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San
Diego is a coastal Southern California city
located in the southwestern corner of the continental
United States.
As of 2005, the city has a population of 1,255,540
people. It is the second largest city in California
and the seventh largest in the United States.[1]
It is the county seat of San Diego County.GR6
The San Diego metropolitan area has over 2.9
million people while the larger metropolitan
area, which includes Tijuana, Mexico, is the
21st-largest in the Americas, with a population
over 4.8 million.
San
Diego lies just north of the Mexican border
(shares border with Tijuana, Mexico) and lies
south of Orange County. It is home to miles
of beaches, a mild Mediterranean climate and
many military institutions, such as the United
States Navy, the United States Coast Guard and
the United States Marine Corps.
The
University of California, San Diego (UCSD) and
the affiliated UCSD Medical Center combined
with nearby research institutes in the Torrey
Pines area of La Jolla make the area influencial
in biotechnology research. San Diego's economy
is largely composed of agriculture, biotechnology/biosciences,
computer sciences, electronics manufacturing,
defense-related manufacturing, financial and
business services, ship-repair and construction,
software development, telecommunications and
tourism.
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The city of San Diego itself has
deep canyons separating its mesas, creating small
pockets of natural parkland scattered throughout
the city. Downtown San Diego is located on San
Diego Bay. Balboa Park lies on a mesa to the northeast.
It is surrounded by several dense urban communities
and abruptly ends in Hillcrest to the north. The
Coronado and Point Loma peninsulas separate San
Diego Bay from the ocean. Ocean Beach is on the
west side of Point Loma. Mission Beach and Pacific
Beach lie between the ocean and Mission Bay, a
man-made aquatic park. La Jolla, an affluent community,
lies north of Pacific Beach. Mount Soledad in
La Jolla offers views from northern San Diego
County to Mexico. Mountains rise to the east of
the city, and beyond the mountains are desert
areas. Cleveland National Forest is a half-hour
drive from downtown San Diego. Numerous farms
are found in the valleys northeast and southeast
of the city. San Diego County has more endangered
plant and animal species (as determined by US
Environmental Protection Agency) than any other
county in the United States.[ |
