Where would you want to be living if the price of gas shot up to $5, $6, even $8 a gallon as a result of a terrorist attack on energy supplies or a massive hurricane that wiped out gulf coast refineries? Not Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Houston, Texas, or other unsustainably designed cities, according to a report by the environmental website, SustainLane.com [1]. The study evaluated the top ten cities in the country to live in the event of an oil shock [2], judging them according to their public transportation systems, access to wireless networks for telecommuting, low level of sprawl, and the availability of locally grown [2] organic [2] produce.

The top-ranked cities are as follows: New York, NY, Boston, MA, San Francisco, CA, Chicago, IL, Philadelphia, PA, Portland, OR Honolulu, HI, Seattle, WA, Baltimore, MD, and Oakland, CA.

The report reveals interesting tidbits including the fact that "Philadelphia leads the largest 50 cities in the U.S. with the highest combined per capita rate of farmers markets and community gardens." And "Seattle is the national leader in wireless connectivity, followed closely by San Francisco, Oakland, New York and Portland."

But above all other matters, public transportation is the critical factor: "Public transportation is a key element in city planning," said San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom in response to the SustainLane ranking. "It is critical in this time of global warming [2] and volatile petroleum availability that we work to make our transit options not dependent solely on fossil fuel."

Image credit: SustainLane.com [3]