This post captures a hodge podge of categories that measure bad stuff. Now, some cities in some other categories of my research have some less-than-stellar statistics. But the things I've measured -- population, education, housing prices, etc. are not by themselves "bad." Sadly, my research doesn't cover every city in every category, either because the cities were too small to be included in a study or because the city didn't keep data in the right way to inform the study. I may make more efforts to find out the missing information.
So without further ado...
So without further ado...
Crime Rates: From the FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2009. Based on number of violent crimes per 100,000 people. City rank first; metropolitan area rank second.
LA: 158th & 73rd worst crime rates.
Chicago: City & metro area both N/A. The FBI report noted that Illinois keeps statistics in a way incompatible with the FBI's method.
Philadelphia: 30th & 94th worst crime rates.
Columbus: 49th & 79th worst crime rates.
DC: 22nd & 125th worst crime rates.
Denver: 141st & 152nd worst crime rates.
Portland: 174th & 208th worst crime rate (metro area is below national average).
Raleigh: 236th & 258th worst crime rates (city slight below national average and metro area significantly below national average). Apparently a very safe place. Except I once had a tire slashed, along with everyone else in a quarter mile radius. Really. :(
Cleveland: 7th & 97th worst crime rates. I never realized Cleveland was so menacing!
Des Moines: 165th & 248th worst crime rates (metro area significantly below national average)
Asheville: City N/A & 253rd worst crime rate (significantly below national average)
 |
| Property crime. Even Graceland is not immune. |
Safety from Natural Disasters: City rankings from SustainLane.com, which considered hurricanes, major flooding, catastrophic hail, tornado super-outbreaks, and earthquakes, taking into consideration potential frequency of disaster as well as the extent of damage. Rank shown is relative safety from natural disasters out of the 50 largest cities in the U.S.
LA: #43, which is deemed “endangered.”
Chicago: #12
Philadelphia: #8
Columbus: #39
DC: #27
Denver: #13
Portland: #30
Raleigh: Not ranked, but in my experience, very susceptible to hurricanes, even that far inland, which are enormously destructive.
Cleveland: #3, which is the safest city on the list.
Des Moines: Not ranked, but my guess is Des Moines gets hail and tornadoes.
Asheville: Not ranked, and I don't have enough knowledge of the area to guess at its dangers. Paul, any ideas? :)
But this New York Times/Sperling's Best Places map tells a different story, showing Portland as being the safest from natural disasters, and Chicago, Philadelphia and Raleigh being in moderately dangerous areas. And all the rest in between.
 |
| Yellowstone, after a forest fire. |
Air Pollution: From an American Lung Association study, 2011, based on ozone and daily & long-term particle pollution. The study listed only the cleanest and dirtiest cities, so any city without notes is neither particularly clean nor particularly dirty. No pun intended.
 |
| Air and aesthetic pollution. |
LA: 2nd most polluted city. 1st most polluted in ozone. 2nd most polluted in year-round particles. 4th most polluted in short-term particles. Well, that's the stereotype about LA, right? Too bad LA didn't prove to be different from the stereotype in this regard, as it has in some others.
Chicago: 17th in short-term particles.
Philadelphia: 24th in year-round particles. 20th in short-term particles.
Columbus:
DC: 14th in ozone.
Denver:
Portland: 24th in short-term particles.
Raleigh:
Cleveland: 12th in year-round particles.
Des Moines:
Asheville: On the list of cleanest short-term particle cities (list is unranked). Nice!
 |
| OK OK. This fish didn't die from air pollution! But it died from something, alright? |
Poverty Rate & Rank: From a Brookings Institute 2011 study of the largest 100 metropolitan areas. Percentage of people in the metro area living in poverty, and the area's rank among the 100 areas. Low numbers are better.
LA: 7.8% #63
Chicago: 14.4% #28
Philadelphia: 21.4% #15
Columbus: 13.7% #30
DC: 6% #78
Denver: 4% #84
Portland: 1.1% #97. The least impoverished.
Raleigh: 6.5% #72
Cleveland: 23.5% #7. The most impoverished.
Des Moines: 2.9% #90
Asheville: Too small to be included in the study.
As far as natural disasters are concerned the only thing I've ever really heard about was the French Broad river breaching which it did not that long ago (though before we moved here). The water was up into the shopping area outside the Biltmore estate to give you an idea of how high it got. Actually, the River Arts District was created by the floods (not sure if it was the recent ones or the 1916 floods). All the businesses were literally washed out and the land owners reduced the rent and pushed them as artists studios. The key is to live above the flood-plane. Down town is, I believe, well above.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to reenforce the good air quality here too. The area had a lot of TB retreats as Doctors back in the day thought the clean mountain air had healing properties. I can't argue with them...
Theге is ԁefinatеly a lot to find
ReplyDeleteout about this ѕubject. I love all of the ρoints you maԁe.
My webpage: what is going green
You're so cool! I don't think I've truly read through a single thing like this before. So wonderful to find somebody with a few original thoughts on this topic. Seriously.. thanks for starting this up. This website is one thing that is needed on the internet, someone with some originality!
ReplyDeleteAlso visit my blog: what is going green
Aw, thіs was an іncrеdibly nice post.
ReplyDeleteSpending some time and aсtual effort to produce a good article… but what can I ѕaу… I
procrastinate a lot and ԁοn't manage to get nearly anything done.
Feel free to visit my web-site; organic reviews