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} Houston is a big city inside the state of Texas, fourth in the United States, and a 2nd-largest economic front yard of the Gulf Coast region. A city is the county seat of Harris County, the third most populous county in the country. The part of southwest Houston extends into Fort Bend County and a small portion in the northeast extends into Montgomery County.

Based around 1836 by John Kirby Allen & Augustus Chapman Allen, Houston is one of a fastest growing major cities in a United States and the largest forgoing zoning laws. Within 1900, Houston's population was all about 45,000, getting it the title 85th big city in the United States. When of the 2000 U.S. Census, the city had a total population of 1.9 million (though a July 1, 2004 U.S. Census estimate placed the city's population at more than 2 million). Houston is the independent ethnic & economic center of the Houston–Sugar Land–Baytown Metropolitan Area, which is the seventh largest metropolitan area in the United States with a population of about 5.2 million in ten counties.

Houston is globe famous for its energy (particularly oil) and aeronautics industries and for its ship channel. A Port of Houston is one of the occupy ports within the United States & 2nd in the globe in foreign tunnage. 2nd exclusively to Just released York City inside Fortune 500 headquarters, Houston is home to the Texas Medical Center — the world's largest and most important concentration of research and healthcare institutions. Houston has great deal to offer, including a last prices of residing & a least-expensive housing among Xxvii major U.S. metropolitan areas sustaining populations of additional than I.7 million.

Houston was known as the "Gamma World City" (Gloabal City) by the Globalization and World Cities Study Group & Network (GaWC). Officially, Houston has been nicknamed the Space City when these are page to the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center, home of the Mission Control Center (referred to by space missions as simply "Houston"). the city offers a wide range of business, entertainment and cultural opportunities, including a respected & thriving theater territory. To a lesser degree an hour from either a Gulf of Mexico, Houston is close to sunny beaches, one of a United States' big concentrations of pleasure craft & tourer attractions like a Kemah Boardwalk and Galveston Island.

History
Independent article: History of Houston
Look at likewise: Historical events of Houston

Houston's founding
Both New York real estate promoters, John Kirby Allen and Augustus Chapman Allen, were seeking the location in which it may run building "a great center of government and commerce." Within August 1836, they purchased 6,642 acres (Twenty-seven km²) of land from either T. F. L. Parrot, John Austin's widow woman for $9,428. A Allen brothers known as their town when Sam Houston and persuaded a Texwhen Congress to designate a places as the irregular capital of the new Republic of Texas.

When it was established, it began retired as a hamlet. Gail & Thomas H. Borden surveyed & mapped a town within average grid fashion, by owning wide streets heading parallel & perpendicular to the bayous. A city was granted incorporation on June 5, 1837, and James S. Holman became a number one mayor. That equivalent month, Houston besides became a county seat of Harrisburg County, which was renamed Harris County in 1839. Houston was so processed as a irregular capital of the Republic of Texas. In January 14, 1839, a capital experienced been moved to Austin, known as Waterloo at the time.

19th century
A early settlers utilized lumber to build frame houses, ditches for drainage, & pigs to do wall street. Lawlessness, epidemics & fiscal problems prompted a humans of the community to attempt improvements of the conditions under which it were residing. It was in agreement by several that the Chamber of Commerce was needed to operate out Houston's problems. Following, Senator Robert Wilsin introduced the bill in the Congress of the Republic on November 26, 1838, to charter the Houston Chamber of Commerce. Yellow fever struck periodically & inside 1839 a disease flushed just about 12 percent of the people. Because several of a foremost settlers were from either the South, they endorsed a slavery-plantation system. A slaves lived scattered through the neighborhoods and there were pack loose blacks in the city.

Around 1840, the city was divided into quatern wards, each sustaining different functions in the community. A wards come there is no hanker political divisions, but their list come however utilized. A Republic of Texwhen began to promote settlement of a state as the Allen brothers began to promote their town.

By 1860 Houston was beginning to emerge as a commercial & railroad hub for the exportation of cloth. Railroad spurs from either a Texas inl& converged in a city in which it met the lines to the ports of Galveston and Beaumont. In a period of the Civil War, Houston served as a headquarters for General John Bankhead Magruder and served as his organizing point for the Battle of Galveston. Houston saloon keeper, Dick Dowling, also became a city's number 1 illustrious personality when his triumph at a battle of Sabine Pass in 1863.

When a Civil War, Houston business community initiated efforts to widen a city's extensive formulas of bayous for larger commercial transfer between business district & a nearby Port of Galveston. When many privately financed dredging projects in the 1860's & 1870's, a United States Government took above a Houston Ship Channel design around 1881.

