San Francisco Bay Area

The San Francisco Bay Area, colloquially known as the Bay Area, is a geographically diverse metropolitan region that surrounds the San Francisco Bay in Northern California. It encompasses the cities of San Francisco, San José, and Oakland, and their many suburbs. It also include the smaller urban and rural areas of the North Bay. Home to almost seven million people,^[1] it is composed of cities, towns, military bases, airports, and associated regional, state, and national parks sprawled over nine counties (sometimes defined as ten or eleven counties) and connected by a massive network of roads, highways, railroads, and commuter rail.

While San José is the largest city in the Bay Area (having surpassed San Francisco in the 1990 census) and the tenth largest city in America, for most of its history San Francisco was the most populous city, and remains the focal point and the major cultural center in the region.

Subregions

North Bay

Main article: North Bay (San Francisco Bay Area)

The region north of the Golden Gate Bridge is known locally as the North Bay. This area consists of Marin County and extends northward into Sonoma and Napa counties and eastward to Solano County. With some exceptions, this region is quite affluent: Marin County is ranked as the wealthiest in the nation. The North Bay is generally the least urbanized part of the Bay Area, with many areas of undeveloped parks and farmland. It is the only section of the Bay Area that is not served by a commuter rail transit service, and Sonoma-Marin service was recently voted down. The lack of transportation services is mainly because of the lack of population mass in the North Bay, and the fact that it is separated completely from the rest of the Bay Area by water, the only access points being the Golden Gate Bridge leading to San Francisco, the Richmond-San Rafael and Carquinez Bridges leading to Richmond, and the Benicia Bridge leading to Martinez.

San Francisco

Main article: San Francisco, California

The City and County of San Francisco is generally placed in a category by itself in terms of geography and culture. It is separated by water from the north, west and east, and by a county line from its neighbor cities to the South. San Francisco has long served as the cultural, financial and urban center of the region. For most of the Bay Area's history, it has also served as the key population center. However, the limitations of the size of the county (47 Sq. Miles, making SF the 2nd most densely populated city in the US after New York) prohibited the growth of the city and, since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, other cities and counties have received the larger share of population hi

Peninsula

Main article: San Francisco Peninsula

The area between the South Bay and the City and County of San Francisco is the San Francisco Peninsula, known locally as The Peninsula. This area consists of a series of small cities and suburban communities in San Mateo County and the northwestern part of Santa Clara County, as well as various towns along the Pacific coast, such as Pacifica and Half Moon Bay. This area is also extremely diverse, although it contains significant populations of affluent family households. Many of the cities and towns had originally been centers of rural life until the post-World War II era when large numbers of middle and upper class Bay area residents moved in and developed the small villages. Since the 1980s the area has seen a large growth rate of middle and upper class families who have settled there as part of the technology boom of Silicon Valley. Many of these families are of foreign background and have significantly contributed to the diversity of the area.

East Bay

Main article: East Bay (San Francisco Bay Area)

The eastern side of the bay, consisting of Alameda and Contra Costa counties, is known locally as the East Bay. The East Bay is split into two regions, the inner East Bay, which sits on the Bay coastline, and the outer East Bay, consisting of inland valleys separated from the inner East Bay by hills and mountains.

• The inner East Bay includes the cities of Oakland, Alameda, Hayward, Fremont, Newark, Union City, Berkeley, and Richmond, as well as many smaller suburbs such as Emeryville, Albany, San Leandro, El Sobrante,Pinole, Piedmont and El Cerrito. The inner East Bay is more urban, more densely populated, has a much older building stock (built before World War II) and a more ethnically diverse population. Oakland hosts the region's largest seaport and professional sports franchises in basketball, football, and baseball. As with many inner urban areas the Inner East Bay also features a high accumulation of crime as well as other socio-economic problems. According to the FBI Uniformed Crime Reports, more than 50% of all homicides in the Bay Area in 2002 occurred within the city limits of Oakland and Richmond. The homicide rates have steadily increased, as 2005 had the highest homicide rates for both Richmond and Oakland.

• The outer East Bay consists the eastern portions of Alameda and Contra Costa counties and includes the cities of Orinda, Walnut Creek, Concord, Martinez, Pittsburg, Antioch, and Pleasant Hill, and Lafayette to the north (also referred as Central Contra Costa County) and the cities of Dublin, Pleasanton, Livermore, Danville, San Ramon to the south (sometimes referred to as the Livermore-Amador Valley or the Tri-Valley), as well as other smaller towns, such as Alamo and Orinda. They are connected to the inner East Bay by BART and by highways and the Caldecott Tunnel. The outer East Bay is mostly suburban to rural and was mostly built after World War II. The white population is still the majority population in this area; however it is expected to become a minority within ten years.^{[citation needed]} Most of the white population moved to the area from San Francisco and the inner-East Bay to flee many of the socio-economic problems which afflict those areas and which are now spreading to the outer-East Bay.

