Like many municipalities in the American Southwest, San Antonio experiences a steady population growth. The city's population has nearly doubled in 35 years, from just over 650,000 in the 1970 census to an estimated 1.2 million in 2005.
The city has also grown substantially in area. Unlike most large cities in the U.S., San Antonio is not completely surrounded by independent suburban cities, and under Texas law exercises extraterritorial jurisdiction (ETJ) over much of the surrounding unincorporated land, including directing growth and zoning. It pursues an aggressive annexation policy and opposes the creation of other municipalities within its ETJ. This is the reason the city is the 7th largest in the U.S. but its metropolitan area is just 29th largest. Nearly three-fourths of its current land area has been annexed since 1960. In recent years, the city has annexed several long narrow corridors along major thoroughfares to facilitate eventual annexation of growth developing along the routes. The city plans to annex nearly forty additional square miles by 2009.
Downtown is encircled by three numerical freeways, Interstates 35 and 37, and U.S. Highway 90/Interstate 10. Together the three highways create a rectangular route around the downtown area of San Antonio: I-35 to the north and west, I-37 to the east, and US-90/I-10 to the south.
Downtown is home to many districts including the Alamo District, Alamodome District, Central Business District, Convention Center District, Historic Civic District, Houston Street District, King William Historic District, La Villita District, Market Square District, North Downtown, North River District, River Bend District, SoSo (South of Southtown), Southtown, and the University District.
The Central Business District is home to Rivercenter, anchored by Dillard's and Macy's. The five-level Art Deco Dillard's, at the corner of Alamo and Commerce streets, opened in 1887 as Joske's. Joske's flagship store was 551,000 square feet (51,200 m²) in floor space until Dillard's bought the Joske's chain in 1987. Today, Dillard's only occupies a fraction of the original building.
Famous for its River Walk, the Alamo, Tejano culture, and home to the SeaWorld San Antonio and Six Flags Fiesta Texas theme parks, the city is visited by 20 million tourists per year.
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "San Antonio".