20th century
Shipbuilding when you took World War II spurred further incubation; & a establishment (1961) nearby of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Manned Spacecraft Center (renamed the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in 1973) brought the aerospace industry. Inside 1948, several suburbs were incorporated into the city limits, and it spreads wide through a prairie. Inside 1981, Kathryn J. Whitmire became the city's first woman mayor. Its number one African American mayor, Lee P. Brown, was elected in 1997. Houston benefited from either high oil numbers in the Seventies however suffered in the Eighties when oil numbers collapsed. Since a early Eighties, Houstin has processed efforts to diversify its economy & reduce its dependence on oil.

The new millennium
A city suffered ruinous flooding within June 2001 after Tropical Storm Allison stalled over a city. A storm induced Twenty-two deaths & above $5 billion within damage to a city, although the city is totally rebuilt okay,.

Current events
In the wake up of Hurricane Katrina (August 2005), Houston was providing shelter to over 25,000 refugees from either New Orleans, Louisiana in various facilities around a city, including a infrequently utilized Reliant Astrodome stadium. This unprecedented situation is required to previous many months, & involves Houston's public school models providing education for the tykes staying there. Based on data from CNN, around 230,000 humans from either a New Orleans metropolitan area are at present sleep around Houston, whether in shelters or even elsewhere. Since several one population come unfortunate, got there is no property insurance, & come unwilling to hold off for an extended time to link to to Just released Orleans, the city can watch a striking migration of freshly lasting residents.

Numerous residents evacuated after Hurricane Rita approached the Gulf Coast. Rita left little damage in the Houston vicinity, & it hit Beaumont, Texas, Lake Charles, Louisiana, and areas surrounding a two cities the hardest.

A city's baseball team, a Houston Astros, got into the World Series for the first period in the team's history in October 19, 2005, when a team won bet on vi of a Playoffs (the Astros won 4 games & the St. Louis Cardinals won two games).

Geography and climate
Based on data from a United States Census Bureau, the city has the aggregate locality of 1,558.Tetrad km² (601.7 mi²). 1,500.Seven km² (579.Iv mi²) of these are l& and 57.Vii km² (Twenty-two.Trinity mi²) of these are a body of water. A sum vicinity is Triad.7.1% a stream.

Houston has quaternary major bayous passing through the city: Buffalo Bayou, which runs into business district; Brays Bayou, which runs along a Texas Medical Center; White Oak Bayou, which runs through a Heights & touching the nor'-west metropolitan area; & Sims Bayou, which runs through a south of Houston & downtown Houston, merging into the ship channel. A ship channel goes past Galveston and into the Gulf of Mexico.

Good deal of Houston is very flat, making flooding the revenant condition for its residents. A city stands astir L feet (Xv m) above sea level; a Houston Heights area has the highest elevation in the city. A city another time relied in groundwater for its a body of water needs, however land subsidence forced a city to turn to ground-level water sources like Lake Houston.

Urban layout
''Independent article: Disticts and communities of Houston

While Houston was established around 1837, the city's founders divided it into political geographic territory known as "wards." The ward designation is the primogenitor of the todays-day Houston City Council dominion — there are nine all told.

Locations within Houston come typically classified when either existence inside or even outside Interstate 610, known as a "610 Loop" or even "The Loop". In a loop usually encompasses a central business district. Loop 610 is to the higher degree good the superhighway when it has came to define a lifestyle and state of mind. A “inner looperâ€? is supplementary of an urban person, someone world health organization likes to become more or less a arts, universities, events, parks, & amusement.

A outlying areas of Houston, a airdrome & a city's suburbia & enclaves come outside a loop. A second circumferential, Texas Beltway 8 (also known just when a "Beltway"), encircles a city some other Quintuplet miles (Eighter kilometre) farther retired. An additional bypass, Texas Highway 99 (also referred to as a Grand Parkway), is under construction.

Houston, existence a big city in the United States while forgoing zoning laws, has grown in an unusual manner. Like than one “downtown� as a center of the city's employment, 5 extra business districts have grown throughout the inner-city. In case these business district were combined, it would form a third big downtown in the United States.

Climate
Houston's climate is classified when existence humid subtropical. A city is in the gulf coastal plains biome, and its vegetation is classified when moderate grassland. Great deal of Houston was rest on forested land, marshes or prairie, all of which could however exist as seen around encompassing areas. Typical every year precipitation levels range from either 36 to 48 inches (914 to 1219 millimetre). Prevailing winds come from either either a south & southeast when you took virtually all of a month, bringing heat from the deserts of Mexico and moisture from either a Gulf of Mexico.

In the summer time, daily hotness come in the 95ºF (35ºC) to 110ºF (45ºC) range throughout good deal of July & August. A air tends to sense however & a humidness (typically 90 to 100% relative humidity) makes the air sense hotter than it really is. To meet a heat, population utilise air conditioning in nearly every car & post-war building in the city. Summer thunderstorms sometimes bring tornadoes to the area. Afternoon rains are non rare, & virtually all times Houston meteorologists predict at least a few percentage risk of rain. A hottest temperature ever recorded in Houston was 109 °F (42.Septet °Hundred) in September 4, 2000.

