Portland one of America’s ‘snobbiest’ cities

Yes, just a few days after a post in which I cite a report declaring Portland-South Portland to be the smartest in Maine, I’m uploading a post citing a report that Portland is one the country’s snobbiest cities.

Which means that — according to the publication Travel + Leisure, where the latest online list is coming from — Portlanders are likely to be the first to tell you how smart they are.

Over the course of a four-year stretch in which Portland has been named to just about any nationwide “List Of Most [Fill in the Blank] Cities” available, Travel + Leisure has been among those to most regularly highlight Maine’s largest city — mostly for good reasons, although not always. While the magazine finds Portland’s farmers markets, environmental friendliness, brunch and gay travel opportunities to be great, among other things, it found the city’s residents to be unfashionably dressed.

To which, as a snobby Portland journalist I reply, “How dare you besmirch my attire, you insolent swine?!?!”

(In all seriousness, I suspect the poorly dressed list was based on a submitted photograph of me.)

Anyway, in part as a way to goose reader participation in its annual “America’s Favorite City” survey, Travel + Leisure is back with a new list, this time finding Portland No. 18 among the country’s snobbiest cities.

The magazine did its best to make the “snobby” designation a compliment. Here’s what they wrote about the city:

The Old Port is a great place to be a beer snob: check out Novare Res Bier Café, which boasts 500 different kinds of bottles and 25 taps. Readers may have found the quaint Maine city a tad exclusive — it ranked poorly for varied hotel options — yet they did deem Portland very welcoming in one way: it won the survey for feeling safe.

The much larger Houston, Texas, came in No. 17 on the list, while just behind Portland in the 19th spot was Austin, Texas. (What snobs those Texans are, apparently.)

In the top ranking for snobbosity? San Francisco, Calif.

Seth Koenig

About Seth Koenig

Seth has nearly a decade of professional journalism experience and writes about the greater Portland region.