What makes your city unique?

[fivedayrental]

Danbury,CT

1. We were once the hat capital of the world in the mid 1800s.

2. The city has a park that's larger in size than Central Park

3. Danbury Fair Mall is the 3rd largest mall in the East with 1.2 million square feet of retail space

4. Candlewood Lake is the 3rd largest man-made body of water in the USA east of the Mississippi.

5. Richter Prk (Public Golf Course) is consistently ranked in top 50 public golf courses in the country.

6. There is over 50 different languages spoken in the Danbury School System.

7. Much of downtown has burned in the American Revolution by the British.

8. There is 1 section the interstate that carries the distinguishtion of 3 or 4 different routes.

9. Famous historcial figures born and lived here include Charles Ives and Marian Anderson.

10. Lastly, Wooster Cementary is the second largest non-demonanational cementary in the state (only to the state cementary..I only know this from doing work at Wooster cem. for the historical society).

[ctman987]

Hartford, CT

* Has an underground river called the Park River that went right through downtown but was buried after a major flood and a highway was built over part of it.

* The Old State House is one of the oldest state houses in the country (Restored 1786 historic landmark)

* Wadsworth Athneum is the oldest continually operate public art museum in the country.

* The Travelers Insurance Tower when it was built was the tallest building in New England at the time

* Hartford Convention of 1814

* Dikes protect downtown from flooding of the CT River

* The city had an old Chinatown but the area was razed for the construction of interstate highways and Constituition Plaza

* Sailors and Soldier Memorial Arch completed in 1885 is a monument to those who died in the Civil War.

* The Bulkley Bridge which connects Hartford to East Hartford (Opened 1908) is the largest stone arch bridge in the world

* Colt Factory: The former headquarters of the Colt Firearms Manufactoring Company (now loacted in West Hartford). The old facility is being renovated into apartments, office space and retail space.

* The Hartford Courant is the countrys oldest continualy published newspaper

* The current mayor is the city's first Latino mayor (African Americans and Latino Americans make up a majority of the city population)

* In the 1960's destroyed a whole neighborhood full of homes and businesses to make way for I-91 and Constitution Plaza a 12 acre complex of officue buildings, undergroung parking garages, a hotel, news studio and restaurant.

* Home to Saint Francis Hospital which is the largest Catholic Hospital in New England and a few years backed merged with Mount Sainai Hospital (A Jewish Hospital) which made the merger the first of its kind.

* Home to Adriaens Landing a billion dollar public funded redevelopment project on the banks of the CT River which features a brand new 540,000 square foot Connecticut Convention Center, 409 room 22 story Marriott Hotel, a soon to be built Front Street retail and entertainment complex and a science museum.

* Home to Trinity College a very well known liberal arts college and is one of the only well known liberal arts colleges to be located in an urban center

* The University of Hartford is just over the border in West Hartford

* Hartford is home to the Hartford Seminary, about 5 minutes from Hartford in Bloomfield is the Saint Thomas Seminary and 15 minutes south of Hartford is a third seminary.

[Southron]

Mobile, Alabama

Home of the original American Mardis Gras celebration

Azalea City - azaleas first imported to US from France to Mobile in 1754

Sugar-white gulf beaches

Spanish moss on live oaks

Mobile Bay has the second largest natural gas reserves in the world.

History of producing great baseball players:

Hank Aaron

Satchel Paige

Amos Otis

Ozzie Smith

Tommie Agee

Willie McCovey

Cleon Jones

Milt & Frank Bolling

Other famous Mobile natives:

Jimmy Buffett

Shelby Lynne

Allison Moorer

Ken Stabler

Vince Dooley

Danny Sheridan

[facilities man]

I'm not a historian but here are a few interesting things about the Orlando area.

Because it is a tourist destination there are approx. 250,000 people in the metro area everyday visiting. These visitors all go out to eat and visit the attractions, which makes for a much more lively metro area than most of similar size.

Over 120,000 hotel rooms, second only to Las Vegas.

Only metro area in the world with four types of cargo ports.

1. Train

2. Shipping (Port Canaveral)

3. International Airport

4. Space (Cape Canaveral)

Second largest Convention Center in the country at 2.1 million square feet. If you laid the Empire State Building on its side, it would fit in the Convention Center.

Tourist based eceonomy, but other big employers are...

Computer Simulation

Defense

Nasa

Education

Hospitals

Video Game Development.

Corporate headquarters for Darden Restaurants, (Olive Garden, Red Lobster, Bahama Breeze, Smokey Bones), AAA, and Hughes Supply.

The University of Central Florida is one of the 10 largest schools in the country with approx. 45,000 students.

[BarGal]

Some other things you may not know about Detroit...

On June 23, 1963 Martin Luther King Jr. gave his legendary "I have a dream" speech for the very first time right here in Detroit.

Minuro Yamasaki, who designed the World Trade Center, started his career in Detroit (with buildings like One Woodward Avenue)

Downtown Detroit has 26% less crime than the national average

Detroit's Campus Martius Park is ranked the 4th Best Public Square in North America

The tallest indoor waterfall, which measures 34.75 m (114 ft) in height and is backed by 840-sq m (9,000-sq ft) of marble, is situated in the lobby of the International Center in Detroit. (According to the Guinness Book of World Records)

There are over 125 bars and restaurants within the one square mile of Downtown Detroit.