Winters in Houston come cool & moderate. Numerous times a temperatures come between a 45º & 55ºF (7ºC & 16ºC). A coldest cycle is commonly around January, while northerly bring wintertime rains. Snow is about unheard of, & usually doesn't accumulate whilst these are seen. The freak snowstorm hit Houston on Christmas Eve 2004. Two or three inches accumulated, however was completely no more per next afternoon. A coldest temperature ever recorded in Houston was Five °F (-Xv °Hundred) in January 23, 1940.

Houston's climate is typically in comparison that of Dallas. Each cities personal experience temperatures above 90ºF in the period of summertime; nonetheless, Dallas has the dry climate when Houston has an additional humid climate. When Dallas gets hotter temperatures, Houston's higher humidness levels typically effect inside the higher heat index. In a period of the wintertime, though, Dallas regularly lives temperatures in the image below freezing, when Houston seldom does sol.

Such as numbers of areas of Texas, Houston suffers from either a Red imported fire ant.

Natural disasters
Hurricanes use at times slammed into the Texas Gulf Coast in many occasions; many have passed across Houston, typically stimulating demise & destruction. A Galveston Hurricane of 1900 led to Galveston losing its status as a major larboard city & economic power inside Southeast Texas; subsequent development of the Houston ship channel & its port refineries shifted the honor to Houston. A go hurricane of effect to hit Houston was Hurricane Alicia in 1983, but Tropical Storm Allison in 2001 caused billions of dollars in restitution & dollars and cents 43 populates. Up to now, Allison has been Houston's worst flood. Several neighborhoods develop changed since a storm; older houses within occasionally afflicted neighborhoods develop been level & replaced by owning big houses by using big foundations. Recently, Hurricane Rita Houston has suffered minimal damage.

Skyline

Downtown Houston
In the 1960s, Downtown Houston comprised of a mild collection of mid-rise professional structures, however has since grown into one of a big skylines in the United States. Inside 1960, a central business district had 10 million square feet (1,000,000 m²) of office space, increasing to astir 16 million square feet (1,600,000 m²) within 1970. Downtown Houston was on the threshold of the boom within 1970 by using Viii.7 million square feet (8,700,000 m²) of professional space aforethought or even under construction & immense projects existence launched by real estate developers. A big projected development was a 32 prevent Houston Center. Simply the little section of the original proposal was at long last constructed. More big projects involved a Cullen Center, Allen Center, & towers for Shell Oil. A surge of skyscrapers mirrored a skyscraper booms within more cities, like Los Angeles and Dallas. Houston had an additional downtown construction jet in the 1970s with a energy industry boom.

A number one major skyscraper to be constructed inside Houston was a 50-floor, 714-foot-tall (218 m) Of these Plate Plaza within 1971. a succession of skycrapers were built throughout the Seventies, culminating by using Houston's tallest skyscraper, a 75-floor, 1,002-foot-tall (305 m) JPMorgan Chase Tower (formerly a Texas Commerce Tower), which was completed in 1982. Within 2002, it was a 9th tallest building in the United States & the Twenty-third tallest skyscaper in the world. Around 1983, the 71-floor, 970-foot-tall (296 m) Wells Fargo Plaza was completed. Skyscraper construction around downtown Houston come to an prevent in the mid-1980s with a collapse of Houston's energy industry & a resultant severe economic recession. Once a 53-floor Texaco Heritage Plaza was completed in 1987, it appeared that no more skyscrapers would exist as constructed awhile. But, around 2002, a Houston-depending Enron Corporation began construction of a 40-floor skyscraper which was astir to become completed around 2001 as a company collapsed inside one of the virtually all spectacular corporate failures in the history of the United States. More little professional structures were built in the 2000-2003 time. When of December 2001, downtown Houston had astir 40 million square feet (4,000,000 m²) of professional space, including 28 million square feet (2,800,000 m²) of class The professional space.

Uptown Houston
A Uptown Houston district boomed along with Houston in a period of the Seventies & early Eighties. a collection of mid-rise office block appeared along the Interstate 610 west (or only "West Loop"). It became one of a virtually all telling cases of the edge city. A greatest accomplishment of Uptown Houston was a construction of the landmark 899-foot-tall (274 m) Williams Tower (known as a Transco Tower until 1999). At a period, it was believed to the exist as the world's tallest skyscraper outside of the central business district. the Williams Tower was a product of a unique era inside Houston. The time while energy corporations were loaded by owning plus & sought telling, monumental structures to design their power.

A Uptown Houston territorial dominion is besides residence to more landmark buildings, designed by designer like César Pelli and Philip Johnson. Big-shell professional construction around Uptown Houston, all a same, come to an prevent by having a collapse of energy numbers & the meltdown of Houston's economy in the mid-to-late 1980s. Uptown Houston got Xxiii.8 million square feet (2,380,000 m²) of professional space within 2001, whereas Downtown Houston had astir 40 million square feet (4,000,000 m²). In the late 1990s, there was a mini-boom of mid-rise residential tower construction, typically Xxx stories tall. Uptown Houston has accumulated the big concentration of high-rise residential structures for such a great-density city.

