Of the 40 most livable cities in China, the coastal city Qingdao took the top spot, while Beijing falls to the bottom, according to the China Livable Cities Research Report conducted by the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

The report showed that 40 cities, mainly provincial capitals with more advanced economic and social development, achieved 59.92 points on average, just below the benchmark for livability of 60 points.

Following Qingdao as most-livable were Kunming in Yunnan Province, Sanya in Hainan Province, Dalian in Liaoning Province and Weihai in Shandong Province.

At the bottom of the rankings were Nanchang in Jiangsu Province, Taiyuan in Shanxi Province, Harbin in Heilongjiang Province, Guangzhou in Guangdong Province, and Beijing.

The research examined 29 indicators from six perspectives -- safety, access to public services, natural environment, social and humanistic environment, public transport and environmental health hazards.

The report's main author Zhang Wenzhong, a researcher with the Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research at CAS, said the evaluation system intentionally excluded home prices to prevent possible hype by real estate developers.

Key areas where cities fell short were safety, potential health hazards in the environment and public transport. Many respondents in the survey complained about the choking smog and traffic jams that affect life quality.

Beijing's poor performance was mostly the result of concerns over air pollution.

Zhang said that among four livability studies about Beijing in 2005, 2009, 2013 and 2015, the city continued to register poorer scores as time went on due to potential health hazards in the environment.

Beijing scored higher than average in other aspects, especially in safety, overall social environment and transportation.

Researchers believe China still has a long way to go to build livable cities, according to the report.

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