LONELY PLANET NAMES QUEENS THE TOP U.S. DESTINATION TO VISIT IN 2015

Dec. 10, 2014 - CBS Local NY

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) – Forget Brooklyn and Manhattan.

The Lonely Planet has declared Queens the number one place in the U.S. to visit next year.

“With microbreweries springing up, new boutique hotels, a reinvented seaside at Rockaway, a world-class art scene, and a truly global food culture, 2015 is the year to try Queens,” according to the travel guide book publisher.

Queens is home to over 2 million people from every corner of the globe and is a great destination for food and art lovers, according to the Lonely Planet.

“Nowhere is the image of New York as the globalmelting pot truer than Queens,” Lonely Planet wrote on its website. “Browse New York’s biggest Chinatown in Flushing, shop for brilliantly colored saris in Jackson Heights, and inhale the heady aromas of coffee and hookahs in Astoria.”

Queens Borough President Melinda Katz isn’t surprised by the honor.

“It’s an exciting time for this great borough,” Katz told 1010 WINS. “I think that you’re going to see a lot of great new things in this borough.”

“We’re not only the hippest borough moving forward, but we’re also a borough of families,” Katz said. “Those families create the infrastructure for this borough and it’s why folks are fighting from all over the world just to educate their children right here in the borough of Queens.”

Katz said Queens is “truly the world’s borough,” adding that there are 130 languages spoken in its schools.

“You can get off on the 7 train and you can explore every neighborhood. You can basically just go from country to country on every subway stop on the 7 train,” Katz told WCBS 880’s Marla Diamond.

Queens was followed by Western South Dakota, New Orleans, Louisiana, the Colorado River region and North Conway, New Hampshire.