South Bay

Main articles: South Bay (San Francisco Bay Area) and Silicon Valley

The communities along the southern edge of the Bay are known as the South Bay, Santa Clara Valley, and Silicon Valley. Some Peninsula and East Bay towns are sometimes included in the latter. It includes the city of San José, and its outlying neighbors including Gilroy and the high-tech hubs of Mountain View, Santa Clara, Milpitas, Cupertino, Palo Alto, Sunnyvale as well as many other suburbs like Los Altos, Saratoga, Campbell and Los Gatos. Home of Silicon Valley, the South Bay was also an early development of working and middle class families who left the coastal cities of the Eastern Bay south of Oakland and Alameda. Large numbers of families during the post-World War era also moved there for the aerospace industry. This area has long been developed and expanded and is often featured as a stereotype of the typical California suburban city. Today, the growth continues, primarily fueled by technology and cheap immigrant workers. The result has been a huge increase in the value of property forcing many middle class families out of the area or into nascent ghettos in older sections of the region.

Befitting of the title Silicon Valley, this region is home to a vast number of technology sector giants. Some notable tech companies headquartered in the South Bay are Intel, AMD, Cisco Systems, Hewlett-Packard, Apple, Google, and Yahoo!. As a consequence of the rapid growth of these and other companies, the South Bay has gained increasing political and economic influence both within California and throughout the world.

Santa Cruz and San Benito

Main articles: Santa Cruz County, California and San Benito County, California

The regional governments in the San Francisco Bay Area, including the Association of Bay Area Governments, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, and the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board include only the nine counties above in their boundaries or membership. (The BAAQMD includes all of the nine counties except the northern portions of Sonoma and Solano; the RWQCB includes all of San Franciso and the portions of the other eight counties that drain to San Francisco Bay or to the Pacific Ocean.)^[2] However, the United States Census Bureau defines the San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland Consolidated Statistical Area as an eleven-county region, including the nine counties above plus Santa Cruz and San Benito Counties. Meanwhile, the California State Parks Department defines the Bay Area as including ten counties^[3], including Santa Cruz but excluding San Benito.

Some residents of the Santa Cruz Mountains (Boulder Creek, Brookdale, Ben Lomond, Felton, Scotts Valley) do not usually consider themselves to be residents of the Bay Area, rather just of the Santa Cruz Mountains themselves. The Santa Cruz Mountains run along the spine of the San Francisco Peninsula, beginning in San Francisco and continuing down to their terminus near the City of Gilroy, effectively creating the Santa Clara Valley.

The city of Santa Cruz is geographically isolated from the rest of the San Francisco Bay Area, and is usually considered a part of the Monterey Bay area since the city lies on the north end of the Monterey Bay. The city is also sometimes regarded as the northernmost point of the California Central Coast, which extends along the state's coastline to Santa Barbara.

Demographics

Affluence

The San Francisco Bay Area is one of the wealthiest regions in the United States. According to the United States Census Bureau, of the 280 defined metropolitan areas, the San Francisco Bay Area has the highest median household income in the nation with $62,024 in the year 2000. The Census Bureau also released data in August 2006 citing San José as having the second highest median household income among large cities. Among medium-sized cities, Pleasanton has the highest household income in the country, and Livermore the third highest.^[4]

While only 26% of households nationwide boast incomes of over $75,000 a year, 48% of households in the San Francisco Bay Area feature such incomes.^[5] The percentage of households with incomes exceeding the $100,000 mark in the Bay Area was double the nationwide percentage. Roughly one third (31%) of households in the San Francisco Bay Area had a six figure income, versus less than 16% at the nationwide level.^[6] In June 2003, a study by Stanford University reviewing US Census Bureau statistics determined the median household income in the San Francisco Bay Area to be roughly 60% above national average.^[5] Overall the largest income bracket in the Bay Area were households making between $100,000 and $150,000 annually, who constituted roughly 18% of households.^[5] On a national level the largest income bracket were households with incomes between $30,000 and $40,000 who constituted 13% of all households nationwide.^[6]

