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North Bay 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, though Sonoma-Marin service has entered the planning phase. 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 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 serves as the cultural, financial and urban center of the region. East Bay 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. 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, including Palo Alto and Stanford University, Menlo Park, Mountain View, Daly City, San Mateo, and Foster City, Burlingame, Hillsborough, Redwood City, San Carlos, Atherton, as well as various towns along the Pacific coast, such as Pacifica and Half Moon Bay. South Bay 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 Jose, and its outlying neighbors including Gilroy and the high-tech hubs of Mountain View, Santa Clara, Cupertino, Palo Alto, Sunnyvale as well as many other suburbs like Los Altos, Saratoga and Los Gatos. Santa Cruz There is disagreement over whether Santa Cruz County is part of the San Francisco Bay Area. Many residents do not consider Santa Cruz as being part of the Bay Area; however, there is no formal definition of "San Francisco Bay Area" (such as by the US Census Bureau), so the term is somewhat flexible. Some tourist guide books (Lonely Planet) group Santa Cruz in the San Francisco Bay Area section, while others (Eyewitness Travel Guides) do not. Some California agencies include Santa Cruz as part of the Bay Area region, such as the state's parks department, • while other agencies such as the Association of Bay Area Governments and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission do not. More importantly, 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. Santa Cruz 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. 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. The Census Bureau also released data in August 2006 citing San Jose 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.• 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 (Hillsborough, Atherton, Ross, Diablo, Tiburon, Los Altos, Nicasio, Portola Valley, Los Gatos, San Francisco). Forty-two San Francisco Bay Area residents made the Forbes magazine's 400 richest Americans list, published in 2006. Thirteen live within San Francisco proper, tying Moscow and London with the most billionaires in the world. Among the forty-two were several well-known names such as Steven Paul 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 Jose metropolitan areas held $1 million in investable assets *, 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 *. 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, theaters 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 Jose 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 Jose 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. 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 remnants 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 lead 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 2517 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 roughtly parallel to the major faultlines: Earthquake faults The region is also traversed by at least four 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. Earthquakes
Transportation 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. | width="100%" |- valign=top | width=50% | Public (Formerly CSU Hayward) Seminaries | width=50% | Private
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. Sports NCAA Division I College Sports Regional counties, cities and suburbs The following lists are based on the ten-county definition of the Bay Area. Cities in bold serve as county seat. The places listed in italics are located in Santa Cruz county, which is excluded by the nine-county definition. Counties Cities with more than 200,000 inhabitants Cities with 100,000 to 200,000 inhabitants Municipalities and suburbs with 10,000 to 100,000 inhabitants Municipalities and suburbs with fewer than 10,000 inhabitants See also | |||||||||||||
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