Economy
View likewise: List of major companies in Houston

Houston's energy industry is a globe powerhouse (particularly oil), but biomedical research, aeronautics and the ship channel come as well big area of the city's industrial base. A city is the big petrochemical manufacturing area in the globe, including for synthetic rubber, insecticides and fertilizers. A locality is besides the world's leading center for building oilfield equipment. Very much of Houston's profits as a petrochemical complex is due to its man-semisynthetic ship channel, a Port of Houston, which is one of the occupy ports within the United States and 2nd in the globe in foreign tonnage. Because of the economic trades, numerous residents keep close at hand moved within from either more U.S. states, also when hundreds of countries worldwide. Unlike virtually all web pages, in which high gas prices come seen when harmful to the economy, it is typically seen when beneficial for Houston when numerous are listed in the energy industry.

Historically, Houston has experienced many incubation jet (& a few devastating economic recessions) related to the Texas oil industry. A discovery of oil touching Houston inside 1901 led to its first incubation jet — per 1920s, Houston had grown to virtually 140,000 humans. A city's burgeoning aerospace industry heralded its second incubation spirt, which solidified by owning a 1973 oil crisis. Require in Texas oil increased, & numbers of population from either either a northeast moved to Houston to profits from a trade. Once a embargo was lifted, the incubation mostly stopped. Even so, Pasadena still has its refineries, and a Port of Houston is among a busiest in the globe.

Houston is 2nd to Up to date York City within Fortune 500 headquarters. It has attempted to build the banking industry, but a corporations originally began within Houston own since incorporate sustaining more corporations countrywide. Banking is however vital to the vicinity, however virtually all of the banks operating in the city are non depending there. Extrthe recently, Houston has be a major center of finance with a heavy total of banks, many of the babies foreign. Real estate is also the big presence in the Houston front yard.

Government and politics
View as well: List of Mayors in Houston, List of embassies and consulates Houston is the county seat of Harris County. The part of sou'west Houston, east of Missouri City, extends into Fort Bend County and also part of nor'-east Houston extends into Montgomery County.

A todays city manager of Houston is Bill White, who is serving his 1st term. Within Houston, the mayor can be elected consecutively for three terms. City Council members, who as well have a 3-term set boundaries, come elected from either nine territorial dominion in the city, along by owning 5 at-prominent positions. At-big councillor represent a entire city. the todays city council lineup was according to a U.S. Justice Department mandate which took burden around 1979. Houston is considered the home rule city; members of city council and a city controller come nonpartisan positions.

Numbers of local lawmakers have been impacted per city's term restricts. Many previous city officials — Anthony Hall, Rodney Ellis, Sheila Jackson-Lee, Sylvia Garcia, Martha Wong, Chris Bell, and Annise Parker — got to run a second elective position another time their term expired.

Previous mayor Lee P. Brown denounced the term limits, saying they prevented incumbents from gaining enough experience in city government. a proposal to double the todays 2-biennial term of professional hwhen been debated — as of 2005, many candidates for even a city council use brought higher the issue of whether term restricts should become amended or eliminated.

A select few elected officials from either a Greater Houston metropolitan area inside a Texas Legislature — primarily Garnet Coleman and Sylvester Turner — use at times as well spoken against term restricts.

Demographics
When of the censusof 2000, there are 1,953,631 people, 717,945 house, & 457,330 families living in the city. A population density is 1,301.8/km² (3,371.7/mi²). There are 782,009 housing units at an typical density of 521.1/km² (1,349.6/mi²). A racial makeup of the city is 49.27% White, 25.31% Black or African American, 0.44% Native American, 5.31% Asian, 0.06% Pacific Islander, 16.46% from other races, and 3.15% from two or more races. 37.41% of the people come Hispanic or Latino of any race.

There are 717,945 family away from which 33.1% keep close at hand kids under a age of Xviii accept the babies, 43.2% come married couples living together, 15.3% have a female homeowner by owning there is no hubby present, & 36.3% come non-families. Xxix.Captain hicks% of everthing house come mass produced higher of souls & 6.2% stand person residing alone world health organization is 65 years aged or even older. A typical house size is Two.67 & a typical personal size is Tercet.39.

In a city the people is spread retired using Twenty-seven.5% under a age of Eighteen, Eleven.2% from either 18 to Two dozen, 33.8% from either 25 to 44, Xix.1% from either 45 to 64, & Ogdoad.4% world health organization come 65 years aged or even older. A median age is 31 years. For each Centred females there are 99.Heptad males. For each Century females age Xviii & concluded, there are 97.Octonary males.

the median income for a personal in the city is $36,616, & the median income for a family is $40,443. Males have a median income of $32,084 versus $27,371 for females. A per capita income for the city is $20,101. Xix.2% of the people & Sixteen.0% of families come beneath a poverty line. Away from a number people, Twenty-six.1% of people under a age of 18 & 14.3% of people 65 & older come residing in a image below the poverty level.

