Augusta finished 2009 in a better economic position than most of the major metropolitan areas in the nation.

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The Augusta-Aiken area ranked 18th among the nation's 100 largest metropolitan areas in economic performance, the Brookings Institution said Tuesday.

The Washington, D.C., think tank releases MetroMonitor every three months, tracking the recession and recovery on a metropolitan level. The latest report covers October to December.

This is the third time Brookings has ranked Augusta in the top 25 for its quarterly analysis. It ranked 23rd in the previous two reports.

"As people from Augusta travel outside the area, they are beginning to see how fortunate we are," said Augusta Mayor Deke Copenhaver. "These rankings are based on real data; it is not subjective."

In comparing the region to other cities, Augusta fared the best in its gross metropolitan product, a measure of goods and services, which has been growing faster than the national average.

Brookings said Augusta's GMP grew 2 percent from the third quarter to the fourth quarter. The national average was 1.6 percent.

"In most metro areas, increased economic output is juxtaposed with continued high unemployment," said Howard Wial, a fellow with the Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings and a co-author of the report. "Even though each of the 100 largest regional economies expanded in the past quarter, most of them continued to lose jobs."

Two years into the Great Recession, the largest 100 metro areas have lost 4.6 percent of the jobs they had when the recession began in 2007, Wial said. Augusta, though, lost 2.9 percent of its jobs from its peak employment, according to the report.

Although Augusta did not fare well in its unemployment rate and job losses, ranking in the middle of the 100 metro areas, it did rank strongly in housing prices and a low foreclosure rate.

"Because we never went through the bubble, we're still affordable. We're still a good investment," Copenhaver said.

Augusta's foreclosure rate is better than half of the average for all 100 metro areas.

Augusta placed between El Paso, Texas, and Kansas City, Mo.

The top performing cities in the fourth quarter MetroMonitor were San Antonio; Rochester, N.Y.; Austin, Texas; and Baton Rouge, La.

The worst performing cities are Tampa and Cape Coral, Fla.; Youngstown, Ohio; and Las Vegas.

Copenhaver said the rankings, new airline coverage and development projects around the city could position Augusta to take advantage of the economic recovery.

"There is an impressive body of evidence now that Augusta is doing better than most cities from an economic perspective," he said.