Best cities list puts Niagara in middle
An online ranking of Canada’s best places to live has placed Niagara squarely in the middle of the pack.
In the MoneySense survey for 2018, Grimsby had Niagara’s best showing, coming in at 83rd. Next was Niagara-on-the-Lake, named Canada’s 107th best place to live.
Among the region’s biggest cities, St. Catharines finished at 180, Niagara Falls at 203 and Welland at 216.
Bringing up the rear for Niagara,
Fort Erie was ranked 344th, West Lincoln 364th and Port Colborne 387th of the 415 Canadian
municipalities that made the list.
An average of Niagara’s rankings places it 220th.
“I think I feel all right. I don’t
think we can beat ourselves up over it,” said Mishka Balsom, president of Greater Niagara Chamber of Commerce.
MoneySense used 10 criteria in its ranking — wealth and economy, demographics, home affordability, low taxes, transit friendliness, health accessibility, low crime, arts in the community, nice weather and amenities.
Generally, Niagara’s 12 cities and towns were credited for good access to health care, for offering good amenities and for their arts communities.
With a few exceptions, they didn’t score as well in other categories used in the survey: low crime, public transit, low taxes or affordable housing.
Balsom said the survey did not consider many of the attributes businesses do when deciding where to locate or where to expand an existing operation.
“Factors such as access to post-secondary education are huge,” she said. “Niagara ranks well, with Niagara College and Brock University.
“Investors are also looking at affordability, infrastructure — and we have this great advantage of being so close to the United States … access to skilled labour, as well, which ties to our postsecondary education.
“Niagara, because of that, has a lot going for it.”
There’s also an inter-dependence among Niagara communities that Balsom said the survey didn’t recognize.
“So although some of the communities like Fort Erie or Port Colborne didn’t rank as favourably, think about how many people live there and are employed in St. Catharines or Niagara Falls, and how much we are linked together.
“Even our health-care system is linked — we go for X-rays in Niagara Falls or specialist appointments in St. Catharines.”
The lack of a good, integrated transit system is being addressed finally, too, she added.
A look at MoneySense’s 2017 rankings, though, shows how volatile — some might say nonsensical — polls like this can be as methodology is adjusted year to year.
Niagara-on-the-Lake, for example, finished 54th best in 2017 but dropped 53 places to 107th this year.
Niagara Falls climbed 79 places in one year, to 203 from 282, and West Lincoln fell 104 spots, plummeting to 364 on the 2018 ranking from 260th place the year previous.