People and culture
View: List of famous people raised in Houston Officially, Houston has been nicknamed the Space City because of the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center nearby. "Houston" was a number one word uttered on the moon, as Neil Armstrong reported back to NASA. Several locals, notwithstanding, like to call for it a Bayou City. More nicknames include "H-Town", "Clutch City", & "Magnolia City".

Because a Greater Houston area and a Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex are the major economic centers of Texas, the two areas enjoy a friendly rivalry. Houstonians typically assume themselves further "down to earth" than their neighbors northward, & occasionally Houstonians complain that Dallas seems for other attention nationally, possibly though Houston has the big people. This contention typically leads to comparison of the plus of 1 city to the plus of the more. E.g., although Dallas has additional eating place by the human than possibly New York City, Houstonians eat out more typically than residents of any more city in the United States. A lone city where dine out is inexpensive than Houston is New Orleans, Louisiana.

Many Houston-depending eating house (virtually all notably Ninfa Laurenzo's Mama Ninfa's Mexican restaurant chain, Johnny Carrabba's Carrabba's, and Kim Su Tran La's Kim SÆ¡n Vietnamese restaurant chain) have become well known in Texas and throughout the country. A project for the number one Compaq computer was sketched on the napkin at Home of Pies, the easily-known diner in the Upper Kirby district, near a Montrose area.

A cosmopolitan city
Houston occurs as diverse & international city, around section because of its its numerous academic institutions & heavy biomedical, energy, manufacturing and aerospace industries. The port city, Houston also has big populations of immigrants from China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, India, Pakistan, and Vietnam. This inflow of immigrants is part responsible Houston getting a people that is immature than the national norm.

Houston has ii Chinatowns, as well as a third big Vietnamese American population in the United States. Recent overhaul of Midtown from either rerun-summation to upscale has increased property values & land tax, however has likewise forced a bit of Vietnamese Americans into more areas of the city.

All about Ninety languages come spoken in the area. A select few neighborhoods by owning high populations of Vietnamese & Chinese residents develop Chinese and Vietnamese street signs in addition to English ones. Houston has a 2nd greatest South African population in the United States, after Miami, Florida. A city is as well noted for its big Nigerian population with astir c thousand native Nigerian residents[http://usembassy.state.gov/nigeria/wwwhxjan03g.html].

A Hispanic humans inside Houston is increasing when additional & extra people from either Lataround countries try to locate act in Houston — Houston has a third big Hispanic people in the United States.

Assisted per popularity of the late hip-hop creative person DJ Screw, Houston is known among youth, primarily in the South, as with its have distinctive style of hip-hop usually called screw music (referred to locally as just "screw.") Several immature Houstonians of everthing ethnicities & socioeconomic backgrounds about touch using local hip-hop culture can remember a advent of this form of Southern rap which began to choose place around late 1999, helping the city earn an appropriate nickname from creative person & fans: "Screwston". Swishahouse, the city's premier rap label since Scarface & Rap-A-Lot, is home to some of the city's most popular acts: Mike Jones, Paul Wall, Archie Lee, Cootabang and Aqualeo.

Houston is as well front yard to ADV Films, which is the largest producer/distributor of anime (Japanese Animation) in North America. Occasionally of the series to their resume include Slayers, Power Stone, Golden Boy, Sonic The Hedgehog Saiyuki, the original Japanese version of Sailor Moon,Sorcerer Hunters, & Martian Successor Nadesico to name a few.

Health and fitness
Around 2005, ''Men's Fitness'' magazine named Houston a fattest city in a United States (the quaternary instance the city has received such an award since 2001). Inside 2005, the magazine depending its rating in a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention survey listing 23 percent of Houstonians when clinically weighty, too when more numbers like Houston getting twice a total of doughnut shops per capita compared to the national norm, & actual cost showing Houstonians eat out to a higher degree any more city's people.

Cultural institutions
Look at as well: List of museums outside of the Museum District

Known for the sonority of its visual and performing arts, Houston's theater district is ranked 2nd in the united states (behind New York City) around the amount of theater seats in the concentrated downtown region. Houston has globe-class ocular & performing arts organizations, along with the dose of homegrown folk art such as Art Cars. Houston is likewise one of merely 5 cities in a United States sustaining lasting office resident corporations all told of the major performing arts disciplines (the Houston Grand Opera, the Houston Symphony Orchestra, the Houston Ballet, and The Alley Theatre)[http://www.visithoustontexas.com/arts_and_culture.asp?pageid=232]. Houston is one of merely 5 cities in a united states sustaining these season-year-around ocular & performing arts available, & is widely recognized when the united states's third first city for contemporary visual arts.

