of rankings (see Figures 1 & 2 for the lists of top 10
cities). The first group comprises four popular quality-of-life rankings that attract widespread
attention from local and international media. They include Mercer, EIU, and Monocle’s
annual quality-of-life rankings as well as the World Happiness Report. The second group
of rankings adopt a more holistic definition of liveability. They include rankings by the Mori
Memorial Foundation (Mori) — a Japanese urban research institution — and Singapore’s

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Asia Competitiveness Institute (ACI). Of all the rankings considered, the World Happiness
Report was the only one that measured subjective well-being. All the others based their
rankings only on objective features that shape the quality of life, such as public transport,
recreation options, and access to nature.

EIU Global Monocle Quality Mori Global Power ACI Global Liveable
Liveability Ranking of Life Survey Cities Index 2015 Cities Index 2010
2015 2015
# of cities 140 25 40 64
City 1. Melbourne 1. Tokyo 1. London 1. Geneva
ranking 2. Vienna 2. Vienna 2. New York 2. Zurich
3. Vancouver 3. Berlin 3. Paris 3. Singapore
4. Toronto 4. Melbourne 4. Tokyo 4. Copenhagen
5. Calgary & Adelaide 5. Sydney 5. Singapore 5. Helsinki
7. Sydney 6. Stockholm 6. Seoul 6. Luxembourg
8. Perth 7. Vancouver 7. Hong Kong 7. Stockholm
9. Auckland 8. Helsinki 8. Berlin 8. Berlin
10. Helsinki & Zurich 9. Zurich & 9. Amsterdam 9. Hong Kong
[...] Copenhagen 10. Vienna 10. Auckland
Figure 2: Top 10 cities or countries, 49. Singapore [...]
and Singapore’s position. 13. Singapore
Note: ACI has yet to publish its full rankings for 2015.

Defining and Measuring Urban Liveability

The focus of liveability research has shifted over the decades. When social scientists began
defining and measuring urban liveability in the 1960s1, they did so because they wanted to
make cities more equitable. The thinking then was that social indicators would help inform
and shape policies that would benefit everyone, especially those who were economically and
socially disadvantaged.

*
In fairness to Florida, he contended
in his later works — notably The
Flight of the Creative Class —
that cities had to be inclusive.
To achieve this, he urged the US
government to soften its stance
on immigration, and to reform the
education system so that the middle
to lower class — who made up 70
per cent of the workforce — could
participate in the creative economy.
By the 1980s, research objectives began to shift. Researchers moved towards studying
urban liveability to determine what made cities more competitive. The aim was to inform
policymakers looking to improve living conditions in order to attract to mobile talent and
capital. Economist, Richard Florida, is perhaps one of the most well-known proponents of
this mode of thinking. In his 2002 bestseller, The Rise of the Creative Class, Florida contended
that in the knowledge age, cities needed a “people climate”2, meaning that cities had to
cater to the preferences and lifestyle aspirations of knowledge workers.*
CLC’s Liveability Framework, which is based on Singapore’s development experience, straddles
the objectives of fostering both an equitable and competitive city. It defines liveability in terms
of three broad development outcomes: competitive economy, sustainable environment, and
a high quality of life. In other words, a liveable city should have an efficient economy that
provides good jobs for people with diverse skills; makes judicious use of scarce resources;
and provides a high quality of life for everyone. This triple bottom line is underpinned by
good governance and an integrated approach to planning for development.

While we do not claim to have the best definition of liveability, CLC’s Liveability Framework is
nevertheless a useful starting point for analysing city rankings. This is because the Framework
comprehensively defines what liveability means in Singapore’s policy context. In addition,
the Framework recognises the fact that human well-being is multi-dimensional. It therefore
gives equal weight to all three developmental goals, even though the economic imperative,
arguably, looms largest in Singapore’s policymaking circles.

City Rankings Adopt Narrow Definitions of Liveability

ACI’s Global Liveable Cities Index (GLCI) operationalises CLC’s Liveability Framework best.

