By now you know venture investors turned more active in the second quarter, with a substantial uptick in dollars flowing from their checkbooks to startups.

What you may not know is that New York was one of the cheapest places to do a deal in this ebullient period. And that New England didn’t waste time trying to re-cement its status against the behemoth New York has become. (New Enterprise Associates announced its New York office just this week.)

The average second quarter deal size in the Big Apple was a miserly $6.4 million, compared with $9.3 million in Silicon Valley, $10 million in the Los Angeles metro area and $9.3 million in New England, according to an analysis of MoneyTree data.

Not surprisingly, this was not rock bottom for the quarter. The most inexpensive locality among major investment areas was the Midwest, where the average deal required a check of just $4.6 million

Meanwhile, New England gained on its rival, just as its Red Sox maintain a narrow lead over the lackluster Yankees. New England’s share of second quarter investments rose to 14.7%, representing a 4-percentage-point gain in the past year. New York held an 8.3% share, up a smaller 1.7 percentage points.

For those of you keeping score, Silicon Valley’s share of investment dollars fell to 39.5% from 43.8% a year ago. Caution is needed, however, when examining these quarterly fluctuations. Silicon Valley accounted for 41.2% in the first quarter.

What follows is a slideshow of the top 11 geographical areas with their second quarter investment totals, deal volume, share of total investments and average deal size.

Before we start, however, let me remind you that during the quarter, venture investors put $7.5 billion into 966 deals, a dollar increase of 5% from a year ago and 19% from the first quarter of 2011. The increase pushed investments to a 3 year high, according to the MoneyTree Report, which is compiled by PricewaterhouseCoopers, the National Venture Capital Association and Thomson Reuters, publisher of this blog.

Related posts:

1. Silicon Valley Remains King Of Venture As New York Gains On New England
2. Slideshow: First Quarter Deal Size Climbs, as Seed Investing Falls and Cleantech Rebounds
3. Slideshow: Top Second Quarter Venture Deals Show Internet, Health Care And Late Stage Focus
4. Internet Enthusiasm Pushes Venture Investing to a Three-Year High
5. Second Quarter IPO Proceeds Exceeded $10B For Third Quarter In A Row