Six of the top ten California places with the highest per capita income are in the San Francisco Bay Area (Belvedere, Atherton, Woodside, Portola Valley, Diablo). Of the 100 highest income counties by per capita income in the United States, six are in the San Francisco Bay Area (Marin, San Mateo, San Francisco, Santa Clara, Contra Costa, Alameda). According to Forbes Magazine, published in 2005, 12 of the top 50 most expensive Zip Codes are in the Bay Area (Atherton, Ross, Diablo, Belvedere-Tiburon, Nicasio, Portola Valley, Los Altos-Los Altos Hills, Los Gatos-Monte Sereno, the Cow Hollow-Marina District of San Francisco, Alamo, and Burlingame-Hillsborough). [2]

Forty-two San Francisco Bay Area residents made the Forbes magazine's 400 richest Americans list, published in 2006^[7]. Thirteen live within San Francisco proper, placing it seventh among cities in the world. Among the forty-two were several well-known names such as Steve Jobs, George Lucas, and Charles Schwab. The highest-ranking resident is Larry Ellison of Oracle at No. 4. He is worth $19.5 billion.

A study by Claritas indicates that in 2004, 5% of all households within the San Francisco and San José metropolitan areas held $1 million in investable assets [3], and Wells Fargo estimates that there are 180,000 millionaire households in the Bay Area, 10% of which have $5 million or more in assets [4].

Living expenses

The popularity of the region, owing both to its mild weather and its cultural and economic diversity, combined with limited buildable areas, has led to high housing costs, especially for ownership and for commercial property leases. Owing to the relatively lower costs of outlying housing and limited public transportation, long, expensive, and often unpleasant automobile commutes are common in the region, and these costs tend to trickle down throughout various activities, making many other activities such as dining out, theater tickets, etc. more expensive than in other areas of the country. For only a limited portion of the population have wages kept pace with the increased expenses and many minimum wage earners, even those holding multiple jobs, (and many families with multiple members employed) are classified as "working poor", while the higher incomes necessary for a satisfactory lifestyle in the region lead to higher taxes, especially at the federal level for persons not qualifying for high mortgage or self employment related deductions.

Weather

Because the hills, mountains, and large bodies of water produce such vast geographic diversity within this region, the Bay Area offers a significant variety of microclimates. The areas near the Pacific Ocean are generally characterized by relatively small temperature variations during the year, with cool foggy summers and mild rainy winters. Inland areas, especially those separated from the ocean by hills or mountains, have hotter summers and colder overnight temperatures during the winter. Few residential areas ever experience snow, but peaks over 2000 feet are often dusted with snow several times each winter (including Mount St. Helena, Mount Hamilton, Mount Diablo, and Mount Tamalpais). The coast north of San Francisco, where year-round cool, moist conditions enable redwoods to grow, has almost nothing in common with Livermore, just 40 miles inland across the bay, which has desert-like precipitation and heat. San José at the south end of the Bay averages fewer than 15 inches of rain annually, while Napa at the north end of the Bay averages over 30 and parts of the Santa Cruz Mountains just a few miles west of San José get over 55. In the summer, inland regions can be over 40 degrees Fahrenheit (22 degrees Celsius) hotter than the oceanic coast when a hot spell is breaking down.

Geology and landforms

Multiple terrains

The area is well known worldwide for the complexity of its landforms, the region being composed of at least six terrains (continental, seabed, or island arc fragments with distinct characteristics) pushed together over millions of years by the forces of plate tectonics. As a consequence, many types of rock and soil are found in the region. Formations include the sedementry rocks of sandstone, limestone, and shale in uplifted seabeds, metamorphic serpentine rock, coal deposits, and igneous forms as the basalt flows and ash deposits of extinct volcanos. Pleistocene-era fossils of mammals are abundantly present in some locations.

Vertical relief

The region has considerable vertical relief in its landscapes that are not in the alluvial plains leading to the bay or in inland valleys. In combination with the extensive water regions this has forced the fragmented development of urban and suburban regions and has led to extensive building on poor soils in the limited flatland areas and considerable expense in connecting the various subregions with roads, tunnels, and bridges.

Several mountains are associated with some of the many ridge and hill structures created by compressive forces between the Pacific Plate and the North American plate. These provide spectacular views (in appropriate weather) of large portions of the Bay Area and include Marin County's Mount Tamalpais at 2,571 feet (784 metres). Contra Costa County's Mount Diablo at 3,849 feet (1,173 metres), Alameda County's Mission Peak at 2,517 feet (767 m), and Santa Clara County's Mount Hamilton at 4,213 ft (1,284 m), the latter with significant astronomical studies performed at its crowning Lick Observatory.

The three major ridge structures are all roughly parallel to the major faultlines:

• The California Coast Ranges, which are the spine of the San Francisco Peninsula and Marin County
• The Oakland-Berkeley Hills and their southern ridgeline extension through Mission Peak.
• The Diablo Range, containing Mount Diablo and Mount Hamilton.

