Uploaded on 2017-02-16 by Kiana Otsuka

Honolulu, Hawaii, USA I think Hawaii scores very high in livability because of its warm climate year around, many recreation opportunities (outdoor) and its relatively clean environment (all reflected in the picture attached). Below you will find a deeper discussion into why I live in Hawaii, and what I'd change to increase its livability. Why do we live where we live? Name the place you live and provide 5 reasons why you live there. Those reasons may not be related to the official livability criteria. Order them with the most important at the top of your list. To support your statements you are asked to provide one or more images from your area of residence, that describe the reasons you selected. Honolulu, Hawaii, USA - Hawaii - Climate, Recreation opportunities and environment 2.1 Climate - warm, all year-round, sunny 2.2 Recreation Opportunities - lots to do outdoors, hiking, swimming, etc. 2.3 Safety - Honolulu has one of the lowest violent crime rates 2.4 People - Warm, kind people, more generally (not sure where that would fit in the characteristics of livability, perhaps culture?) 2.5 Environment - relatively clean environment To what extend does your own place of residence fulfill your ideal livability criteria? On a scale from 1-100 rate to what extend your place of residence fulfills your ideal livability criteria (i.e. the top-5 criteria you selected in Question 1). I would rate Honolulu, in relation to my ideal livability criteria as 60. Unfortunately, Honolulu does not fulfill my top 2 ideal livability criteria (transportation and job opportunities). Though renowned for its bus system, Honolulu's bus system is slow (due to high levels of traffic) and does not run frequently enough to be efficient, in my opinion. Honolulu is currently building its first rail system, which should help to improve its current access to public transportation, and hopefully reduce the traffic (often flips with Los Angeles as worst traffic in the USA). Job opportunities (in my field) are limited in Honolulu. Honolulu's economy depends heavily on tourism and the military, and therefore does not provide many well-paid jobs in planning. However, I do believe Honolulu has a relative clean environment and many outdoor recreation possibilities (this one really depends if you're an outdoors person). And to reiterate, Honolulu is one of the safest cities in the USA. Provide also a general livability score for your city, using the same scale (1-100). I think Honolulu's general livability score should be 70. I think the city is really livable, with its warm climate, great health care and its low violent crime rate. I will discuss what I would change about the city, below, in the next question. What would you change? Imagine that you were the mayor of your place of residence. Which would be the first measure you would take to improve livability? To improve livability, the first thing I would do is, make housing more affordable (though not sure, how exactly to go about that). There's currently a bill in the legislature that wants to test rent caps, and increase the minimum wage to $15/hour. The cost of living in Hawaii, is really high, and there is a significant wage gap between cost of living and wages. Housing is a big cost for many people, so if we could decrease the cost of housing, it would help a lot of people.