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This is because ACI took the Framework into account when developing its index. ACI
measures urban liveability from the perspective of an ordinary resident rather than that of an
expatriate or creative individual – which is the preferred unit of analysis in most city rankings.
ACI’s ranking is also one of the few that takes into account the inclusiveness of a city. It
measures, among other things, income inequality and cost of living. Singapore was ranked
third in 2010 and seventh in 2015, due to our relatively weaker scores in areas such as social
equity and environmental sustainability.3

In spite of its relevance, the ACI’s ranking is not well known. In addition, unlike most city
rankings, ACI’s rankings are not updated regularly. As a result, it does not enjoy the annual
media coverage that the other rankings receive, and so in turn has limited impact on public
debate and policy discussions.

Rankings that do shape discussions are incidentally the ones that adopt narrower definitions
of liveability. These definitions tend to be limited in at least four ways.

First, city rankings tend to give disproportionate weight to the preferences of expatriates
and highly-skilled professionals. This is especially so for the quality of life rankings by Mercer,
EIU and Monocle. While there are other rankings that take into account the perspective
of residents, these tend to suffer from other limitations. Mori, for example, has a separate
ranking based on the preferences of residents for its Global Power Cities Index. But Mori’s
resident-centric ranking is of limited use because its indicators are undisclosed. Even in Mori’s
case, the resident-centric ranking is secondary to the main ranking which is also tilted to the
preferences of creative individuals.

Figure 3: Vienna is usually a top-

ranked city on liveability indices
that are tilted to the preferences
of expatriates and highly-skilled
professionals. Image credit: Miroslav
Petrasko. Retrived from http://bit.
ly/1T1dEer.

Second, some city rankings give short shrift to economic performance. This is the case for
Mercer’s Quality of Living Survey and EIU’s Global Liveability Ranking. Both do not count
economic statistics such as GDP per capita and unemployment rate amongst their indicators
even though both metrics are known to have significant impact on the quality of life.

Third, city rankings usually omit indicators that measure inequality, such as income inequality,
for which data is available. This is undesirable because income inequality also affects the
quality of life. Research has shown that unequal cities tend to experience higher crime rates,
and that residents from such cities are also more likely to report being unhappy.4 Nonetheless,
apart from ACI, Mori’s is the only other ranking that measures income inequality.

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Figure 4: Downtown Vancouver

is lauded for its cycling lanes, but
housing prices there have soared,
pricing out low income groups.
Image credit: Paul Krueger. Retrived
from http://bit.ly/1Qy3Eb0.

More subtly, there are numerous other types of inequalities that co-exist and mutually
reinforce one another in a city. For example, in many cities, income inequality reinforces
spatial inequality when lower income groups are priced out of neighbourhoods with access
to better amenities, quality schools and jobs. Collectively, income and spatial inequalities
worsen the distribution of opportunities. Though these are important facets of urban life,
city rankings do not measure them. One constraint might be the lack of reliable data for
measuring these types of inequalities. But, it is more likely that such measurements are left
out because the focus of most city rankings are skewed towards the perspective of highly-
skilled professionals, who are typically at the top end of most distributions, and therefore
less concerned about the inclusiveness of a city.

An interesting exception to this trend is the World Happiness Report. In 2016, countries
were ranked based not only on their average self-reported happiness but also based on the
equality of their self-reported happiness. This is significant because happiness is often used
as a broad measure of quality of life. Thus, the Report was attempting to measure both the
average quality of life and its distribution (see Figure 5). Singapore was ranked the happiest
city in Asia, and also had one of the most equal distributions of happiness. As happiness is a
relatively uncommon metric for measuring liveability, we will elaborate on its relevance later
in this paper.

Ranking for Average Happiness Ranking for Equality of Happiness

1. Denmark 1. Bhutan
2. Switzerland 2. Comoros
3. Iceland 3. Netherlands
4. Norway 4. Singapore
5. Finland 5. Iceland
6. Canada 6. Luxembourg
7. Netherlands 7. Switzerland
8. New Zealand 8. Senegal
Figure 5: Top 10 countries based on 9. Australia 9. Afghanistan
average life evaluation and equality 10. Sweden 10. Finland
of life evaluation. 22. Singapore
Note: The rankings for average happiness were based on Gallup World Poll data for 2013 to 2015. To increase the
number of observations, the rankings for equality of happiness also included 2012 data.

