View from the top of a 65 metre wind turbine at Tararua Wind Farm looking towards Ashhurst.

Claims Palmerston North could be one of the windiest places to live have been debunked, with Wellington beating it on almost all fronts.

Major UK media organisation The Guardian recently dubbed Wellington the world's windiest city – fairly or unfairly – using the Solace In The Wind sculpture on the waterfront as a clear symbol of Wellington's windy ways.

The Guardian article, in their Extreme Cities section – and titled Where is the world's windiest city? Spoiler alert: it's not Chicago, said:

"The capital of New Zealand is, by reputation, the windiest city on earth and it can make every day something of a trial," and adds: "Judging which is the world's windiest city is tricky, as no global database for cities exists and measurement techniques are not standardised.

"Other contenders include Rio Gallegos and Punta Arenas in Argentina and Chile's windswept southern Patagonia. St John's in Canada is north America's windiest city, averaging between 13 (21kmh) and 15mph (24kmh).

"Wellington's strongest recorded gust of 154mph (247kmh) was measured on Hawkins Hill in 1962, just a few miles from the [city] centre."

In response, Metservice lead meteorologist Lisa Murray said Wellington might have some of the fastest gust but it was also important to measure which places had the most constant breezes, or "wind run."," Murray said

"There's lots of places on the planet that have constant wind and don't have any fine days like we do in Wellington."

In the "wind run" stakes, Palmerston North was breezy more often than Wellington, she said.

"It might be just 30 kilometres per hour but it's more constant."

Murray said she was not aware of tables that ranked windiest locales, although it was possible scientists could poll the world's metservices and make a list.

But Atmospheric research meteorologist, Richard Turner at NIWA in Wellington, had two words for those suggesting Wellington was winder than Palmerston North: "no way".

The average wind speed at Palmerston North Airport was about 15 kmh, but jumped to 24 kmh at Wellington Airport, he said.

"The Guardian article...seemed to be ranking the cities by average wind speed."

On that basis, Palmerston North was "just a pretender" to Wellington's infamous moniker, he said.

The biggest wind gust at Wellington Airport in 2015 was 104kmh, but only got as high as 89 kmh at Palmerston North Airport.

Wellington also held claim to a larger all-time reading, with breezes getting up to 158kmh during the Wahine storm of 1968.

Palmerston North's biggest reading was 125kmh from November 1993.

Turner said he could not pick the windiest spot in Palmerston North, but any area exposed to a northwesterly or southeasterly - or downwind of the Manawatu Gorge - would be a good pick.

He explained that the capital was so windy because of the sea breeze's "funnelling effect" through the Cook Strait channel into Wellington Harbour.

But the scientist would not go as far as declaring Wellington the windiest city in the world.

It was like comparing apples with oranges - The Hawkins Hill spot measured was a high, wind-swept ridge, exposed ridge where no one lived, Turner said.

Defending the capital's reputation as a windy city is a hard ask – given Wellington's own Super Rugby team is named the Hurricanes – but a local businessman gave it a crack.

In their spare time, Wellington businessman Steve Maggs and two other climate buffs pored through 30 years of weather data from the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa) and found that the foul weather title isn't totally justified as the capital actually is less damp and has more sunshine hours than perceived.

Figures from Niwa up until 2013 showed Wellington's greatest rival - Auckland, of course - now has fewer rainy days than it used to.

But annually, Auckland residents had four more days of rain than the capital.

Wellington also got more than 50 hours of extra sunshine than Auckland, on average.

The numbers from 1981 onwards showed strong gusts hit the Wellington region less than one day a week, and just 11 per cent of the time it reached more than 38kmh, Maggs' team found.

Wellington's wind-blown locals might not be willing to bet their umbrellas on the climate buffs' findings, and they are backed by the experts – sort of.

The Guardian said some of the windiest cities in Europe included Spain's Pamplona, Germany's Hamburg and multiple Danish cities.