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Portland Beats Denver As Top City For Weed

Josh Edelson/AFP via Getty Images

Robert McGreevy Contributor
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Portland, Oregon, is the nation’s newest king of cannabis, leapfrogging Denver, Colorado, as the nation’s number one city for the drug, according to a study from Real Estate Witch.

The comprehensive study ranked American cities one through fifty and took into account factors such as state legality, cannabis-prescribing doctors per 100,000 residents and dispensaries per 100,000 residents. It also considered, to a lesser extent, the number of concert venues in the city, Google Trends data on marijuanna related searches, and even the number of Taco Bells per capita.

Portland snagged the top spot from Denver in large part due to the affordability of its product. An ounce of cannabis in Portland costs $210 on average, $32 less than the $242 it costs in Denver, and $106 less than the national average of $316, according to the study.

Despite displacing Denver as as the country’s top spot for pot, Portland has yet to earn the public’s recognition. 58 percent of Americans believe Los Angeles to be the cannabis king, while 2nd and 3rd place belong to San Diego and Sacramento respectively, according to the study.

Real Estate Witch conducted the study using data from Leafly, a prominent dispensary locator website that offers information on dispensary locations, strain types, cannabis legislation and more.

Cannabis is now legal in some form in 39 states. 19 have entirely legalized it for adult use while 20 states, including Florida and Oklahoma, only permit medical use prescribed by a licensed physician, according to Leafly. In states like Nebraska and South Carolina, possession of marijuana has been decriminalized, while Texas lawmakers have recently passed bills to both decriminalize the substance and legalize its medical use. (RELATED: Poll: Support For Marijuana Legalization Soars In Texas)

Despite growing popularity and sales, marijuana remains illegal at the federal level and is listed as a “Schedule 1” controlled substance.