Book-Online-Hotel.com Information United States Houston

Image taken on NASA's Landsat 7 satellite According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 1,558.4 km² (601.7 mi²). 1,500.7 km² (579.4 mi²) of it is land and 57.7 km² (22.3 mi²) of it is water. The total area is 3.7 percent water.
Houston has four major Galveston and into the Gulf of Mexico.
Much of Houston is very flat, making flooding a recurring problem for its residents. The city stands about 50 feet (15 m) above sea level; the Houston Heights area has the highest elevation in the city. The city once relied on groundwater for its water needs, but land subsidence forced the city to turn to ground-level water sources such as Lake Houston.

Geology

Underpinning Houston's land surface are unconsolidated clays, clay shales, and poorly-cemented sands extending to depths of several miles. The region's geology developed from stream deposits from the erosion of the Rocky Mountains. These sediments consist of a series of sands and clays deposited on decaying organic matter that, over time, was transformed into oil and natural gas. Beneath these tiers is a water-deposited layer of halite, a rock salt. The porous layers were compressed over time and forced upward. As it pushed upward, the salt dragged surrounding sediments into dome shapes, often trapping oil and gas that seeped from the surrounding porous sands.
The Houston region is earthquake-free. While the city of Houston contains 86 mapped and historically active surface faults with an aggregate length of 149 miles, the clay below the surface precludes the buildup of friction that produces ground shaking in earthquakes. These faults move only very gradually in what is termed "fault creep."

Climate

Houston's climate is classified as being Mexico and moisture from the Gulf of Mexico.
In the summer, daily high temperatures are in the 95 °F to 102 °F (35 °C to 39 °C) range throughout much of July and August.[1] The air tends to feel still and the humidity (often 90 to 100 percent relative humidity) results in a heat index higher than the actual temperature. To cope with the heat, people use air conditioning in nearly every car and building in the city. Summer thunderstorms sometimes bring tornadoes to the area. Afternoon rains are not uncommon, and most days Houston meteorologists predict at least some chance of rain. The hottest temperature ever recorded in Houston was 109 °F (43 °C)

Government and politics

Houston City Hall

Houston City Hall Founded in United States and the largest without zoning laws. The city is the county seat of Harris County. A portion of southwest Houston extends into Fort Bend County and a small portion in the northeast extends into Montgomery County.
The city of Houston has a strong Mayor-council government. The City's elected officials, serving concurrent two year terms, are: the Mayor, the City Controller and the 14 members of City Council. The City Charter provides the constitutional framework within which city government operates. The City's Code of Ordinances contains the laws of the City.
Under the strong Mayor-Council government, the Mayor serves as the Executive Officer of the City. As the City's chief administrator and official representative, the Mayor is responsible for the general management of the City and for seeing that all laws and ordinances are enforced.
The current mayor is Bill White, who is serving his second term. In Houston, a mayor can be elected consecutively for three terms. City Council members, who also have a three-term limit, are elected from nine districts in the city, along with five at-large positions. At-large council members represent the entire city. The current city council lineup was based on a U.S. Justice Department mandate which took effect in 1979. Houston is a home rule city and all municipal elections in the state of Texas are nonpartisan.
Many local lawmakers have been impacted by the city's term limits. Several former city officials—Anthony Hall, Rodney Ellis, Sheila Jackson-Lee, Sylvia Garcia, Martha Wong, Chris Bell, and Annise Parker—had to run for another elected position once their term expired.
Former mayor Lee P. Brown denounced the term limits, saying they prevented incumbents from gaining enough experience in city government. A proposal to double the current two-year term of office has been debated—as of 2005, several candidates for the city council have brought up the issue of whether term limits should be amended or eliminated.
Some elected officials from the Greater Houston area within the Texas Legislature—primarily Garnet Coleman and Sylvester Turner—have also spoken against term limits.
According to the 2005 Houston Area Survey, 67% of whites in the city are declared or favor Republicans while 88% of blacks in the city are declared or favor Democrats. 58% of Latinos in the city are declared or favor Democrats. Overall Houston is a socially conservative city; 54% of Houston residents oppose abortion and 49% believe "homosexuality is morally wrong."[2]
See also:
List of Houston mayors
List of consulates in Houston

