We're number three!

Vancouver is no longer considered the world's most livable city by the Economist magazine, but the reason why has some people scratching their heads.

The British publication's Economist Intelligence Unit says the City of Glass has now fallen to third place, falling in line behind Melbourne, Australia and Vienna, Austria.

This is the first time in a decade that Vancouver hasn't been in the top spot.

Vancouver lost points this year based on its transportation infrastructure, but there's one problem. The highway with the cited problems isn't in the West Coast city – it's on Vancouver Island.

The Malahat Highway north of Victoria was closed for almost a day – 22 hours – in April after a fuel tanker truck crash. That accident, which happened about 60 kilometres away from the city and a ferry ride away, resulted in a 0.7 percentage point drop in the city's overall livability rating.

"The adjustment is minuscule and should not be considered significant in the context of the overall score, but it was sufficient to drop Vancouver to third position behind Melbourne and Vienna," the survey said.

The Economist says the Stanley Cup Riot in June came too late to hurt the city's scores, but suggested the mayhem and violence could hurt future rankings.

The survey assigns scores to cities based on 30 factors in five categories: stability, health care, culture and environment, education and infrastructure.

Seven of the top cities are in Canada and Australia.

Harare, the capital city of Zimbabwe, ranked as the last livable city in the world, taking 140th place. London and New York sit in 53rd and 56th places.

Here are the world's 10 most livable cities, according to the survey:

  1. Melbourne, Australia
  2. Vienna, Austria
  3. Vancouver, Canada
  4. Toronto, Canada
  5. Calgary, Canada
  6. Sydney, Australia
  7. Helsinki, Finland
  8. Perth, Australia
  9. Adelaide, Australia
  10. Auckland, New Zealand