Research « ICC Liverpool. Does living by the coast improve health and well being? Urban green space & wellbeing. The secrets of the world's happiest cities | Society. Two bodyguards trotted behind Enrique Peñalosa, their pistols jostling in holsters. There was nothing remarkable about that, given his profession – and his locale. Peñalosa was a politician on yet another campaign, and this was Bogotá, a city with a reputation for kidnapping and assassination.
What was unusual was this: Peñalosa didn't climb into the armoured SUV. Instead, he hopped on a mountain bike. A few years earlier, this ride would have been a radical and – in the opinion of many Bogotáns – suicidal act. I first saw the Mayor of Happiness work his rhetorical magic back in the spring of 2006.
Peñalosa insisted that, like most cities, Bogotá had been left deeply wounded by the 20th century's dual urban legacy: first, the city had been gradually reoriented around cars. In the third year of his term, Peñalosa challenged Bogotáns to participate in an experiment. Boys in crisp white shirts and matching uniforms poured through a gate. But for a moment I forgot my questions. UK a great place to live and work, says OECD | Business. Hampstead Heath in the summer. The average British household was only 'modestly' affected by the financial crisis, the OECD says.
Photograph: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images The UK has come in ahead of Germany, the United States and Japan as the best place to live and work, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, although inequality has risen faster in Britain than in other countries since the outbreak of the financial crisis. The Paris-based thinktank has measured wellbeing in 34 industrialised nations, weighing up factors including incomes, education, housing and security.
It says the UK ranks above the OECD country average on measures such as environmental quality, personal security, jobs and earnings and housing. It is close to average for work-life balance, but below in education and skills. The US, Ireland, Germany and France are in the group below, rated as average on the thinktank's "traffic light" system for how countries perform on various elements.