Finally, another important omission in quality-of-life rankings is the cost of living. Mercer and
EIU’s quality-of-life rankings omit this completely. Instead both companies produce separate
city rankings measuring the cost of living for expatriates. One of these, EIU’s Worldwide Cost
of Living Survey, has named Singapore the most expensive city in the world for expatriates
for the past three consecutive years.
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This finding needs to be viewed with caution, and a wider context that in this index, a city’s
ranking also depends on how its currency is performing against the US dollar. In two of
those three years, Singapore’s currency was appreciating against the greenback. That caused
Singapore to appear relatively more expensive, even though domestic inflation was held in
check, and Singaporeans were benefiting from the stronger currency.

Importantly, EIU’s Worldwide Cost of Living Index is tilted to the preferences of expatriates,
rather than the average resident. Consequently, EIU measures cost of living using a basket
of goods that is very different from that which is representative of the average Singaporean.

For example, EIU takes into account housing rent, which is less relevant for Singaporeans,
who are mostly homeowners. In the area of transport, EIU only considers the cost of private
cars and taxis, and not public transport, which the average Singaporean relies on.5

In 2016, EIU attributed Singapore’s high cost of living to, among other things, the high cost
of car ownership and usage that result from the taxes imposed. However, these high taxes
help manage traffic congestion in land–scarce Singapore. This means that in other rankings,
such as the EIU Global Liveability Ranking, these taxes may be looked upon favourably
because they contribute to liveability in Singapore by managing traffic congestion. This goes
to show that measuring cost of living separately may not give a full account of costs and
benefits of living in a particular city.

Indeed, some of the most liveable cities on EIU’s Global Liveability ranking can be quite
costly, especially where housing is concerned. Australian cities are good examples of this.
One measure of housing affordability is the median housing price to median household
income ratio (or median ratio). Minister Khaw Boon Wan had previously set a target of 4.0
for this median ratio. Today, the median ratio for new 4-room public housing flats in non-
mature estates in Singapore is about 2.9. In contrast, the median ratio in Sydney was 12.2
in late 2015. This meant that homeownership was severely unaffordable, and out of reach
for low and middle-income families without significant savings or inheritance. Housing was
also unaffordable for these groups in other Australian cities such as Melbourne, Perth, and
Adelaide (see Figure 6). In addition, rental rates were also found to be unaffordable for low-
income households. In some parts of Sydney and Melbourne, low-income households were
found to be spending as much as 60% of their monthly incomes on rent.6 Thus, discussions
about urban liveability would be incomplete unless we take cost of living, especially of
housing, into account.

City Median housing price Median household Median housing price to

income income ratio
Sydney $1,032,000 $84,600 12.2
Melbourne $730,000 $75,600 9.7
Figure 6: Median housing price to Perth $589,000 $88,800 6.6
median household income ratio, 3rd
quarter of 2015. Adelaide $430,000 $66,700 6.4
Source: 12th Annual Demographia International Housing Affordability Study.

The Price of Simple

So far, we have highlighted the limitations in some city rankings’ definitions of liveability
when compared to CLC’s definition. We now consider the problems with data presentation.
The fundamental issue is that urban liveability is multi-dimensional. Hence, there are many
separate indicators to consider when measuring liveability, which can be cumbersome.

Therefore, there is a strong demand for these indicators to be aggregated in a simple way,
such as into an index, which is the approach adopted by most (but not all) city rankings.7
Cities are then ranked, and the resultant league tables make it easy to communicate a city’s

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relative liveability.

But, this simplicity is achieved through a number of trade-offs. First, when data is aggregated
to form indices, ranking agencies have to make choices on the weights to allocate to each
indicator. These decisions usually reflect value judgments, are not transparent, and can be
controversial.

Second, data aggregation also obscures the rich contextual information used in the
evaluation of cities. Anyone seeking to gain an adequate understanding of the index would
have to refer to the original array of indicators used to construct the index. This itself can be
a cumbersome process because these city rankings do not publish their data, or charge for
access to the data that they use.

