Pasadena, California

Official name	City of Pasadena
Nickname	City of Roses, Crown City
Settlement type	City
Image seal	City of Pasadena, California, seal.png
Map caption	Location in Los Angeles County and the State of California
Subdivision type	Country
Subdivision name	United States
Subdivision type1	State
Subdivision name1	California
Subdivision type2	County
Subdivision name2	Los Angeles
Government type	Council-Manager
Leader title	Mayor
Leader name	Bill Bogaard (D)
Leader title1	City Council
Leader name1	Jacque Robinson Margaret McAustin Chris Holden Steve Haderlein Victor M. Gordo Steve Madison Terry Tornek
Leader title2	City Manager
Leader name2	Michael Beck
Leader title3	City Attorney
Leader name3	Michele Beal Bagneris
Leader title4	City Clerk
Leader name4	Jane Rodriguez
Established title	Settled
Established date	January 27, 1874
Established title2
Established title3	Incorporated
Established date3	June 19, 1886
Area magnitude	1 E8
Area total km2	60.0
Area land km2	59.8
Area water km2	0.2
Unit pref	Imperial
Area total sq mi	23.2
Area land sq mi	23.1
Area water sq mi	0.1
Population blank1 title	Demonym
Population blank1	Pasadenan
Population as of	2009
Population total	143,667
Population density km2	2477.1
Population density sq mi	6384.7
Timezone	PST
Utc offset	-8
Timezone dst	PDT
Utc offset dst	-7
Coordinates type	type:landmark_region:US
Elevation m	263
Elevation ft	863
Postal code type	ZIP codes
Postal code	91101-91191
Area code	626, 323
Blank name	FIPS code
Blank info	06-56000
Blank1 name	GNIS feature ID
Blank1 info	1664804
Website	City website

Pasadena () is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Although famous for hosting the annual Rose Bowl football game and Tournament of Roses Parade, Pasadena is the home to many scientific and cultural institutions, including the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena City College (PCC), Art Center College of Design, the Pasadena Playhouse, California School of Culinary Arts Pasadena, the Norton Simon Museum of Art and the Pacific Asia Museum. As of 2009, the estimated population of Pasadena is 143,667, making it the 168th-largest city in the United States. Pasadena is the seventh-largest city in Los Angeles County, and in 1886, became the first to be incorporated in Los Angeles County, largely as a ploy to get rid of its saloons. It is one of the primary cultural centers of the San Gabriel Valley.

History

Demography

The California Finance Department estimated in 2008, that Pasadena's population is 148,126, Males had a median income of $41,120 and $36,435 for females. The per capita income for the city was $28,186. About 11.6% of families and 15.9% of the population were below the poverty line, including 21.3% of those under age 18 and 10.5% of those age 65 or over.The communities of Eagle Rock, Highland Park and Garvanza are incorporated within the city of Los Angeles and Altadena is an unincorporated part of Los Angeles County. the final of the FIFA World Cup 1994 hosted in USA, and the final in FIFA Women's World Cup 1999.

The Rose Bowl stadium was the home ground for the Los Angeles Galaxy of Major League Soccer from the team's inception in 1996 until in 2003, it moved into the soccer-specific Home Depot Center in Carson, California. The venue additionally hosted the 1998 MLS Cup.

The Rose Bowl Aquatics Center is an aquatics facility located adjacent to the Rose Bowl Stadium. The pool hosted the final practices of the 2000 US Olympic swimming and diving team. In 2008, the facility held the U.S. National Diving Championships. The Rose Bowl Tennis Center, operated by the city of Pasadena, is located due south of the Rose Bowl stadium.

Tournament of Roses Parade

Pasadena is home to the Tournament of Roses Parade, held each year on January 1 (or on January 2, if the 1st falls on a Sunday). The first parade was held in 1890 and was originally sponsored by the Valley Hunt Club, a Pasadena social club. The motivation for having the parade was, as member Professor Charles F. Holder said, "In New York, people are buried in snow. Here our flowers are blooming and our oranges are about to bear. Let's hold a festival to tell the world about our paradise."

By 1895, the festivities had outgrown the Valley Hunt Club, and the Tournament of Roses Association was formed to take charge of the parade. The Rose Parade, as it is familiarly known, traditionally features elaborate floats. According to the organizers, "Every inch of every float must be covered with flowers, or other natural materials, such as leaves, seeds, or bark. On average a float requires about 100,000 flowers and greenery. Volunteer workers swarm over the floats in the days after Christmas, their hands and clothes covered with glue and petals." The most perishable flowers are placed in small vials of water, which are placed onto the float individually. Over the almost 3 hours of the parade, floats, and participants travel over five miles (8 km)

The Rose Parade is satirized by the popular Doo Dah Parade, an annual event that originated in Old Pasadena in 1978, and soon gained national notoriety. Readers Digest named the Doo Dah Parade “America’s Best Parade”, and was a recent feature in 50 Places You Must Visit Before You Die!. but the parade is now held in May. In 2011, after 33 years in Pasadena, the parade plans to move to East Pasadena for the first time.

Government

Federal, state, and county government

chose a bold design for the new Pasadena, California Police Department Building, which opened in 1990.]] Federally, Pasadena is located in California's 29th congressional district, which has a Cook PVI of D +12 and is represented by Democrat Adam Schiff. Although Pasadena has been liberal in state politics, in national politics, it was a stronghold for moderate Republicans; it was represented in Congress by Republicans from 1945 to 2001. In the state legislature Pasadena is located in the 21st Senate District, represented by Democrat Jack Scott, and in the 44th Assembly District, represented by Democrat Anthony J. Portantino. The Los Angeles County Department of Health Services operates the Monrovia Health Center in Monrovia, serving portions of Pasadena.