Rivers and bodies of water

• San Francisco Bay
• San Pablo Bay
• Suisun Bay
• Sacramento River
• San Joaquin River
• Petaluma River
• San Joaquin-Sacramento Delta

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Earthquake faults

The region is also traversed by at least five major slip-strike fault systems with hundreds of related faults many of which are "sister faults" of the infamous San Andreas Fault, all of which are stressed by the relative motion between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate or by compressive stresses between these plates. Significant blind thrust faults (faults with near vertical motion and no surface rupture)s are associated with portions of the Santa Cruz Mountains and the northern reaches of the Diablo Range and Mount Diablo.

Natural hazards

Earthquakes

The region is particularly exposed to hazards associated with large earthquakes,^[8] owing to a combination of factors:

• Numerous major active faults in the region.
• A combined thirty year probability of a major earthquake in excess of seventy percent.
• Poorly responding native soil conditions in many places near the bay and in inland valleys, soils which amplify shaking as shown in the map to the right.
• Large areas of filled marshlands and bay muds that are significantly urbanized, with most subject to liquefaction, becoming unable to support structures.
• A large inventory of older buildings, many of which are expected to perform poorly in a major earthquake.
• Extensive building in areas subject to landslide, mudslide, and in some locations directly over active fault surface rubble zones.
• Most lowrise construction is not fireproof and water systems are likely to be extensively damaged and so large areas are subject to destruction by fire after a large earthquake.
• The coastal location makes the region vulnerable to Pacific Ocean tsunamis.^[9]

Some of these hazards are being addressed by seismic retrofitting, education in household seismic safety, and even complete replacement of major structures such as the eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.

For an article concerning a typical fault in the region and its associated hazards see Hayward Fault Zone.

Flooding

Some flooding occurs on local drainages under stustained wet conditions when the ground becomes saturated, more frequently in the North Bay area, which tends to recieve substantially more rainfall than the South Bay. In one case, the Napa River drainage, floodplain developments are being purchaced and removed and natural wetlands restored in the innovative Napa River Flood Project as undo channelization of insufficient capacity around such developments was causing flooding problems upstream. Many of the local creeks have been chanelized, although modern practice and some restoration work includes returning the creeks to a natural state with dry stormwater bypasses constructed to handle flooding. While quite expensive, the restoration of a natural environment is of high priority in the intensively urbanized areas of the region.

Windstorms

While rare, a very strong arctic storm can bring both substantial rainfall and strong wind gusts that can cause trees to fall on power lines. Owing to the wide area involved (sometimes hundreds of miles of coast), service can be interrupted for up to several days in some more remote localities, but service is usually restored quickly in urban areas.

Transportation

Main article: Transportation in the San Francisco Bay Area

The Bay Area is served by many public transportation systems, including three international airports (SFO, OAK, SJC), six overlapping bus transit agencies, four rapid transit and regional rail systems including BART, and multiple public ferry services.

The freeway and highway system is very extensive; however, many freeways are heavily congested during rush hour, especially the trans-bay bridges.

Higher education

The region is home to several universities and seminaries, most notably Stanford University and the University of California, Berkeley.

Religious life

The San Francisco Bay Area has a very diverse religious life with thousands of churches, mosques, temples, and other religious centers. The Bay Area is home to Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, Sikh, and numerous other religious communities. San Francisco has historically been predominantly Roman Catholic, mainly due to the Italian and Irish immigrant population of the early 20th century.^{[citation needed]}

Sports

NCAA Division I College Sports

• California Golden Bears
• St. Mary's College Gaels
• San Francisco Dons
• San José State Spartans
• Santa Clara Broncos
• Stanford Cardinal

Regional counties, cities and suburbs

Counties

• Alameda County (737 sq. mi., excluding water)
• Contra Costa County (720 sq. mi., excluding water)
• Marin County (520 sq. mi., excluding water)
• Napa County (754 sq. mi., excluding water)
• San Francisco County (47 sq. mi., excluding water)
• San Mateo County (449 sq. mi., excluding water)
• Santa Clara County (1,291 sq. mi., excluding water)
• Santa Cruz County
• Solano County (829 sq. mi., excluding water)
• Sonoma County (1,576 sq. mi., excluding water)

Cities and municipalities

• List of cities and municipalities in the San Francisco Bay Area

See also

Template:Commonscat

• Islands of San Francisco Bay
• List of San Francisco Bay Area writers
• List of San Francisco Bay Area wildflowers
• United States metropolitan area

References