Simsbury First on Hartford Magazine's Top Towns List

Simsbury topped the chart in Hartford Magazine's annual Top Towns issue and was named the top overall town in the region.

The rankings, part of the magazine's June issue, uses a formula that includes educational factors (student scores in reading, writing, math and science; graduation rate; and amount spent on education), economics (home prices, taxes and poverty rate), and quality of life (higher education of residents, voter turnout, median age of residents and population density) to order the towns.

“Greater Hartford is a fantastic place to live” said Rich Graziano, publisher and CEO of Hartford Magazine and CT1 Media. “The town-by-town information and rankings in this issue show the positives of what each town has to offer its residents and the region as a whole.”

Taking top honors overall this year is Simsbury, which offers great restaurants, golf, colonial roots, one of the top libraries in the state, and is the only town in Connecticut to earn a “bike friendly” label from the League of American Bicyclists.

"The top rating- the highest rating- reinforces all the hard work that both our staff and our residents do to maintain and make Simsbury so special," First Selectman Mary Glassman said during a board of selectman meeting Wednesday.

Glassman also announced that Simsbury recently won a Conn. Main Street Center Award of Excellence for the town's achievements in developing a "vibrant and sustainable" main street.

In addition to earning the top overall spot, Simsbury led the pack among medium-sized towns (population 15,000-30,000). Avon took second place, with Farmington and South Windsor tied for third, followed by Berlin, Rocky Hill, Windsor, Wethersfield, Bloomfield and Plainville.

Burlington won top honors among small towns (population under 15,000), followed by Granby, Marlborough, Suffield, East Granby, Canton and Hebron.

Glastonbury was the leader among large towns (population over 30,000), following by Middletown, West Hartford, Southington, Newington, Manchester, Enfield, East Hartford, New Britain and Hartford. 

Towns were ranked using a formula including educational factors (student scores in reading, writing, math and science; graduation rate; and amount spent on education), economics (home prices, taxes and poverty rate), and quality of life (higher education of residents, voter turnout, median age of residents and population density).

The Top Town issues of Hartford Magazine issue will be available on newsstands Friday, June 1st  and is available now on www.hartfordmag.com.