European Survey: Helsinki residents express strongest satisfaction with own city’s cultural facilities

European Commission assayed opinions in 75 cities

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According to the European Urban Audit, a survey conducted by the European Commission in 75 European cities in November 2006, Helsinki residents expressed the strongest satisfaction with the city’s cultural facilities, including concert halls, theatres, museums, and libraries.
     
In each city, 500 randomly selected individuals were contacted. The respondents were taken from all parts of the cities. They were asked 23 questions about the quality of life in their place of residence. Two of the questions applied to culture.
      In Helsinki, 95 per cent of all respondents expressed their moderate or strong satisfaction with cultural facilities offered by the city. Some 61 per cent of respondents expressed strong satisfaction with these services.
      For example, residents in London, Paris, Rome, Berlin, and Stockholm expressed somewhat lower satisfaction with such services than did the respondents in Helsinki.
     
However, the results do not set Helsinki apart: in as many as 13 European cities some 90 per cent of residents felt that they were satisfied with the quality of their cities’ cultural offerings.
      The survey indicated further that the number of highly satisfied residents was even higher than in Helsinki in such European cities as Munich, Amsterdam, Vienna, Cardiff, Glasgow, and Newcastle.
      The largest number of highly satisfied residents was found in Vienna.
      Apart from Helsinki, another city involved in the survey was Oulu, where the number of satisfied citizens was almost as high as in Helsinki - 94 per cent. However, the proportion of those residents expressing strong satisfaction was only 37 per cent, which is 24 %-points lower than in Helsinki.
     
The second cultural question was on cinema facilities. Answers to the question about satisfaction with the quality of cinema services in Helsinki were somewhat less enthusiastic, with only 85 per cent of respondents expressing some degree of satisfaction with these services. In Oulu the percentage of satisfied residents was 86 per cent.
      Pekka Timonen, the Cultural Director of the City of Helsinki, said that the results of the survey did not come as a total surprise to him, as previous studies have also indicated that Helsinki residents regard the city’s art facilities as fairly good.
      In Timonen’s view it is possible that Helsinki will soon be the one city among the Baltic cities known for its wide and multiple cultural life.
      Helsinki’s fresh budget proposal shows a growth of some ten per cent in cultural services. The City of Helsinki is the second greatest sponsor of culture in Finland, after the state.
     
The survey results form an interesting afterword to another Eurobarometer study on Cultural Values, which at least in some measure gave the impression that Finns in general are lukewarm on "culture".
      The Eurobarometer assay results highlight a strong difference in what is understood by the term "culture" between different areas of Europe.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  EDITORIAL: Hard modern times for Helsinki film-freaks (1.8.2007)

Links:
  Urban Audit
  European Urban Knowledge Network
  Eurobarometer: European Cultural Values

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