I disagree strongly with the above poster. I actually interviewed today at a university in my home state and mentioned being closer to my large extended family as a reason I am interested in the program. I think it demonstrates that I'd have a strong support network as a student. Also, the area the school is in gets an unfairly bad rap, and my interviewers actually said that they were glad that they didn't have to defend the area to me since I was already familiar with it. Finally, the fact that it's a metropolitan area means there are a lot more resources available than if I was in somewhere more remote so it's not totally unrelated to the program to care about the area.