Austin
Austin Facts
Capital city of the State of Texas
Located 75 mi northwest of San Antonio
Population (within city limits): 710 k people (2006)
Area: 250 mi2
Fourth largest city in Texas
Austin-San Marcos metropolitan area population: 1.3 M people
Economic bases:
- Government, and university education (specifically, the state agencies that come with being the capital city, and, of course, The University of Texas)
- High-tech manufacturing (particularly chip manufacturing — Austin has a dozen or so semiconductor "fabs")
- Software and information services
Famous for:
- State capitol
- UT
- Live music
- The bats
- "Laid-backness" — the town's unofficial motto is "Keep Austin Weird"
Climate
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Annual | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Avg. daily high | 60.3 | 65.1 | 72.5 | 78.9 | 84.8 | 90.9 | 95.0 | 95.6 | 90.1 | 81.4 | 70.1 | 62.3 | 78.9 |
| Avg. daily low | 40.0 | 44.0 | 50.9 | 57.6 | 65.4 | 71.1 | 73.4 | 73.3 | 68.8 | 59.8 | 49.3 | 41.9 | 58.0 |
| Average rainfall | 1.89 | 1.99 | 2.14 | 2.51 | 5.03 | 3.81 | 1.97 | 2.31 | 2.91 | 3.97 | 2.68 | 2.44 | 33.65 |
On average, it snows one day every 2.3 years in Austin.
U.S. National Weather Service Austin Climate Narrative
Flying to Austin
IATA airport code: AUS, ICAO airport code: KAUS
Airlines serving AUS:
- Southwest Airlines
- American Airlines (including Trans States)
- Continental Airlines
- Delta Air Lines (including SkyWest Airlines, Shuttle America, Atlantic Southeast Airlines, and Pinnacle)
- United Airlines (including SkyWest and Mesa)
- JetBlue Airways
- U.S. Airways (including Mesa)
- Northwest Airlines (including Pinnacle Airlines)
- Frontier Airlines
- vivaAerobus
- Air Canada
The airport is convenient to town, new, not giant, but big enough to get you most places conveniently. The Austin Convention & Visitors Bureau answers the question "How far is it from the airport to downtown?" with "It’s a mere seven and a half miles, less than 15 minutes drive time (or about four songs’ worth)."
"Gee-whiz" Trivia
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Third fastest growing large city in the nation from 2000 to 2006
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#1 Best Big City in "Best Places to Live" (Money magazine 2006)
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"Greenest City in America" (MSN)
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America's #1 College Town (the Travel Channel)
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5th safest city of cities of 500,000 or more population (Morgan Quitno Press)
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#2 on Orbitz.com’s list of the Top Ten Fastest Growing Wine Regions.
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Austin-Bergstrom International Airport was named Best Domestic Airport at the 2006 Airports Council International Airport Service Quality Awards
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#2 on Prevention Magazine’s list of the "top ten cities for taking a stroll"
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The most wired city in the nation (www.forrester.com, July 2005)
Accommodations
Hotels close to where I live downtown:
- Holiday Inn Austin-Town Lake 200 ft
- Four Seasons-Austin 1.3 mi
- Hampton Inn & Suites Austin-Downtown 1.5 mi
- Hilton Austin 1.3 mi
- Radisson Hotel & Suites 1.6 mi
- Courtyard Austin Downtown/Convention Center 1.4 mi
- Residence Inn Austin Downtown/Convention Center 1.4 mi
- Omni Austin Hotel 1.8 mi
- Intercontinental Stephen F. Austin Hotel 1.8 mi
More Austin Info
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Austin Convention & Visitors Bureau: http://www.austintexas.org/
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Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austin,_Texas
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About.com articles on Austin: http://austin.about.com/
