City of Miami
Key facts
- #3 richest city and #3 largest skyline in the US, #4 highest percentage of poor families
- Tropical climate: winter temperatures range between 68–80 °F (20–27 °C), summers are hot and wet with a chance for hurricanes
- Notable ties to Latin America, 70% of residents are Latino or Hispanic
- One of the largest and most prominent LGBTQ communities in the US
- A significant transshipment point of cocaine
Introduction
Miami, nicknamed Magic City, is a coastal metropolis in southeastern Florida. Located in Miami-Dade County, it is Florida's second-most populous city after Jacksonville, with more than 440,000 residents.
As the third-richest city in the US, Miami's metropolitan area is the county's most significant urban economy. The downtown area has one of the largest concentrations of international banks in the nation and is home to several university-affiliated hospitals and health facilities, including the nation's largest hospital, Jackson Memorial Hospital. It's also home to several prominent business companies, both national and international, and has the third-largest skyline in the US, with over 300 high-rises, the tallest Panorama Tower reaching up to 868 ft (265 m).
In addition, the city ranks number two in popular tourism hubs after New York City, with over five million visitors per year, and is the third richest measured in global buying power. The city's seaport, PortMiami—located in Biscayne Bay at the mouth of Miami River—is the busiest cruise port in the world. Because of the city's notable commercial and cultural ties to Latin America, it is also known as a gateway to the region.
In short, Miami is a vibrant minority-majority metropolitan area fueled by vast human capital, cultural experience, and political engagement. It is said to combine the best traits of America's big metropolises; it parties 'till 5 a.m. like NYC, it has sun-kissed beaches rivaling those of Los Angeles, and it gets down with diversity like Houston. It's one of the nation's best vacation destinations, providing visitors a colorful variety of art, food, cocktails, bars, clubs, and music.
It's a feel-good city, perfect for all generations, races, sexes, and orientations… At least until one starts to scratch through the surface and finds the reason why Magic City has earned itself another, less flattering nickname:
Vice City—because life is not just about virtues.
Location, geography, and climate
Florida, also called "Sunshine State", is located in the southeastern region of the United States, the second southmost state after Hawaii, and the only state that borders both the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean. It's a popular destination for retirees, vacationers, and both domestic and international migrants, thanks to its warm, sunny climate. Most of Florida is at or near sea level, making it the flattest state in the country, with the lowest high point at just 345 ft (105 m). It borders Alabama to the northwest, Georgia to the north, the Bahamas to the east, and the Straits of Florida and Cuba to the south. Southern Florida, where Miami resides, is the only region of the continental US that includes areas with a tropical climate.
The state has several unique ecosystems, including one of the largest tropical wildernesses in the US, Everglades National Park. The wildlife includes Florida-specific species like the American alligator, crocodile, and flamingo, the Florida panther, bottlenose dolphin, and manatee. The state's titular coral barrier reef system is the third-largest in the world and the only living coral reef in the continental United States.
Located in a broad plain between the Everglades to the west and Biscayne Bay to the east, Miami and its suburbs extend from Okeechobee Lake southward to Florida Bay. The main portion of the city is on the shores of Biscayne Bay, home to several hundred natural and artificial barrier islands.
The Gulf Stream runs northward just 15 miles (24 km) off the coast, keeping Miami's climate mild and warm all year round. Sea-level elevation and position just above the Tropic of Cancer shape the city's climate: the average winter temperature, from December through March, ranges roughly between 68–80 °F (20–27 °C). The summer is hot and wet, creating daily thundershowers in the humid air masses, and can include hurricanes from the beginning of June to the end of November, with the peak seen during the Cape Verde season in mid-August.
Demographics and economy
Known as Miamians, 70% of Miami's residents are Latino or Hispanic, with Cubans being represented the most. Despite Florida containing the highest percentage of residents over 65 in the US (17.3%), many of whom are military retirees, Miami's demographic median age is under 40, and more than two-thirds of the city's residents are working age. A third of the population has a bachelor's degree or higher education, the vast majority being high school graduates. Less than a percent (0.7%) of Miami's residents are homeless, with a fifth living on the streets.
Spanish and Spanish Creole dominate English as the primary languages, incorporating their native rhythm and pronunciation into the Miami accent. Third comes French and Haitian Creole, spoken by 4.5% of the population. Most of the city's residents are Christian, with the Catholic Church being the largest single denomination, mainly due to the large Hispanic population. The state also has a relatively significant Jewish community—the third-largest in the US. As of 2021, the number of registered Republican voters exceeded that of Democrats, a first in Florida's history.
