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Washington, D.C. formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States, founded on July 16, 1790. The U.S. Constitution allows for the creation of a special district to serve as the permanent national capital. The District is therefore not a part of any U.S. state and is instead directly overseen by the federal government.
Within the District, a new capital city named after George Washington was founded in 1791 to the east of a preexisting settlement at Georgetown. In 1871, the City of Washington, Georgetown, and other outlying areas were combined under a single, unified government, which formed Washington, D.C. as it exists today. The city shares its name with the U.S. state of Washington located on the country's Pacific coast.
Washington, D.C. is located on the north bank of the Potomac River and is bordered by the states of Virginia to the southwest and Maryland to the other sides. The city has a resident population of 601,723; because of commuters from the surrounding suburbs, its population rises to over one million during the workweek. The Washington Metropolitan Area, of which the District is a part, has a population of nearly 5.6 million, the seventh-largest metropolitan area in the country.
The centers of all three branches of the U.S. federal government are located in the District, as are many of the nation's monuments and museums. Washington, D.C. hosts 176 foreign embassies as well as the headquarters of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Organization of American States(OAS), the Inter-American Development Bank, and the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO). The headquarters of other institutions such as trade unions,lobbying groups, and professional associations are also located in the city.
The District is governed by a mayor and a 13-member city council. However, the United States Congress has supreme authority over the city and may overturn local laws. Residents therefore have less self-governance than residents of the states. The District has a non-voting, at-large Congressional delegate, but no senators. D.C. residents could not vote in presidential elections until the ratification of the Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1961.
Washington, D.C. is a planned city. The design for the City of Washington was largely the work of Pierre (Peter) Charles L'Enfant, a French-born architect, engineer, and city planner who first arrived in the colonies as a military engineer with Major General Lafayette during the American Revolutionary War. In 1791, President Washington commissioned L'Enfant to plan the layout of the new capital city. At L'Enfant's request, Thomas Jefferson provided plans of cities such as Amsterdam, Paris,Frankfurt, Karlsruhe and Milan, which he had brought back from Europe in 1788. The plan for Washington was modeled in the Baroque style and incorporated avenues radiating out from rectangles, providing room for open space and landscaping. L'Enfant's design also envisioned a garden-lined "grand avenue" approximately 1 mile (1.6 km) in length and 400 feet (120 m) wide in the area that is now the National Mall.
In March 1792, President Washington dismissed L'Enfant due to his insistence on micromanaging the city's planning, which had resulted in conflicts with the three commissioners appointed by Washington to supervise the capital's construction. Andrew Ellicott, who had worked with L'Enfant surveying the city, was then commissioned to complete the plans. Though Ellicott made revisions to the original plans, including changes to some street patterns, L'Enfant is still credited with the overall design of the city. The City of Washington was bounded by what is now Florida Avenue to the north, Rock Creek to the west, and the Anacostia River to the east.
By the start of the 20th century, L'Enfant's vision of a capital with open parks and grand national monuments had become marred by slums and randomly placed buildings, including a railroad station on the National Mall. In 1900, Congress formed a joint committee, headed by Senator James McMillan, charged with beautifying Washington's ceremonial core. What became known as the McMillan Plan was finalized in 1901. It included the re-landscaping of the Capitol grounds and the Mall, constructing new Federal buildings and monuments, clearing slums, and establishing a new citywide park system. Architects recruited by the committee kept much of the city's original layout, and their work is thought to be largely in keeping with L'Enfant's intended design.
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Stuff They Don't Want You To Know - Washington, D.C.by HowStuffWorksFeatured Video106,794 views
I live just miles away from D.C. It's a great city! It reminds me, with all the ancient greek buildings, of my hometown, Sarajevo. My top five american city, for sure.
AlGhaffar 6 months ago