One alternative to constructing an index based on an array of indicators is to measure

happiness, or subjective well-being. Happiness, or subjective well-being, is often treated as
a broad indicator for quality of life. This is because self-reported happiness reflects several
dimensions of life. These include individual factors such as personality, income, health, and
an individual’s perceived freedom in making important life choices. It also includes social
factors such as the degree of social trust, and political factors such as the government’s
adherence to rule of law. Instead of measuring these dimensions separately and aggregating
them into a quality-of-life index, researchers can just measure one indicator: happiness.

This is the approach adopted by the World Happiness Report. It ranks countries based on a
single evaluative question asking people to value their lives today on a zero (worst possible
life) to 10 (best possible life) scale. By relying on self-reported data, the Report leaves it to
the respondents to decide how much weight to allocate to the different factors that affect
quality of life. Therefore, responses stand a better chance of reflecting the priorities of those
surveyed, rather than the value judgement of the ranking agency.

Figure 7: Denmark is usually ranked

as the happiest country in the world.
But the World Happiness Report
do not explain how policymaking
contributes to the happiness of
Dane’s. Image credit: Alex Berger.
Retrieved from http://bit.ly/1Tu1IVt.

But even this solution is quite simplistic. High-level evaluative questions do not say anything
specific about people’s satisfaction with the cities they live in, or the level of satisfaction
stemming from aspects of life that are within a policymakers’ control. As such, policymakers
may be better served if they collected their own data on the self-reported satisfaction on
various aspects of city living such as mobility, employment opportunities, and others. The
European Commission has been conducting such a survey every third year since 2007.

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*
Heng and Lai’s sustainability
framework had four key thrusts,
namely, (1) support economic
development; (2) conserve and
optimise resources such as land,
water, energy and food; (3) protect
the built and natural environment; and
(4) enhance community well-being
and local culture. When mapped
onto CLC’s Liveability Framework,
(1) corresponds to competitive
economy; (2) and (3) to sustainable
environment; and (4) to quality of life.
Figure 8: Green roof on Chicago’s
City Hall’s Roof. Image credit: Center
for Neighbourhood Technology.
Retrieved from http://bit.ly/25y30Fy.
An Alternative Approach
By now, we hope we have made the case that city rankings suffer from many limitations.
Part of the problem lies with their narrow definitions of liveability. Aside from this, data
presentation is also a challenge. Thus, we present an alternative approach for analysing
urban liveability: by focusing on various cities’ best practices instead of ranking them.
This is the approach adopted by Professor Heng Chye Kiang and Dr Lai Choo Malone-Lee
at the National University of Singapore.8 Instead of producing yet another city ranking, they
have developed a comprehensive database of indicators for evaluating sustainability*, in
which they defined sustainability in a manner similar to CLC’s definition of liveability. In
addition, Heng and Lai also compiled a database of various cities’ best practices to provide
policymakers with examples of how cities can improve their performance in some areas. The
key objective of crafting this framework is to enable cities to take ownership of the indicators
they wish to monitor (and convert them into an index if they so wish) and collate the best
practices that they wish to follow.
By learning from best practices, policymakers are primed to innovate systematically for
Singapore’s context. One area of focus could be in urban greening — a common indicator in
city rankings. Urban greening can be achieved in many ways. The most traditional method
is to allocate land to parks so that city dwellers might have access to open and green spaces
in which to rest and ruminate. But some cities have gone further by mixing land use. In
Lisbon, Portugal, businesses are allowed to operate out of kiosks in parks. These kiosks
provide spaces for budding entrepreneurs who cannot otherwise afford a brick and mortar
store. Meanwhile, park users also benefit from these retail kiosks as they enjoy the various
goods and services that the kiosk operators provide, adding to their park experience. That
is a good example of enhancements to the city-dweller’s quality of life enabled by creative
land use mix.
Other cities have chosen different approaches. Chicago’s city government has partnered with
both the private sector and its citizens to implement an extensive green roofs programme
in both residential and commercial buildings. These roofs are designed to reduce the urban
heat island effect and improve air quality. What started out as a small pilot trial about half
the size of a soccer field on the roof of Chicago’s City Hall has since expanded to more than
500 buildings. Today, Chicago has the most extensive green roofs in all of the US.
These policy interventions are not foreign to Singapore. Today, NParks already rents out
pop-up kiosks at East Coast Park (ECP) for S$900 each month, or S$150 each weekend. If
the concept has worked at ECP for both park users and retailers, it might be worthwhile
introducing these kiosks in other parks around Singapore.
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Similarly, the government presently incentivises building owners to incorporate green roofs
with their outdoor dining areas. Perhaps the next step is for us to incorporate green roofs
on some of our older stock of HDB flats that do not have rooftop or sky gardens unlike their
newer counterparts. These roof gardens could be used as sites for NParks’ Community in
Bloom projects. Having a garden close to home would improve the spatial distribution of
green spaces, and in turn, quality of life for flat dwellers.

