City Indexes
An accurate guide for cities’ evaluation
Let’s talk about countries. Countries are… out of date. Well, let’s talk about cities.
Some years ago cities picked up the torch and became the most important players in the world canvas. Each city competes with other cities to get improved and be the best place for people to live, work, study and travel in the world. Everything a city does or does not has impact to its image. This image affects its residents and its visitors as well as decision makers. There are smart, livable, safe, cultural, green, innovative cities and much more. And, of course, there are different indexes which analyse cities and decide which one is the best in the world in each category.
The Global Power City Index (GCPI) is published each year since 2008 from the Mori Memorial Foundation’s Institute for Urban Strategies. GCPI evaluates and ranks the biggest cities of the world according to their “magnetism” or their comprehensive power to attract creative people and enterprises from around the world. The index focuses on a wide variety of functions in order to assess and rank the global potential and comprehensive power of a city. Cities’ evaluation is based on six main functions representing city strength (economy, research and development, cultural interaction, livability, environment, accessibility) and five global actors who lead the urban activities in their cities (manager, researcher, artist, visitor, resident). Each of the six urban functions comprises multiple indicator groups, which in turn consists of several indicators. A total of seventy indicators are used in the GPCI. The average indicator scores of the indicator groups are combined to create the function-specific rankings. The comprehensive ranking is created by the total scores of the function-specific rankings. The actor-specific ranking is analyzed from the viewpoints of specific actors. After determining the key “needs” of each actor, indicators corresponding to that actor’s needs are extracted from the seventy indicators used in the function-specific ranking to calculate the city-score for each actor. London, New York, Tokyo, Paris and Singapore are the top five out of forty four cities for 2017.
Based on the index and the factors measured we realize that in the near future competition between cities will be very intense. The best cities have to be perfect in every aspect for everyone who can relate to them in any way at any time. Cities must operate perfectly in financial, cultural, environmental, technological and educational matters so as to have the chance to be a part of the world system. However, no matter how good indexes are, they are based on measures and indicators. In order to have a complete view of a city, we need to learn more than measurement about that city. For this purpose we selected two European cities as examples: Amsterdam and Madrid. Both cities are capitals and have a powerful city brand.
Amsterdam, the capital of Netherlands, is well-known for its canals, its tulips and its libertarian ethics about sex and drugs. In 2003 it was decided to change the city’s image so as to maintain city’s position as a popular European destination. After conducting a benchmarking survey (Berlin, Dublin, Barcelona and Rotterdam), they realized there was a need for a coherent long-term vision, a selection of priorities, a realistic promoted image, a powerful brand and a balance in the roles of the public and private sectors. Three target groups were identified: businesses, residents and tourists. Amsterdam created a campaign to rebrand the city, with creativity, innovation and spirit of commerce as the values of the new brand. “I amsterdam” became a small, powerful, easy to remember and clear motto of the city brand and the city’s logo (three red Amsterdam crosses) was taken from the city’s 15th century coat of arms.
“I amsterdam” invites you to become a part of it: I amsterdam and you can be too. Ten years later, two visual icons, Adam and Eve, were added to the brand. They were modular iconic figures that could be used in static and dynamic applications to support storytelling and complex information transfer. Amsterdam’s brand was designed to last for another eight to ten years without change. Amsterdam is 17th in the GCPI (economy 19th, R&D 17th, cultural interaction 14th, livability 2nd, environment 13th, accessibility 7th — manager 14th, researcher 17th, artist 9th, visitor 17th, resident 9th) and 11th in the Sustainable Cities Mobility Index.
Madrid, the capital of Spain, is the most populated city, an economic center and the center of the Hiberian Peninsula. It is known as “the city where everything old is new”. Its logo is sleek and sober. Madrid is well-known for different aspects of its culture. It is a sport city and a city of arts and culture (the city is near Toledo and Escorial) as well as a green city (Parko Retiro and Royal Gardens). Also, Madrid’s city brand includes a special food culture and a vibrant nightlife (the nickname of Madrilenos is “Los Gatos”).
Many startups and companies are set there. Furthermore, Madrid has good transportation system and a strict law which keeps city clean and safe. Madrid is 27th in the GCPI (economy 38th, R&D 36th, cultural interaction 19th, livability 8th, environment 19th, accessibility 17th — manager 37th, researcher 35th, artist 12th, visitor 14th, resident 22th) and 24th in the Sustainable Cities Mobility Index.
This research and article are part of Athens Co creation City Banding Project in the context of MA in Cultural Management in Panteion University under the lead of mrs. Betty Tsakarestou as professor and project initiator.
Also read
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Athens: The goods, the bads and…the ugly truth about Greece’s capital
