The District of Columbia (Washington, D.C.) has plenty of cultural amenities, enough to rank it ahead of Boston and New York in Money magazine’s best places to live in the eastern United States. Washington’s top ranking may be a surprise to some people knowledgeable about the many problems in the nation’s capital, but Money magazine, in its annual ranking of the nation’s 300 most livable areas, said that museums were among the many advantages found in the metropolitan area.

By the magazine’s reckoning, of the nation’s biggest cities, Norfolk, Virginia represents the finest of the South, Minneapolis is the mightiest of the Midwest, and Seattle is the best of the West.

Money magazine changed the format for the 12th annual ranking, listing the top places by region and population size, instead of a straight 300-place catalog it used in the past. In compiling the list, Money gathered data on the country’s 300 largest metropolitan areas, and ranked them according to how the scored on 37 “livability factors,” including clean water, low crime, clean air, good public schools, and low property taxes.

The cities were then ranked according to size, metropolitan areas of 1 million people or more, those with populations of 250,000 to 999,999, and populations of 100,000 to 249,999. Using those population ground rules, the West’s best were Seattle, Washington, Boulder/Longmont, Colorado, and Fort Collins, Colorado.

Best places to live in the West

Large (1 million or more)

1. Seattle, Washington
2. Denver, Colorado
3. Los Angeles, California

Medium (250,000 to 999,999)

1. Boulder, Colorado
2. Tacoma, Washington
3. Eugene, Oregon

Small (100,000 to 249,999)

1. Fort Collins, Colorado
2. San Luis Obispo, California
3. Olympia, Washington

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