Yekaterinburg was only given the 49th position in the rating of Russian cities with the happiest residents, whereas the capital of a neighboring region Tyumen was one of the top 10, RBC daily reports.

The monitoring agency NewsEffector conducted a research on the happiness levels of people living in the Russian Federation constituencies. The research findings indicate that the happiness index for cities with a population of over one million people is not so great after all. Saint Petersburg, for one, was only given the 16th position, Yekaterinburg was given the 49th position, and Novosibirsk was given the 13th position in the rating. Moscow only came 52nd in the happiness rating. These rating positions resulted from the low scores for such criteria as the environment, the feeling of security, and the city development dynamics. All this affects the happiness levels badly.

Chita came last in the rating, while Grozny, Tyumen, and Kazan were named as Russia’s happiest cities.

‘The fact that the capital of Chechnya had the highest happiness index among all the cities of Russia was a rather unexpected one,’ says NewsEffector Director Sergey Moroz.

Surgut, Krasnodar, Sochi, Nizhnevartovsk, Novorossiysk, Belgorod, and Yaroslavl were among the top ten.

The survey involved 26,900 respondents from Russia’s one hundred largest cities.