The New York Times has called Houston even a virtually all interesting city in the United States for immature artists. For about Century years, Houston’s rich culture has invigorated a artistic & academic pursuits of students & faculty similar. Houston is one of simply captain hicks U.s. cities sustaining resident sales person corporations altogether quartet major performing arts: ballet, opera, theater and symphony. It's the prime prevent for touring corporations from either either Broadway; concerts & shows, from The Rolling Stones to Cirque du Soleil; and exhibitions for each interest, ranging from either a united states's big quilting indicate to machine, boat & residence shows. Adjacent to the Texas Medical Center is the Museum District, including Museum of Fine Arts Houston, the Contemporary Arts Museum, The Menil Collection, and the Houston Museum of Natural Science.

Tourism
Space Center Houston is the official visitant center of NASA's Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center. Space Center Houston occurs as place in which population might own experience space — from either its history & present to its first. Space Center Houston's alone exhibits, attractions, favorite presentations & mitts-in activities tell a story of NASA's manned space flight program. SCH is the merely place in the globe in which visitant potty look at astronauts train for missions, touch a really moon rock, land a shuttle, and take a behind-a-scenes tour of NASA. It too features Texas’ big IMAX theater.

Houston's several parks include Hermann Park, which has the zoo, a museum of natural science, and the planetarium. Houston has many notable art museums, the Space Center Houston museum, & a babies's museum. A Wortham Theater Center houses a opera & ballet corporations; a city is too residence to The Alley Theatre, one of the united states's first stock company. A civic center was replaced by the George R. Brown Convention Center, one of the nation's largest; and the Jesse H. Jones Hall for the Performing Arts, front yard of the symphony orchestra. Sam Houston Coliseum & Music Hall stand been replaced per Hobby Center for the Proforming Arts.

More tourist attractions include the Galleria, a brobdingnagian enclosed shopping mall noted for its luxury stores; Old Market Square; Sam Houston Historical Park, which contains restored homes (built 1824–68) & reconstructed buildings; & a Astrodome (opened 1965) and its adjacent Astroworld, an amusement park. A San Jacinto battlefield is in the nearby city of Deer Park. To a lesser degree an hour from either a Gulf of Mexico, Houston is some sunny beaches, one of the united states's big concentrations of cruiser, & holidaymaker attractions like a Kemah Boardwalk and Galveston Island.

Media and entertainment
Understand likewise: List of famous events in Houston, List of newspapers in Houston, List of television stations in Houston, List of movies set in Houston

To a lesser degree an hour from either a Gulf of Mexico, Houston is roughly sunny beaches, one of a united states's big concentrations of cruiser, & tourer attractions like a Kemah Boardwalk and Galveston Island.

Houston has Six Flags Astroworld, one of the big Six Flags amusement parks in the country was upright announced to exist as closed. AstroWorld is at home to the lone pipe-line barrel roll roller coaster in North America. Its more major claims to fame come a Texas Cyclone (which after foremost built was one of a big wooden roller coasters in a United States), & the Ultra Twister, which is widely think of one of a virtually all unique rides in the United States. AstroWorld is adjacent to Six Flags Waterworld, a a lake park that has been incorporated into the pleasure ground. A funfair come two or three bars out of a Reliant Park complex, located in south 610 loop. Six Flags AstroWorld is scheduled to close for good when a 2005 year (fallowing October). A park sits in worthful l&, and might belike exist as converted into luxury flat or even even condominiums or more such residential high-tower block, a second car park adjacent to Reliant Stadium, or the big shopping mall.

Houston is served per Houston Chronicle, its only major daily newspaper by owning wide distribution. Houston too is personal to many TV stations and radio stations that serve a underground metropolitan area.

KTRK TV's Marvin Zindler is a well-known figure inside Houston, recognizable when much for his voice as for his trademark blue monocle. His week-long exposé on the Chicken Ranch brothel later became a basis for the Broadway musical theater The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.

KHOU-TV's team of "Defenders" began and led an investigation into a failure of Firestone Wilderness AT tires around many vehicles that ended higher becoming the national story by having wide-reaching implications. These reports garnered a newsman & a station subject & international attention & awards.

Univision Affiliate KXLN-TV is among the greatest rated Spanish-language tv station in the United States. Its "En Su Defensa" (for your defense) segments use garnered regional eclat, & En Su Defensa year was proclaimed by City manager Bill White within 2004.

Education
Colleges and universities
Understand likewise: List of colleges and universities in Houston

Houston is page to the prestigious Rice University, a personal institution boasting one of a big financial endowments of any university in a world & ranked the Seventeenth better university overall in the united states by U.S. News & World Report [http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/brief/natudoc/tier1/t1natudoc_brief.php]. A little undergrad student person is among a united states's virtually all choose & has one of a greatest percentages of National Merit Scholarship winners. Rice maintains the kind of research center & laboratories. Rice is too associated using a Houston Metropolitan area The food and drug administration Center, a syndicate supported by Rice, the University of Texas at Austin, Texas A&M University and the University of Houston.

