New year, new data, same result.
For the third straight year, Los Angeles sits atop ASCE’s list of the Best Places for Civil Engineers.
Houston ranked second. Atlanta was a big mover, taking over the third spot after finishing sixth last year.
The 2024 ASCE Best Places list is built on three inputs: the number of civil engineering jobs available between June 2022 and June 2023 from Madgex Inc., compensation data from the ASCE Salary Report, and cost-of-living data from the Council for Community and Economic Research.
It was the huge amount of available civil engineering work that propelled L.A. to the top of the stack again this year. Ruwanka Purasinghe, P.E., M.ASCE, works as a civil engineering associate for the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, and he’s president-elect of the ASCE Los Angeles Section. He spoke about Los Angeles topping the Best Places list for a new episode of the ASCE Plot Points podcast and referenced the close proximity of major employers like LADWP, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, and Los Angeles International Airport.
“We have really big utilities here; really big civil engineering infrastructure,” Purasinghe said. “The job market has been pretty good here in L.A. for the last decade.”
And, of course, there are all the more nuanced things that go into quality of life that aren’t necessarily tracked in the Best Places metric. For Purasinghe, Los Angeles scores high there, too.
“If you are a beachgoer, if you want to wake up and smell the sea breeze, you can do that. If you want to be in a very suburban area, more residential, wider streets, you can find a neighborhood for that. If you want to live in a high-rise building and not have to deal with a backyard, you can find that,” Purasinghe said.
“I was born and raised in L.A., so I might be a little biased, but I feel like L.A. offers a lot.”
Here is the complete top 10 list of ASCE’s Best Places for Civil Engineers 2024:
10. Dallas
ASCE Salary Report rank: 26th
Civil engineering job index rank: 10th
Cost of living index rank: 26th
Last year’s overall rank: 2nd
9. Phoenix
ASCE Salary Report rank: 17th
Civil engineering job index rank: 11th
Cost of living index rank: 31st
Last year’s overall rank: 7th
8. Boston
ASCE Salary Report rank: 18th
Civil engineering job index rank: 7th
Cost of living index rank: 47th
Last year’s overall rank: 12th
7. Chicago
ASCE Salary Report rank: 24th
Civil engineering job index rank: 8th
Cost of living index rank: 37th
Last year’s overall rank: 5th
6. Denver
ASCE Salary Report rank: 29th
Civil engineering job index rank: 5th
Cost of living index rank: 35th
Last year’s overall rank: 4th
5. Washington, D.C.
ASCE Salary Report rank: 9th
Civil engineering job index rank: 4th
Cost of living index rank: 43rd
Last year’s overall rank: 9th
4. New York City
ASCE Salary Report rank: 4th
Civil engineering job index rank: 2nd
Cost of living index rank: 50th
Last year’s overall rank: 16th
3. Atlanta
ASCE Salary Report rank: 16th
Civil engineering job index rank: 3rd
Cost of living index rank: 25th
Last year’s overall rank: 6th
2. Houston
ASCE Salary Report rank: 2nd
Civil engineering job index rank: 6th
Cost of living index rank: 7th
Last year’s overall rank: 3rd
1. Los Angeles
ASCE Salary Report rank: 10th
Civil engineering job index rank: 1st
Cost of living index rank: 48th
Last year’s overall rank: 1st
Fill out the ASCE 2024 Salary Survey and contribute data that will inform this fall's ASCE Salary Report and next year's Best Places list. Deadline is May 15.
