Coastal elites (and Midwesterners!) rejoice — New York, Chicago and San Francisco were ranked as three of the world’s top 10 cities by Vancouver-based global real estate, tourism and economic development advisement firm Resonance Consultancy.
Resonance ranked 100 cities based on six categories (place, product, programming, people, prosperity, and promotional) that were broken down into 24 individual factors including housing affordability, job opportunities, quality of key institutions, attractions, and infrastructure, diversity of people, economic prosperity, and quality of arts, culture and nightlife.
Coming in after No. 1 and No. 2 ranked London and Paris, New York City was the highest-rated U.S. city thanks to stellar city programming and events that keep tourists coming and a boom in real estate development, namely westside Manhattan’s Hudson Yards, an 18-million-square-foot area that includes 4,000 residences, more than 100 high-end storefronts and more than 137,000 hotel rooms.
Chicago came in seventh place with high ranks in product and programming. Much like New York City, Chicago boasts a vibrant shopping, nightlife, culinary and cultural scene, but the city’s infrastructure pushed it ahead of the competition. The top-notch airport and transit public system makes the city accessible, said the report.
San Francisco shored up the end of the pack at No. 10, ranking highly in the people and prosperity categories. San Francisco has become a tech hub — attracting companies such as Twitter and Spotify and young, tech-savvy graduates from across the country. According to Resonance, San Francisco ranks No. 5 globally for GDP per capita and No. 15 for global head offices. Furthermore, San Francisco’s workforce is the fourth best educated in the world — and that is only expected to improve as more companies begin to call the City by the Bay home.
Los Angeles (No. 13), Miami (No. 26), Houston (No. 31), Seattle (No. 34), Dallas (No. 35), Denver (No. 43), and Austin (No. 47) made the top 50. Boston, San Jose, Washington, D.C. and Las Vegas also made the list.