Prince George moved up a personal finance magazine's rankings of Canada's best cities, but still has a long way to go to be anywhere near the top.
The city was rated the 134th best place to live out of 180 in this year's rankings, released last week by MoneySense, a marked improvement from 164th out of 179 last year.
As in past years, crime continued to be the biggest black mark as Prince George was ranked 165th on that criteria while it was 120th on accessibility to walking paths and bike routes and 101st on weather.
But the city rated 35th on discretionary income, 52nd on job prospects and 56th on household income.
Mayor Dan Rogers said the rankings failed to include one important measure - the number of volunteers per capita.
"We would be ranked right up there and that's in my mind a stronger attribute of a good community to live in," he said.
Rogers said he takes greater credence from the annual survey through the Institute of Social Research at the University of Northern British Columbia.
"That's a whole lot more valuable because it leads to benchmarks that we can follow," he said, noting there's not much the city can do about the weather.
Quesnel and Williams Lake, meanwhile, ranked 177th and 176th thanks largely to high crime rates, poor access to health care and low job prospects.
Ottawa-Gatineau was the top-ranked city, although it was 117th on housing affordability. Victoria was second, despite ranking 175th in housing affordability.
