|
The City and County of ( Bought to you by our San
Francisco limousine) San Francisco is the fourth-largest city in
California and the fourteenth-largest in the United States, with a 2005
population of 739,426.[2] It is located on the tip of the ( Bought to you
by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco Peninsula and has
traditionally been the focal point of the ( Bought to you by our San
Francisco limousine) San Francisco Bay Area. ( Bought to you by our San
Francisco limousine) San Francisco is the second most densely populated
major city in the United States.[3]
In 1776, the Spanish became the first Europeans to settle in ( Bought to
you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco, establishing a mission
named for Francis of Assisi. With the advent of the California Gold Rush
in 1848, the city entered a period of rapid growth. After being devastated
by the 1906 earthquake and fire, ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine)
San Francisco was quickly rebuilt and is today one of the most
recognizable cities in the world.
( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco is renowned
for its months-long episodes of fog, steep rolling hills, the eclectic mix
of Victorian and modern architecture, and its peninsular location
surrounded on three sides by the Pacific Ocean and ( Bought to you by our
San Francisco limousine) San Francisco Bay. Famous hallmarks and landmarks
include the Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz Island, the cable cars, the
Transamerica Pyramid, and Chinatown.
Geography
( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco and northern
San Mateo County( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San
Francisco is located on the west coast of the U.S. at the tip of the (
Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco Peninsula and
includes significant stretches of the Pacific Ocean and ( Bought to you by
our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco Bay within its boundaries.
Several islands are part of the city, notably Alcatraz, Treasure Island,
and the adjacent Yerba Buena Island. Also included are the uninhabited
Farallon Islands, 27 miles offshore in the Pacific Ocean. The land within
the city limits roughly forms a seven by seven mile square, which has
become a colloquialism referring to the city's shape.
( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco is famous
for its hills, which are defined as elevations over 100 ft (30 m). There
are a total of 43 hills within city limits.[24] Some neighborhoods are
named after the hill on which they are situated, including Nob Hill,
Pacific Heights, Russian Hill, Potrero Hill, and Telegraph Hill.
Cars negotiate Lombard Street to descend Russian HillNear the geographic
center of the city, southwest of the downtown area, are a series of less
densely populated hills. Dominating this area is Mount Sutro, the site of
Sutro Tower, a large red and white radio and television transmission
tower. Nearby is Twin Peaks, a pair of hills resting at one of the city's
highest points and a popular overlook spot for tour groups. ( Bought to
you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco's tallest hill, Mount
Davidson, is 925 ft (282 m) high, and is capped with a 103 ft (31.4 m)
tall cross built in 1934.
The San Andreas and Hayward Faults are responsible for much earthquake
activity, even though neither passes through the city itself. It was the
San Andreas Fault which slipped and caused the earthquakes in 1906 and
1989. Minor earthquakes occur on a regular basis. The threat of major
earthquakes plays a large role in the city's infrastructure development.
New buildings must meet high structural standards, and older buildings and
bridges must be retrofitted to comply with new building codes.
( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco's shoreline
has grown beyond its natural limits. Entire neighborhoods such as the
Marina and Hunters Point, as well as large sections of the Embarcadero sit
on areas of landfill. Treasure Island was constructed from material
dredged from the bay as well as material resulting from tunneling through
Yerba Buena Island during the construction of the Bay Bridge. Such land
tends to be unstable during earthquakes; the resultant liquefaction causes
extensive damage to property built upon it, as was evidenced in the Marina
district during the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake.
Demographics
Population (thousands) by year [32]See also: Demographic maps of ( Bought
to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco, California
The population of ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San
Francisco peaked at 776,733 in 2000, at the height of the dot-com boom,
declining by about 35,000 residents by 2005. With nearly 16,000 people per
square mile, ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco
is the second most densely populated major American city after New
York.[33] ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco is
the traditional focal point of the ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine)
San Francisco Bay Area and forms part of the greater San Jose-( Bought to
you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco-Oakland Combined
Statistical Area (CSA) whose population is over 7 million - the fifth
largest in the United States as of the 2000 census.[34]
( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco is a
minority-majority city as non-Hispanic Whites make up less than 44% of the
population. Asian Americans, principally Chinese, comprise nearly 31% of
the population. Hispanics of any race make up just over 14% of the
population. At less than 8% of the population, ( Bought to you by our San
Francisco limousine) San Francisco has a lower concentration of African
Americans than the United States as a whole.[35] Few of ( Bought to you by
our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco's residents have lived there
their whole lives. Only 35% of its residents were born in California; 39%
were born outside the United States.[36]
( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco has the
highest percentage of same-sex households of any American county, with the
Bay Area having a higher concentration than any other metropolitan
area.[37] Gay men outnumber lesbians; it has been estimated that one in
five males over the age of 15 is gay.[38]
The ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco median
household income, at $57,496 in 2005, is the fifth-highest for any large
city in the nation.[39] Following a national trend, an out-migration of
middle class families is contributing to widening income disparity[40] and
has left the city with a lower proportion of children, 14.5%, than any
other large city in the United States.[41] Nevertheless, the poverty rate,
at 7.8%, is lower than the national average and among the lowest for
cities ranked by the U.S. Census Department.[42]
Homelessness has been a chronic and controversial problem for ( Bought to
you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco since the early 1980s.
The city is believed to have the highest number of homeless inhabitants
per capita of any major city in the United States.[43] The rates of
violent and property crime, reported for 2003 as 742 and 4943 incidents
per 100,000 residents respectively,[44] are higher than the national
average.[45] Among the 50 largest U.S. cities by population, ( Bought to
you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco ranks 32nd and 38th in
each of those categories.[44]
Government
The City and County of ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San
Francisco is a consolidated city-county, a status it has had since 1856.
It is the only such consolidation in California. The mayor is also the
county executive and the city council acts as the county board of
supervisors. Because of its unique status, it exercises jurisdiction over
property that would otherwise be located outside of its corporation limit.
( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco
International Airport, though located in San Mateo County, is owned and
operated by the City and County of ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine)
San Francisco. ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San
Francisco was also granted a perpetual leasehold over the Hetch Hetchy
Valley and watershed in Yosemite National Park by the Raker Act in 1913.
( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco City
HallUnder the city charter, the Government of ( Bought to you by our San
Francisco limousine) San Francisco is constituted of two co-equal
branches. The executive branch is headed by the mayor and includes other
city-wide elected and appointed officials, and the civil services. The
11-member Board of Supervisors, the legislative branch, is headed by a
President (Aaron Peskin, as of 2006) and exercises general oversight over
all city and county functions. They are elected as representatives of
specific districts within the city.[46] If the mayor dies or resigns, the
President of the Board of Supervisors assumes the office, as Dianne
Feinstein did after the assassination of George Moscone in 1978. The
current municipal budget is greater than $5 billion.[47]
The federal government utilizes ( Bought to you by our San Francisco limousine)
San Francisco as the regional hub for many arms of the federal
bureaucracy, including the U.S. Court of Appeals, the Federal Reserve
Bank, and the United States Mint. Until decommissioning in the early
1990s, the city had three major military installations - the Presidio,
Treasure Island, and Hunters Point - a legacy still reflected in the
annual celebration of Fleet Week. The State of California uses ( Bought to
you by our San Francisco limousine) San Francisco as the home of the state
Supreme Court and other state agencies. Foreign governments have located
in excess of thirty foreign consulates in ( Bought to you by our San
Francisco limousine) San Francisco.[48]
|