Over 1,400 multinational businesses are located in Miami, several of them headquartered or running their Latin American operations in the city. The city's international airport and seaport are among the nation's busiest ports of entry, especially for cargo from South America and the Caribbean. Miami is also a significant music recording and television production center, particularly for Spanish-language media, and a popular location for shooting music videos and films.
Tourism is one of Miami's largest private-sector industries, with attractions such as Walt Disney World, Miami Beach, and the Kennedy Space Center attracting millions of visitors annually.
Florida has the third-lowest tax rate in the US, losing only to Texas and Alaska. The state has no individual income taxes, its state-local burdens are average, and corporate taxes are limited to 5.5%. Miami's median household income is less than $48,000, a quarter below the state average, greatly affected by the city's fourth-highest percentage (31.7%) of family incomes below the federal poverty line.
Culture and recreation
Miami's cuisine reflects its diverse population. Heavily influenced by Caribbean and Latin American cuisine and combined with more traditional American cuisine, this unique mix of cooking styles is known as Floribbean cuisine. The city is also known for its Cuban sandwiches, created by Cuban immigrants in the 1960s, as well as its seafood.
Miami has a status as a gay mecca with one of the largest and most prominent LGBTQ communities in the US. It attracts more than one million LGBT visitors annually and hosts some of the country's largest fundraisers and a yearly Miami Beach Pride. The city has had a gay nightlife scene since the 1930s, legal same-sex marriage since 2015, and a chamber of commerce for its LGBT community. Cities in Miami Beach, Wilton Manors, and Key West are often referred to as gay villages, the last having one of the first openly gay mayors in the country.
Things aren't too bad for non-binary, transgender, and queer individuals, either—birth certificates with the option "sex: unknown" were made available in 2022.
In addition to plenty of LGBT-related and supporting events, Miami is home to many entertainment venues, theaters, museums, and performing art centers. Annual events like the Calle Ocho Music Festival and Miami International Film Festival attract international producers to the city, including musicians, singers, dancers, actors, and orchestral players. Miami is also a major fashion center, home to some of the top modeling agencies in the world.
The city's tropical weather allows for year-round outdoor activities: it has numerous marinas, rivers, bays, and canals, as well as access to the Atlantic Ocean, making boating, sailing, canoeing, and fishing popular ways to spend time. Additionally, Biscayne Bay's coral reefs offer snorkeling and scuba diving options. Golf and tennis are the most common dryland hobbies, while jai alai venues cater to those preferring indoor activities.
Miami's streets have hosted various professional auto races, including several Grand Prix events, and its stadiums have been home to international tennis tournaments. The city has five major league professional sports teams: Miami Dolphins (American football), Florida Panthers (ice hockey), Miami Heat (basketball), Miami Marlins (baseball), and Inter Miami CF (soccer), as well as many college sports teams.
Finally, as the originator of the Paso Fino horse breed, the city hosts its share of equine competitions.
History
Native Americans
As early as 10,000 years ago, the area now known as Miami was inhabited by Native Americans. They were hunter-gatherers who didn't practice agriculture and lived along the banks of the Miami River. By the time Europeans arrived, the land was inhabited by the Tequesta tribe. They had irregular contact with the Europeans and had largely migrated by the middle of the 18th century. Another tribe, Mayaimi, who lived around Lake Okeechobee during the same period, gave the city its current name.
The first recorded European landing was made in 1566 by a Spanish admiral and conquistador, Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, and his men. The soldiers built a Jesuit mission at the mouth of the Miami River but left Florida to look for more willing subjects a year later. The Tequestas were left to fight European-introduced diseases, such as smallpox, significantly weakened and eventually defeated by a rival tribe, the Creek.
It took until the 1800s for Europeans to permanently settle in Miami in the form of treasure hunters, who came to South Florida to loot ships navigating around the treacherous Great Florida Reef. Around the same time, a group of Native Americans and runaway slaves arrived in the Miami area, forming a tribe known as Seminoles. They gave their name to the Seminole Wars, a series of conflicts between 1835 and 1842, where a ruthless American cavalry officer led several raids against the Indians. Known as the longest and most devastating Indian conflict in the United States, the wars caused almost a total loss of the local native population.
