Ljubljana’s skyline. (source)

Ljubljana has been appearing on a couple of lists lately. I thought we’d take a look at some of them. The first one is the "top-affordable list," compiled by SmarterTravel.com. According to them, the Slovenian capital is the fifth "most-affordable, must-see" city in Europe — just behind Istanbul and Dubrovnik, Croatia. The full list is available here.

Part of what makes Ljubljana affordable, I assume, are the discount flights there. In general, low-cost airlines have been a boon for eastern Europe, integrating the easterlings into the EU "more effectively than any government programme," as The Times has pointed out. Indeed, easyJet’s arrival in Ljubljana pushed up the number of tourists (both naked and clothed) by a whopping 50%. That’s a lot.

The Times also notes that Slovenia’s second city of "Mirabor" [sic] is courting Ryanair. Unfortunately for Mirabor, the government hasn’t shown itself too keen on the project so I doubt it will come to much.

Of course, an important thing to remember about discount carriers is that they giveth, but also taketh off. Also, Ljubljana may be affordable for western tourists but it’s still an expensive city — more expensive to live in than places like Boston, Toronto, Montreal, Seattle, Atlanta, and many more, according to this list by Mercer.

And speaking of Mercer: they recently published their annual "quality of life" list for 2006. And although Ljubljana is gradually "climbing the rankings," it is still way below "cheaper" places like Boston, Toronto, Montreal, Seattle, and many more, according to this (different) list. (You have to pay to see the full version, unfortunately.) This means that, according to Mercer, Ljubljana doesn’t get you much bang for your buck. Then again, these are the same guys who ranked Frankfurt — quite possibly Europe’s worst city — as "seventh in the world." That pretty much ruins their creditability for me.

Lastly, Lonely Planet recently released "The Cities Book: A Journey Through the Best Cities in the World" and Ljubljana appears there as well, ranking a modest 84th. Surprisingly, tiny Bled is six spots behind the capital at number 90. You can see some of the list here. Frankfurt doesn’t appear in the top 50, so it’s a bit more reliable.

(Thanks ZelenKel and AZ2SI!)