Count me as someone who really enjoyed living in Calgary and Vancouver, but for whom the cons of living in Vancouver outweighed the pros.
Both are great cities (we were 3 and 4 respectively on the best cities in the Economist's world livability rankings this year), with their own upsides and downsides. That said, even though I was a UBC student I echo the comments here about Vancouver being a lonely city to live in. It was super hard to meet people outside of school and even through school most of my friends were transplants.
What I found interesting is that almost all my UBC friends have left Vancouver, the only ones that stayed were born and raised Vancouverites. The most common reason for leaving has been the high cost of living combined with the difficulty in finding well-paying professional jobs. Most, including myself, say they could have coped with the high cost of living if there were good career opportunities, but there just aren't that many opportunities.
That's what Calgary offers, a very high quality of life enabled by good paying jobs, combined with a relatively low cost of living, more outdoor recreation opportunities and friendlier people. What it doesn't have is the ocean, a temperate climate, non-dry air (as a born and raised Calgarian I didn't realize how dry the air is here until I lived elsewhere), and much more limited nightlife opportunities (although this is a less of an issue the older I get).
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