People and culture

Local attractions

Space Center Houston is the official visitors’ center of NASA's Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center. Space Center Houston includes many interactive exhibits — including moon rocks and a shuttle simulator—in addition to special presentations that tell the story of NASA's manned space flight program. It also features Texas’ largest IMAX theatre.
The Theater District, a 17-block area in the heart of downtown Houston, is home to Bayou Place Entertainment Complex, restaurants, movies, plazas and parks. Bayou Place Entertainment Complex is a large multilevel building that is home to full service restaurants, bars, live music, billiards, multiple theatres and art house films. The Houston Verizon Wireless Theatre stages a variety of live concerts and the Angelika Theatre presents the latest in art, foreign and independent films.
Houston's many parks include Hermann Park, which has a zoo, a museum of natural science, and a planetarium. The 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, home of the symphony orchestra. Sam Houston Coliseum and Music Hall have been replaced by the Hobby Center for the Performing Arts.
Other tourist attractions include the Galleria, a huge enclosed shopping mall noted for its luxury stores; Old Market Square; Sam Houston Historical Park, which contains restored homes (built between 1824 and 1868) and reconstructed buildings. The San Jacinto battlefield is in the nearby city of Deer Park. The Port of Houston offers free, 90-minute cruises (except on Mondays and during September). Less than an hour from the Gulf of Mexico, Houston is close to sunny beaches, one of the nation's largest concentrations of pleasure boats, and tourist attractions such as the Kemah Boardwalk and Galveston Island.

Districts and communities

Main article: Districts and communities of Houston

Midtown.

Midtown. When Houston was established in 1837, the city's founders divided it into political geographic districts called "wards." The ward designation is the progenitor of the current-day Houston City Council districts — there are nine in all.
Locations in Houston are generally classified as either being inside or outside Interstate 610, known as the "610 Loop" or "The Loop". Inside the loop generally encompasses the central business district, and has come to define an urban lifestyle and state of mind. The appellation “inner looper” carries with it the expectation of someone who appreciates cosmopolitan-style city life.
The outlying areas of Houston, the airports and the city's suburbs and enclaves are outside the loop. Another ring road, Texas Beltway 8 (also known simply as the "Beltway"), encircles the city another 5 miles (8 km) farther out. Another ring road, Texas Highway 99 (also known as the Grand Parkway), is under construction.
Houston, being the largest city in the Chicago), but because it is spread over a few miles, pictures of the city show, for the most part, the main downtown area.

Transportation

Highways

In Houston urban sprawl and hot, humid summers have made automobiles the favored means of transportation. Houston also has excessive ozone levels and is ranked among the most ozone-polluted cities in the United States.

Houston daytime highway traffic

Houston daytime highway traffic Houston freeways are heavily traveled and often under construction to meet the demands of continuing growth. Interstate 45 south has been in a continuous state of construction, in one portion or another, almost since the first segment was built in 1952. Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) planners have sought ways to reduce rush hour congestion, primarily through High-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lane for vans and carpools. Timed freeway entrances, which regulate the addition of cars to the freeway, are also common. Houston has an extensive network of freeway cameras linked to a transit control center to monitor and study traffic.
One characteristic of Houston's freeways (and Texas freeways in general) are its frontage roads (which locals call "feeders"). Alongside most freeways are two to four lanes in each direction parallel to the freeway permitting easy access to individual city streets. Frontage roads provide access to the freeway from businesses alongside, such as gas stations and retail stores. New landscaping projects and a longstanding ban on new billboards are ways Houston has tried to control the potential side effects of convenience.
Houston has a hub-and-spoke freeway structure with multiple loops. The innermost is Interstate 610, forming approximately a 10 mile diameter loop around downtown. The roughly square "Loop-610" is quartered into "North Loop," "South Loop," "West Loop," and "East Loop." The roads of Texas Beltway 8 and their freeway core, the Sam Houston Tollway, are the next loop, at a diameter of roughly 25 miles. Most of this freeway requires payment of $1.25 toll every five or ten miles ($2.00 toll when crossing the Houston Ship Channel). A controversial proposed highway project, Texas Highway 99 (The Grand Parkway), would form a third loop outside of Houston. Currently, the completed portion of Texas Highway 99 runs from just north of Interstate 10, west of Houston, to U.S. Highway 59 in Sugar Land, southwest of Houston, and was completed in 1994. The next portion to be constructed is from the current terminus at U.S. Highway 59 to Texas State Highway 288 in Brazoria County.
See also:
List of highways in Houston
List of Texas highways