Source:www.insidedetroit.org

[Zonajones]

Phoenix-

Hottest large city in the nation (the hottest day i can remember was 123 F!)

Skyharbor airport is the 5th busiest airport in the world (by total takeoffs and landings)

Phoenix has 2 distinct skylines, the southern skyline, surrounded by I-10 & I-17 is small but dense. The

second is a string of skyscrapers that line Central Ave on ether side. (this pic shows them both in one image http://www.pbase.com/snoyes/image/38814081/original )

South Mountain which lies about 7miles south of the lower skyline is the world's largest city park

I know people who haven't expeirenced one will argue with me, but Phoenix has some of the world's best sunsets.

The AZ Diamondbacks were the fastest expansion team to win a world series

ASU Main (not in Phoenix but still in Metro) is the largest in nation by student pop. with over 52,000 students enrolled.

The metro area is almost completly surrounded by mountain ranges

[dimebag1980]

Shreveport is much like any other riverfront city, with a few exceptions. While many downtown districts front rivers, our river is the only one I know of that is actually red (hence the name Red River.) There may be other muddy rivers with a reddish tint, but this is the only one I've seen in a city's downtown. The color of the Red River is actually a reddish-brown... some people think it's ugly but I've always liked it.

Spanning the Red River, connecting Shreveport and Bossier City, are numerous traffic and rail bridges. Of these bridges, the most notable one is the Texas Street Bridge. My history of this bridge is a bit rusty, but I do know a little bit about it. Built in the early 30's and officially named the Long-Allen bridge, after former Governors Huey P. Long and Oscar K. Allen, it is a 4-lane traffic bridge with pedestrian lanes flanking both the east and westbound sides. At night, the steel cage surrounding the bridge is illuminated with neon lights of mostly pink and purple, making it the largest neon-lit bridge in the nation. Over the last decade, this bridge has become the most recognizable landmark of metro Shreveport-Bossier City.

Another recognizable landmark of metro Shreveport-Bossier would be the Horseshoe Casino Hotel, off Interstate 20, on the Bossier City riverfront. This hotel contains 26 floors of hotel rooms and suites, and is clad in actual gold-plated windows from bottom to top. When the sun is rising during the morning commute and setting during the evening commute, the glare from this building can truly be blinding. Many accidents have been attributed to this daily occurrence, especially back when it was first constructed. To this day I have a hard time driving past it on the freeway during certain times of the day.

Now that I have the two most recognizable riverfront-area landmarks aside, allow me the opportunity to bring up one of the area's least recognized, but most important, building. Just on the outskirts of downtown Shreveport sits one of the largest pieces of musical history in the nation, the Municipal Auditorium. This building was once home to the Louisiana Hayride, a national radio show which launched the careers of some of music's most legendary performers including Hank Williams Sr, Johnny Cash, George Jones, Johnny Horton, and Elvis Presley, just to name a few. At the time of the Louisiana Hayride, Elvis Presley was a truck driver looking to carve out his place in the music world. This talented, and now legendary, performer went to the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, the Opry told him to go back to driving trucks, that he would never make it as a musician. Not allowing his spirit to be broken, he made his way to Shreveport to try his luck on the Hayride. The rest, as they say, is history. Even the popular phrase "Elvis has left the building" was first spoken during a performance at Shreveport's Hirsch Memorial Coliseum.

Today the Louisiana Hayride is becoming a bit more than just a distant memory. Many local and national musicians, including Shreveport's Kenny Wayne Shepherd, make up a group known as FAME (The Foundation for Arts, Music and Entertainment of Shreveport, Bossier Inc.) FAME currently has plans to revive the Louisiana Hayride, making it popular once again. Also on the drawing board for FAME is a $300 million "music village" which could be built in a large urban area surrounding the Municipal Auditorium.

One of the most noticeable changes to the downtown Shreveport area, thanks to the legendary status of Elvis Presley and the Louisiana Hayride, was the changing of Grand Avenue to Elvis Presley Avenue. This made Shreveport the ONLY city outside of Memphis to have a street named for Presley. Elvis Presley Enterprises owns the rights to Elvis' name, so cities can't just name a street after the legend without approval from Elvis Presley Enterprises. The distinction of having a street officially named for Elvis has helped Shreveport reclaim its past and its decades-old relationship with the King of Rock N Roll.

[Greens!]

Houston, TX

-The first word spoken on the moon was "Houston"

-Home to 100,000 native Nigerians

-Two Chinatowns

-Home to the largest concentration of research and healthcare institutions in the world

-More heart surgeries performed in Houston than anywhere else in the world

-The city contains 86 mapped and historically active surface faults

-Houston is second to New York City in Fortune 500 headquarters

-Third largest Vietnamese American population in the United States

-If the city of Houston were a state, it would rank 36th in population behind Nevada and ahead of New Mexico

-Metro area would rank 21st, ahead of Minnesota and behind Wisconsin. Its population exceeds that of North and South Dakota, Alaska, Delaware, Vermont, Wyoming, and the District of Columbia combined.

[Newnan]

contains the 3rd largest number of African Americans out of all US Metro areas.

Is becoming diverse

is building the 5th largest hindu temple outside of India

In this decade has become the hip hop capital of the south

Gone With the Wind was set here

General Sherman burned the city down in 1864