Survey Finds Seattle Residents Like Quality Of Life Despite Woes

They may complain about traffic congestion, crime and high housing prices, but Seattle-area residents are overwhelmingly satisfied with the quality of life in their communities - and are willing to spend money to make it better.

Seattle topped five other regions in the quality-of-life barometer, according to a new poll released by the New York-based Regional Plan Association, the nation’s oldest regional-planning agency.

The RPA commissioned a poll of 400 residents of Seattle-Tacoma, Atlanta, Los Angeles and Dallas, as well as 1,500 residents in the New York area, to see how New York compares with the other cities on lifestyle issues.

Seattle and the three other cities were selected because they are among the nation’s fastest-growing, according to the 1990 Census.

The poll, released Monday, painted a picture of Seattle residents as worried about crime, traffic and growth but not upset enough to leave.

When asked whether they would move out of their community tomorrow if they could, more than two-thirds of Seattle residents said no - the highest in the nation.

However, of those who said they would move, nearly two-thirds said they would choose a rural community. Fewer than half of the residents in the other cities said they would choose country life.

The RPA plans to use the poll results in planning how to improve the quality of life in New York and how to keep businesses in the tristate region of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.

“Corporate-location decisions are increasingly based on qualityof-life factors,” said H. Claude Shostal, RPA president. “To attract or keep companies, we must be competitive in providing their employees with an attractive quality of life. Otherwise, businesses and workers will go to other regions.”

Residents were asked whether they would be willing to spend money to improve specific issues, and nearly two-thirds of residents said they would spend at least $50 a year to preserve open space and ensure clean air and water.

But they were less willing to pay to relieve traffic congestion, reflecting last month’s election results when the region’s voters overwhelmingly turned down a regionaltransit plan for rail and other traffic improvements.