1. A system for determining the intent of query, comprising: a computer system operating with a set of instructions to cause the computer system to form: a search engine that receives a first search query; a query/click log module configured to store log data associated with the first search query; and a computational module that generates metric values associated with the first search query based on the log data and that determines that the first search query is one of a regional specific query or a global query based on the metric values, wherein the metric values reflect a likelihood of local intent of the first search query, the computational module including a location likelihood (LL) computational module that identifies at least one n-gram within the first search query and that generates a first metric value based on the number of times the at least one n-gram occurs with a location term within a geographic region relative to the number of times the at least one n-gram occurs within the geographic region, and a local switch rate (SWR) computation module that generates a second metric based on the number of times a second search query was submitted in tandem with a regional search option relative to the number of times the first search query was submitted without the regional search option, wherein the first search query and the second search query include the same content, and wherein the search engine provides search results selected in part based on the metric values.