news-record.com

RALEIGH (MCT) — The average Triangle resident could be forgiven for yawning at yet another top-10 ranking for the region. But who doesn't like it when someone says you're the smartest?

The Daily Beast, a major news-and-opinion Web site, published a story Monday that listed what it called America's Smartest Cities. In the top slot? That geographic mashup Raleigh-Durham.

''We are fortunate to have great universities in Raleigh-Durham and great 'smart' industries that enrich our community greatly," Raleigh Mayor Charles Meeker told the Web site.

We easily outsmarted such capitals of brainpower as Boston (No. 3) and Hartford-New Haven, Conn. (No. 6). New York, despite all those publishing houses, artists, writers and various media giants, could muster no better than 13th.

Elsewhere in the state, Charlotte weighed in at 16th and Greensboro at 37th.

The rankings were of metropolitan areas of 1 million people or more, and measured per capita so a city like New York wouldn't gain an advantage just for having lots of people.

The formula considered such things as sales of nonfiction books (popular fiction was deemed too low-brow), number of residents with undergraduate and graduate degrees and number of colleges and universities.

There were the usual issues with not quite understanding the three corners of the region when discussing Research Triangle Park. Unbelievably, Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill get a nod, but there is no mention of N.C. State University. What part of the word "Triangle" is it that all these national rankers don't get?

Still, it's nice to get a shout-out for being smart rather than yet another "nice place to live" honor or something just plain weird, like the 8th place we got last week from the Wall Street Journal among U.S. cities that are most likely to emerge as "youth magnets" after the recession.