Mass transit

METRORail in Downtown

METRORail in Downtown The Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County, Texas, or METRO, provides public transportation in the form of buses, trolleys and lift vans. Uptown, METRO provides free service on the Uptown Shuttle.
METRO began running light rail service (United States devoid of a rail transit system by a very large margin.
Following a successful referendum held locally in 2004, METRO is currently in the beginning design phases of a ten year expansion plan to add five more sections to connect to the current rail system. A 27-mile (43 km) expansion has been approved to run the service from Uptown (the Galleria area) through Texas Southern University, ending at the University of Houston campus.

Airports

Houston is served by two commercial airports — the largest of which is the Atlanta Hartsfield with 250 destinations.
The second commercial airport in Houston is the United States tend to prefer Hobby over Bush Intercontinental.
The city's third-largest airport and former US Air Force base, Ellington Field is primarily used for government and private aircraft. At one point, Continental Express operated flights across the city to Bush Intercontinental to allow residents of southeast Houston and Galveston County to easily take flights out of Bush Intercontinental. However, passenger flights ended on September 7, 2004.
Located southwest of Houston, in the city of Sugar Land, is the Sugar Land Regional Airport, formerly Sugar Land Municipal Airport. Sugar Land Regional is the fourth-largest airport in the greater Houston area, and the only general reliever airport in the southwest sector. The airport exclusively serves private planes.

Professional sports

Reliant Stadium and the Reliant Astrodome.

Reliant Stadium and the Reliant Astrodome. Houston is home to the MLB Houston Astros, NFL Houston Texans, NBA Houston Rockets, WNBA Houston Comets, and AHL Houston Aeros, all of whom are playing in new state-of-the-art stadiums. Minute Maid Park (home of the Astros) and Toyota Center (home of the Rockets, Comets and Aeros) are located Downtown, contributing to an urban renaissance that has transformed Houston's center into a day-and-night destination. Rice Stadium, at Rice University, was the home to Super Bowl VIII, and Super Bowl XXXVIII was played at the Reliant Stadium in February 2004. Other sports facilities in Houston are Hofheinz Pavilion, Reliant Astrodome, and Robertson Stadium.
Beginning in 2006, the Champ Car auto racing series will return to Houston for a yearly race, held on the streets of the Reliant Park complex. The city had previously been home to a Champ Car round from 1998 to 2001. On April 1, 2001, Houston hosted WWE's WrestleMania X-Seven at the Reliant Astrodome.
The city hosts the annual NCAA football's Houston Bowl in December. Houston was also host of the NCAA football 2005 Big 12 Conference title game. Additionally, Houston's Minute Maid Park hosted the MLB All-Star game in 2004 and will host the NBA All-Star game at the Toyota Center in 2006.
The city received a new Major League Soccer team on December 15, 2005 when the San Jose Earthquakes decided to relocate the franchise to Houston. Under the relocation agreement the Earthquake name, mascot and logo will remain in San Jose reserved for a future expansion team. The Houston team, which is currently dubbed "Houston 1836," will play at Robertson Stadium at the start of the 2006 season.
Houston Rockets owner Leslie Alexander is currently working to bring a National Hockey League (NHL) franchise to Houston. The team is expected to be acquired by the purchase and relocation of an existing team rather than through league expansion, most likely the Pittsburgh Penguins—which is interested in relocating to Houston. Club
Sport
League
Stadium
Logo Houston Aeros
Ice Hockey
American Hockey League
Toyota Center