If nothing else, Pittsburgh is a study in contrasts.

The good: It has very low murder, burglary and robbery rates measured against 14 comparable cities.

The bad: There are more children living in poverty than in any of the other cities.

The flattering: It has fewer people without health care coverage than most of its peers.

The sad: We tend to need it -- we have more smokers, more diabetes and more fatal heart attacks, especially among women, than most of the other cities.

And the shocker: Andy Warhol trumps Troy Polamalu. In the Pittsburgh region, more people attend arts events than they do sporting events.

They are among the findings of a report to be released today by the Pittsburgh Regional Indicators Project, Pittsburgh Quarterly magazine and the Pittsburgh Foundation, based on data compiled over the last three years.

"How Well Do You Know Pittsburgh Today" measured the region -- 22 counties in southwestern Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio -- against 14 other cities, including Boston, Detroit, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Washington, D.C., Denver and Charlotte.

Most were selected because they shared comparable industrial and demographic histories. Richmond, Charlotte and Denver, all considered hot growth areas, were added to provide more perspective.

The report confirmed some long-held truisms (Yes, we do have bad roads), disputed some widely held misconceptions (It's not that government spends too much, it doesn't spend well), and offered some sobering food for thought (a city built on its ethnic diversity is now one of the least diverse among its peers).

Harold Miller, president of Future Strategies LLC and a member of the Regional Indicators team, said the fundamental reason for compiling the data was that "Policy should be based on facts," not simple assertions that may or may not be true.

"We're not advocating any civic agenda, but rather we're simply providing facts that we hope will lead to a more informed and productive dialogue," John G. Craig Jr., president of the Regional Indicators Project and former Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editor, said in a press statement.

The report offers plenty to chew on.

• At 15.8 percent, Pittsburgh's percentage of the population living in poverty under age 18 is the highest among comparable regions.

• The region fared no better on diversity. It was last among its peers in foreign-born population. It was 12th of 15 cities in African-American population as a percentage of total population.

• Health is a major issue. Pittsburgh has more smokers (22.2 percent of the population) than all but three other cities. The diabetes ranking was the third highest. Pittsburgh has the highest rate of low birth-weight babies among African-American women. Heart attack fatality rates also are high.

• Pittsburgh ranked last in new business start-ups. But its business survival rate, at 79 percent, was highest among all of the cities surveyed. At $42,902, Pittsburgh ranked 11th in average annual pay and below the national average of $44,450.

• Bad roads, we have. The region, with 59 percent of roads categorized as bad or poor, finished ahead of only three other cities. Only Indianapolis, Baltimore and Philadelphia were worse.

The upside?

For one, as bad as the roads are, we spend less time stuck in traffic than motorists in every other city except Cleveland. Pittsburgh also is a safe city. Its murder rate was the third lowest and its burglary and robbery rates the second lowest of the 15 cities.

At 3.2 percent, the appreciation of the region's housing stock in the second quarter of 2008 was the second highest behind Charlotte and well above the national average, which dropped 1.7 percent.

Pittsburgh also has fewer adults without health care coverage than all but five other cities. Mr. Miller said that may be the case because the region has many larger employers, and they typically tend to provide more health care than smaller or start-up businesses.

Health care providers such as UPMC, the largest employer in the region, and the number of universities also factor into that, he said.

But unless the Pittsburgh region becomes healthier as a whole, the coverage advantage could cease, he added.

"If people don't stop smoking, lose weight, health care costs are going to go up. That's going to be problematic for employers in the future," he said.

Perhaps one of the most interesting findings involves the region's aging population. While Pittsburgh has the second oldest population of any city, it will be aging less rapidly than the nation as a whole in the coming decades, the study predicted.

One reason is that because of population losses in the past, Pittsburgh has fewer aging baby boomers to contend with than other parts of the country, Mr. Miller said.

The data compiled as part of the Regional Indicators Project, sponsored by the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University, is available online at www.pittsburghtoday.org and is updated regularly. Mr. Miller said the group hopes the Web site will become a "one-stop shop" for those seeking factual information about the region.

"The purpose of the indicators is not to determine what the priorities are per se. It's for letting people look at the indicators and decide for themselves," he said. "We really want this to help inform policy-makers, not be a recommendation system per se."

If there is one aspect of the report that qualifies as a "double yoi," it is that Pittsburgh is more of an arts town than it is a sports town.

Though they might not twirl Terrible Towels, more people attended arts events than major sporting events. In the 22-county area, 58 percent of those surveyed in 2002 said they had attended an arts event in the previous year, compared to 40.6 percent going to a sporting event.

Asked about the finding, Mr. Miller said, "I think we have a truly diverse, multicultural, world-class population that has a great breadth of appreciation for a full range of entertainment opportunities."