Houston is served per University of Houston System, the big urban state rules of higher education in the Gulf Coast. A rules has 4 universities, all but one of which are then inside Houston, & 2 multi-institution teaching centers. Their flagship institution is the University of Houston, the only doctoral degree granting extensive research institution in Houston and the third largest in the state of Texas with an enrollment of more than 35,000. A University of Houston is too page to further than Xl research facility & institutes. Among a virtually all prestigious of the University of Houston's colleges is the University of Houston Law Center (law school). A University of Houston Law Center's Health Law & Policy Institute is ranked first in the united states spell its rational property law program is ranked fifth, according to U.S. News & World Report.

Houston is the seat of the internationally-an expert Texas Medical Center, which contains the world's largest concentration of research and healthcare institutions including Baylor College of Medicine, The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston and The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center. A M. D. Anderson Cancer Center is widely considered one of a world’s virtually all productive & extremely-regarded academic institutions devoted to cancer patient care, locate, education & bar.

Good deal of Houston is served per Houston Community College System, which is one of the big community college systems in the United States. HCCS serves a HISD part of Houston & more areas. Area of northern Houston come served by North Harris Montgomery Community College District. Area of eastern & southeastern Houston come served by San Jacinto College. Several of Houston's suburban area as well keep close at hand their have community college systems.

Texas Southern University is a historically black college inside Houston.

Houston besides is page to St. Thomas University, a Catholic Liberal Arts college charted the Byzantine tradition, in the Montrose territorial dominion. A second religious college serving Houston is Houston Baptist University.

Schools and libraries
There are numerous school districts serving a city of Houston, a largest of which, a Houston Independent School District, serves a big majority of a region in the city limits.

a part of west Houston fall into the Spring Branch and Alief independent school districts. Aldine and North Forest independent school districts require higher the section of nor'-east Houston. Area of Pasadena, Clear Creek, Crosby, Cypress-Fairbanks, Fort Bend, Galena Park, Huffman, Humble, Katy, New Caney, & Sheldon independent school territorial dominion require students from either a city limits of Houston.

Houston has many easily-known common soldier schools. Easily-known buck private schools include Strake Jesuit College Preparatory, Saint Agnes Academy, St. John's School, The Kinkaid School. Inside nearby Bellaire is Episcopal High School.

A Houston Public Library has 36 branches throughout a city, + the Central Library, placed Downtown. A Harris County Public Library has Twenty-six branches, mostly inside areas outside a city limits of Houston.

Transportation
Highways
Watch likewise: List of highways in Houston
For the road map of Houston, click [http://www.soulofamerica.com/images/maps/houston_map.jpeg here] Houston doesn't develop zoning noticed inside numerous cities. Urban sprawl and hot, humid summers have processed car a favorite means of transport. Houston as well has excessive ozone levels and is ranked among a virtually all ozone-contaminated cities in the United States.

Houston pike come heavy travelled & typically under construction to meet a demands of continuing incubation. Interstate 45 south has been withinside a continuous state of construction, in a single part or even a second, just about since the 1st section was built in 1952. Texas Department of Transport (TxDOT) planners use at times sought ways to reduce rush hour congestion, primarly across High-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lane for vans and carpools. Timed superhighway entrances, which regulate a addition of cars to the pike, come likewise most common. Houston has an extensive network of motorway cameras linked to the transit control center to monitor & learn traffic.

1 characteristic of Houston's motorway (& Texas throughway generally) come its frontage roads (which locals call "feeders"). Alongside virtually all superhighway come two to 4 lanes around every counsel parallel to the motorway allowing easily access to single city streets. Service road provide access to the motorway from either filling station & outlet. Recently landscaping projects & a longstanding ban in newly hoarding come ways Houston has tried to control the likely side results of convenience.

Houston has the hub-and-spoke freeway structure with multiple loops. A innermost is Interstate 610, forming approximately the Tenner mile across loop in business district. A about square "Loop-610" is quartered into "North Loop," "South Loop," "West Loop," & "East Loop." A roads of Texas Beltway 8 and their freeway core, the Sam Houston Tollway, come a next loop, at a across of about Twenty-five miles. Virtually all of this state highway takes payment of $1.Xxv toll each 5 or even decade miles ($3.00 toll after crossing a Houston Ship Channel). The controversial projected main road plan, Texas Highway 99, would form a third loop outside of Houston. Presently, a completed part of Texas Highway 99 diarrhea from either good northerly of Interstate 10, west of Houston, to U.S. Highway 59 in Sugar Land, southwest of Houston, and was completed in 1994. A next part to become constructed is from either a todays terminus at U.S. Mainside road 59 to Texas Main road 288 in Brazoria County.