Into the 1900s
Later in the century, in December 1894 and February 1895, Florida was struck by two freezes that wiped out Florida's crops, except for Miami. Settlers began pouring into the "freeze-proof" lands, further fueled by rumors of an upcoming railway extension. The tracks reached Miami on April 7, 1896, and started passenger service on the 22nd. In July, a meeting took place to give the area city status. Initially, residents wanted to call the city "Flagler" as an homage to the railway company's magnate, Henry Flagler, but eventually, it was named the City of Miami on July 28, 1896, incorporated with 502 voters, of which a fifth were black.
The city continued to grow rapidly, primarily through black labor force, multiplying the population eighteenfold between 1900 and 1920. As more people flooded the area, more land was required, leading to canals being made to remove some of the Everglades' waters. The boom began to falter due to construction delays and an overload of the transport system by an excess of bulky building materials, culminating in the economic bubble's collapse as a category four hurricane swept through the area. This was followed by the Great Depression, leaving more than 16,000 people unemployed.
By the time World War II started in the 1940s, the city was still recovering from the Great Depression. While many Florida cities were brought into financial ruin, Miami remained relatively unaffected. Numerous supply stations and communications were established in the area for the Army and Navy, but rather than building large army bases to train troops, many pre-existing buildings were converted for military use: hotels to barracks, local beaches to training grounds, and even movie theaters into military school classrooms.
Cuban revolution
The Cuban Revolution of 1959 caused most Cubans living in Miami to return to Cuba, only to later return to Florida en masse as exiles. This upset the Miamians, especially the African Americans, and caused the school system to struggle to educate the Spanish-speaking Cuban children. By the end of the 1960s, more than 400,000 Cubans were living in Dade County and would form a predominantly Spanish-speaking community known as "Little Havana," where Spanish speakers elsewhere in the city could conduct their daily business in their native tongue.
In 1966, the Cuban Adjustment Act was passed that allowed the immigrants a permanent stay in the country, in addition to the city's substantial African American and black Caribbean population.
The 1970s was a formative period for Miami, particularly the year 1972, when both the Democratic and Republican National Conventions were held in Miami Beach during the Presidential Election, the Florida International University opened in September, and the Miami Dolphins had their record-breaking undefeated season.
Later in the decade, a Dade County ordinance was passed protecting individuals based on sexual orientation.
More cultural tumult
In December 1979, police officers pursued a black motorcyclist, Arthur McDuffie, in a high-speed chase after he'd made a provocative gesture toward one of them. The officers claimed McDuffie was killed in a motorcycle accident during the pursuit, but the coroner's report suggested otherwise and revealed the officers had beaten him to death. This caused one of the worst riots in the United States in Miami's black neighborhoods, killing 18 people and injuring over 850 more during the three days of rioting.
The 1980s witnessed another exodus of Cubans—"Mariel Boatlift"—and an increased number of immigrants from other nations, such as Haiti. However, this time, the arriving Cubans were poor and released from prison or mental institutes, causing many middle-class non-Hispanic whites to leave the city. By 1990, only 10% of the population was non-Hispanic, compared to 1960 ninety percent.
After the 80s mass immigration and the resulting "white flight," in 1994, fearing the newest exodus would become another Mariel Boatlift, the Clinton Administration announced that Cubans interdicted at sea would be taken to Guantanamo Bay or Panama instead of being brought into the United States. Later that year, the US and Cuba agreed to normalize migration between the two countries, and a second agreement year later paved the way for the admission of the Cubans housed at Guantanamo.
Since then, Miami's Latin and Caribbean-friendly atmosphere has made it a popular destination for tourists and immigrants worldwide, many of them being recent, seasonal immigrants with a high disposable income.
Drug highway
Unfortunately, Miami has also become one of the nation's most significant transshipment points for cocaine. The drug industry has brought billions of dollars into Miami, creating signs of prosperity around the city in the form of five-star hotels, swanky nightclubs, luxury car dealerships, and other major commercial developments. Along with the money arrived a violent crime wave that lasted through the early 1990s.
Followed by an extensive boom of high-rise architecture in the 2000–2010 decade dubbed "Miami Manhattanization," the city's downtown has transformed into the third most remarkable skyline in the US, behind New York City and Chicago. While most of the boom has slowed since 2008's global financial crisis, the Port Miami Tunnel connecting Watson Island to Dodge Island opened in 2014, directly connecting PortMiami to the Interstate Highway.
