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Charlottesville’s top grade
Virginia Business
May 2004
Thomas
Jefferson recognized it 300 years ago, but now it’s
official: Charlottesville is a pretty
nice place to hang your hat. The city was recently named
the Best Place in America to Live by “Cities Ranked
and Rated,” an annually updated book. Authors
Bert Sterling and Peter Sander made their evaluations
based on 10 categories, including economy and jobs,
cost of living, climate, health care, arts and culture
and overall quality of life, and decided that Charlottesville
came out on top of 300-plus cities and towns. Santa
Fe, N.M., San Luis Obispo, Calif., Santa Barbara, Calif.
and Honolulu, Hawaii, rounded out the Top 5.
Other Virginia cities that fared well: Roanoke,
which came in at No. 11, was recently touted by the
authors on NBC’s Today Show as the best place
to live for those in or nearing retirement, citing good
health care and leisure activities and a low overall
cost of living. Lynchburg finished
15th on the strength of mountain views, historic homes,
a low crime rate and a relatively low cost of living.
The Hampton Roads region earned 17th
spot, Northern Virginia (lumped in
with the Washington, D.C., area) was 26th and Richmond
wound up 55th.
In a separate listing called the Best Emerging Places
to Live, the authors ranked the Blacksburg-Christiansburg-Radford
eighth for its “small-town feel and college-town
amenities in a mountain setting.”
Return to Virginia Business - May 2004
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