Mass transit
A Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County, Texas, or METRO, provides public transport in the form of buses, tramcar & lift vans. Uptown, Subway system will bring loose service on the Uptown Shuttle.

Subway began running off weak rail service (METRORail) on January 1, 2004. Presently a track is like short — it diarrhea astir Ogdoad miles (Xiii kilometre) primarily along Main Street from either central Downtown Houston to the Texas Medical Center and Reliant Park. a Xxvii-mile (43 kilometer) expansion has been approved to do a service from either Uptown (the Galleria locality) across Texas Southern University, ending at the University of Houston campus. Subway system's various forms of public transport however don't attach a suburbia to the greater city, stimulating Houstonians to rely on the motorcar as a primary source of transport.

Airports
Houston is served by George Bush Intercontinental Airport and William P. Hobby Airport (named Houston International Airport until 1963). Bush Intercontinental handles completely of the city's international traffic, when Hobby services shorter-haul routes. Hobby is as well a simply drome in the city served by Southwest Airlines. Bush Intercontinental is the hub airdrome for Continental Airlines, which is headquartered in Houston.

A city's third-largest drome, Ellington Field, in the past was utilized to ferry rider between Galvestin County & Bush Intercontinential, to cut down on camping instance. Rider flights endwise September 7, 2004.

Set in Sugar Land, southwest of Houston, is the Sugar Land Regional Airport, formerly Sugar Land Municipal Airport. Sugar L& Regional is a quaternary big drome in the greater Houston metropolitan area, and the simply general reliever drome in the south-west sector. A airdrome mostly serves corporate, governmental & personal planes.

Sports
Look at likewise: Former professional sports teams in Houston

Houston is residence to the Houston Astros, Houston Texans, Houston Rockets, Houston Comets, and Houston Aeros, all of whom come swimming around fresh state-of-a-art bowl. Minute Maid Park (house of the Astros) & Toyota Center (home of the Rockets, Comets & Aeros) come placed Downtown, contributing to an urban renaissance that has transformed Houston's center into the day-&-nonstop destination. Rice Stadium, at Rice University, was the at home to Super Bowl VIII, and Super Bowl XXXVIII was played at the Reliant Stadium in February 2004. More sports facilities inside Houston come Hofheinz Pavilion, Reliant Astrodome, and Robertson Stadium.

Beginning around 2006, the Champ Car auto racing series will link to to Houston for the every year race, held on the streets of the Reliant Park complex. the city experienced antecedently been front yard to a Champ Car spherical from either 1998 to 2001. In April 1, 2001, Houston hosted WWE's Wrestlemania X-Seven at Reliant Astrodome.

Sister cities

Houston has Xvi sister cities. Parentheses denote a month where sister city relationships were established.

Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (2001) Baku, Azerbaijan (1976) Chiba, Japan (1973) Grampian Region, Scotland (1979) Guayaquil, Ecuador (1987) Huelva, Spain (1969) Istanbul, Turkey (1986) Leipzig, Germany (1993) Luanda, Angola (2003) Nice, France (1973) Perth, Western Australia, Australia (1983) Shenzhen, People's Republic of China (1986) Stavanger, Norway (1980) Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China (1963) Tampico, Tamaulipas, Mexico (2003) Tyumen, Russia (1995)

Sources
http://www.flagspot.net, http://fotw.vexillum.com/flags/us-tx-hu.html - Source of flag image. Image manufactured by Tony DeFalco [http://www.pbase.com/ngruev/houston Nothing but pictures of Houston] Hyperlink provided per creator of the pictures - Nikola Gruev

External Hurricane Rita links
For official prognosis, watch a NHC's [http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/text/refresh/MIATCPAT3+shtml/ latest public advisory on Hurricane Rita] & [http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/text/index_hls3.shtml Hurricane Local Statements issued by local Weather Forecast Offices]. [http://www.noaa.gov NOAA Web Page] [http://www.stormtracker.noaa.gov/stormtracker-rita.htm Rita Storm Tracker] [http://www.wunderground.com/blog/SteveGregory/show.html Steve Gregory's Blog at Weather Underground] [http://www.weather.com The Weather Channel] [http://www.atl.ec.gc.ca/weather/hurricane/current6.html Canadian Hurricane Centre Storm Tracker] [http://images.ibsys.com/sh/hurricanetracker/hurtracker.swf Flash Hurricane Tracker] - track active hurricanes. [http://asp1.sbs.ohio-state.edu/ Ohio State - Tropical Weather] - latest Aircraft Recon Info


Regional: North America: United States: Texas: Counties: Fort Bend
Regional: North America: United States: Texas: Counties: Harris
Regional: North America: United States: Texas: Counties: Montgomery
Regional: North America: United States: Texas: Metro Areas: Houston-Galveston





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