Apart from green spaces, another major contributor to urban liveability is mobility. In this
regard, city rankings tend to be partial towards cities with excellent multi-modal transport
systems. This is contrary to the belief that those who love cities dislike cars as a mode of
transport.

Nevertheless, space constraints in most cities usually mean that cities can only develop
excellent multi-modal transport system if cars stop enjoying their de facto privilege over
other modes of travel, such as cycling and walking. Cities are discovering that they can
design beautiful spaces when they do not have to cater to cars. One such example is the
Tilikum Crossing Bridge built over the Willamette River in Portland, Oregon (see Figure 6).
The bridge accommodates light rail, buses, cyclists and pedestrians but has no car lanes. It
includes interesting design elements such as the cables on the bridge that mirror the outline
of Mount Hood which rises up in the background. The bridge is also fitted with lights that
change colour and create different patterns based on the speed, depth and temperature of
the river flowing below.

Figure 9: The Tilikum Bridge

accommodates light rail, buses, and
pedestrians but has no car lanes.
Image credit: TriMet. Retrieved from
http://bit.ly/1Tkl9Sh.

Conclusion

City rankings are here to stay, and will likely continue to capture the attention of both local
and international media, sparking debates that may not always be critical. But, that may be
fine as long as policymakers understand the limitations of these rankings.

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Endnotes

1
McCann, E. J. (2004). “Best places”: Interurban competition, quality of life and popular
media discourse,” in Urban Studies, 41(10), pp. 1909-1929.
2
Florida, R. (2002). The rise of the creative class. New York: Basic Books.
3
Tan, N. (2015, November 26) Singapore ranks 7th in liveable cities index. Channel NewsAsia.
Retrieved from http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/business/singapore/singapore-
ranks-7th-in/2295506.html.
4
Glaeser, E.L., Resseger, M., & Tobio, K. (2009). Inequality in cities, in Journal of Regional
Science, 49(4), pp. 617-646.
5
Cost of living reports do not reflect costs for locals: DPM Tharman. (2014, March 6).
Channel NewsAsia. Retrieved from http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/specialreports/
parliament/news/cost-of-living-reports-do/1021364.html.
6
Community Sector Banking, Shelter Australia and SGS Economics & Planning. (2015).
Rental Affordability Index. Retrieved from http://www.sgsep.com.au/assets/RAI-Release-
Report-Final-231115.pdf.
7
Stiglitz, J.E., Sen, A, & Fitoussi, J-P. (2010). Mismeasuring our lives: Why GDP doesn’t add
up. New York & London: The New Press.
8
Heng, C.K., & Malone-Lee, L.C. (n.d.). An Assessment Framework for Monitoring Cities’
Sustainability. Retrieved from www.sde.nus.edu.sg/csac/booklet%20small.pdf.

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Contributor

Ms. Alisha Gill

Alisha Gill is a researcher at the Centre for Liveable Cities (CLC). She has
performed public policy and research roles in the Ministries of Health and
Finance, the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, and the Institute of Real
Estate Studies at the National University of Singapore (NUS). She graduated
with First Class Honours in Economics from NUS.

Acknowledgements

The author thanks Wu Wei Neng, Joshua Sim, Joanna Tan and Dionne Hoh
at the Centre for Liveable Cities for their comments on this article. Dionne
also assisted with preparing this piece for publication.

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