By Leslie Collins
Northeast News
November 2, 2011

Kansas City’s nicknames have ranged from Cowtown to Paris of the Plains to the City of Fountains.

Now, you can add it to Frommer’s Travel Guides’ list of Top 10 destinations for 2012. It’s the only U.S. city on the list.

“Everybody in the office just got tickled by it,” City of Kansas City Public Information Officer Dennis Gagnon said. “When you actually looked at the list and saw there were no other city’s in the U.S., it just struck you as, ‘Wow, we take things for granted that we should be a little more proud of.'”

Other destinations on the list included the Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia; Beirut, Lebanon; Chongqing China; Curacao; Fukuoka, Japan; Ghana; Girona, Spain; Greenwich, London, England; and the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico.

For Kansas City, Frommer’s highlighted the opening of the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts and called it one of the “most technically advanced performance halls in the nation.”

Frommer’s also listed the National World War I Museum, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, the College Basketball Experience, American Jazz Museum and others and of course, barbecue.

“I think Kansas City is a well kept secret,” Pendleton Heights Neighborhood Association President Kent Dicus said.

Dicus, who’s lived in other cities like Tuscon, Ariz., and the San Francisco Bay area, said Kansas City “offers a little bit of everything.”

“You’ve got four good seasons, and there’s always something to do,” Dicus said. “I just think there is a lot of great history here that you don’t get in a lot of cities that are further west.”

Indian Mound Neighborhood Association President Katie Greer said she wasn’t surprised.

“Of course we are!” she said of Kansas City being on Frommer’s list. “I’ve met so many people here who have said, ‘I’ve lived here my whole life, but I’ve never been to the Steam Boat Arabia or the World War I Museum or the Nelson Atkins Museum.'”

Greer knows about Kansas City’s jewels and slips into travel guide mode whenever her friends and family visit.

“There are so many amazing cultural amenities here,” she said.

“It’s a great thing to be noticed,” Gagnon said. “The biggest thing is it should make it clear to residents who live here that those who live outside our community find it an exciting place to be and we should embrace it and check it out ourselves.”

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THE LOCAL’S FAVORITE:

We asked locals to list their favorite spots in Kansas City

DENNIS GAGNON: Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts and the new wing at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art

KATIE GREER: Kansas City Museum, 18th and Vine District, Steam Boat Arabia

KENT DICUS: Country Club Plaza, Westport, City Market, The Brick bar and grill in the Crossroads District