If you follow the news in Canada, you’d think the country’s largest urban centre is rife with gang violence and shootings.
The media revels in sensationalising these events leading one who doesn’t live in the city to think there’s danger everywhere.
Obviously that’s not the case as the respected Economist magazine Intelligence Unit has just released its 2019 Safe Cities Index.
It listed the Canada’s largest urban centre as the sixth safest city in the world and 8th overall in the specific category of personal security.
Some 60 major cities around the world were studied.
The Economist Intelligence Unit rates the cities is such areas as digital security and dedicated cyber-security teams, infrastructure security, health: access to high quality healthcare, and personal security.
Economist Intelligence Unit- Safe Cities Index 2019
The economist notes that “transparency and accountability are essential in every pillar of urban security, from building safer bridges, to trusting in the sharing of information”, adding that, “ well-governed, accountable cities are safer cities”. The cities were scored on scales of 0 to 100.
In the area of digital security, Tokyo was on top, followed by Singapore and Chicago.
In health security it was Osaka, Tokyo, and Seoul. As for infrastructure security Singapore was first, then Osaka and Barcelona.
In personal security it was Singapore, Copenhagen, and Hong Kong (results obviously taken before the current Hong Kong political unrest).
Toronto was the only Canadian city studied and although not reaching the top in any of the four categories, (digital-9th, health-17th, infrastructure-12th, personal security-8th) it’s combined scores lifted it into 6th place overall in the world’s safest cities.
Additional information-sources
- Economist Intelligence Unit: Safe Cities Index- summary
- Economist IU: SCI-2019-pdf
- Narcity: A Howse: Aug 28/19: Toronto not even Canada’s safest city
- Global News: J Patton: Aug 29/19: Toronto among world’s safest cities
- Toronto Star: S G Bloomberg: Aug 28/19: Tokyo tops list for third time, Toronto in top 10
- BlogTO: M Miller: Aug 29/19: Toronto ranked 6th safest
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