Local government

According to the city's most recent Comprehensive Annual Financial Report of 2009, the city's various funds had $583.0 million in revenues, $518.1 million in expenditures, $954,199,439 in net assets, $732.3 million in total liabilities, and $118,261,490 in cash and investments.

Police services

The Pasadena Police Department serves most of the City of Pasadena. Unincorporated portions of the city are part of Los Angeles County and are served by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD) and the Altadena Station in Altadena serves nearby portions of Pasadena.

Fire department

The Pasadena Fire Department moved into its first formal and permanent station in 1889. Before that they had been housed in a ramshackle structure and summoned by the church bell. There were 24 firemen for two shifts. Today The Pasadena Fire Department consists of 185 full time employees, 153 shift personnel, 32 administrative personnel, and eight modern fire stations that serve an area in a 60 mile radius.

Transportation

Public transit

Pasadena is the northern terminus of the Los Angeles Metro Gold Line light rail, which originates at the Atlantic Station in East Los Angeles. There are currently 6 Gold Line stations in Pasadena: Fillmore Station, Del Mar Station in Old Pasadena, Memorial Park Station in Old Pasadena, Lake Station in Downtown, Allen Station and Sierra Madre Villa Station. Construction began in June 2010 to extend the Gold Line east through several additional foothill communities of the San Gabriel Valley.

Pasadena is also served by various bus services. The Pasadena Area Rapid Transit System exclusively serves the city while Los Angeles metro area bus services Foothill Transit, LADOT, Metro Local and Metro Rapid also serve Pasadena.

Airports

Bob Hope Airport (also known as Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport) in nearby Burbank serves as the regional airport for Pasadena. The airport is owned and operated by the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority. The airport is under the control of the governments of the three cities for which it is named. Most destinations from Bob Hope Airport are within the United States, so Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles and LA/Ontario International Airport in Ontario are also important airports less than an hour from Pasadena. Long Beach Airport in Long Beach, California, is about an hour's drive away as well.

Freeways and highways

Four freeways run through Pasadena and Pasadena is a control city for all of them. The most important is the Foothill Freeway (I-210) which enters the northwestern portion of the city from La Cañada Flintridge. The Foothill Freeway initially runs due south, passing the Rose Bowl before its junction with the Ventura Freeway. At this interchange, the Foothill Freeway shifts its alignment and direction, becoming an east-west freeway, exiting the city on its eastern boundary before entering Arcadia. The Foothill Freeway connects Pasadena with San Fernando (westbound) and San Bernardino (eastbound). as seen from the Metro Gold Line Sierra Madre Villa Station]]

The Ventura Freeway (SR 134) starts at the junction of the Foothill Freeway (I-210) at the edge of downtown Pasadena and travels westward. This freeway is the main connector to Bob Hope Airport and the San Fernando Valley.

A spur of the controversial Long Beach Freeway (SR 710 in Pasadena) is also located in Pasadena. The Long Beach Freeway was intended to connect Long Beach to Pasadena but a gap, known as the South Pasadena Gap, between Alhambra and Pasadena has not been completed due to legal battles involving the city of South Pasadena. The spur starts at the junction of the Ventura Freeway and Foothill Freeway and travels south along the eastern edge of Old Pasadena with two exits for Colorado Boulevard and Del Mar Boulevard before ending at an at-grade intersection with California Boulevard. Currently, Caltrans is researching the possibility of using advanced tunneling technologies to build the Long Beach Freeway under South Pasadena without disturbing the residential neighborhoods on the surface. This would create twin 4.5-mile-long tunnels, which would be the longest in the United States.

seen from the Arroyo Seco below]] The Arroyo Seco Parkway (SR 110) (also known as the Pasadena Freeway) is the first freeway in California, connecting Los Angeles with Pasadena alongside the Arroyo Seco and is the primary access to Downtown Los Angeles. The freeway enters the southern part of the city from South Pasadena. Only one exit is actually inside city limits, the southbound exit connecting to State Street with access to Fair Oaks Avenue. At Glenarm Street, the freeway ends at the six- and four-lane Arroyo Parkway continues northward to Old Pasadena.

Three state highways enter the city of Pasadena. Arroyo Parkway (SR 110), maintained by the city of Pasadena, runs from the termination of the Pasadena Freeway at Glenarm Street to Colorado Boulevard in Old Town Pasadena. While Arroyo Parkway continues north two more blocks, SR 110 ends at Colorado Boulevard.

Rosemead Boulevard (SR 19) is a state highway on the eastern edge of Pasadena and unincorporated Pasadena from Huntington Drive to Foothill Boulevard.

An obscure portion of the Angeles Crest Highway (SR 2) in the San Gabriel Mountains cuts through Pasadena near the Angeles Crest Ranger Station. This stretch of highway in the Angeles National Forest is north of La Cañada Flintridge and west of Mount Wilson and is approximately in elevation.

Historic U.S. Route 66 used to run through Pasadena until it was deleted in 1964. The historic highway entered Pasadena from the east on Colorado Boulevard and then jogged south on Arroyo Parkway before becoming part of the Pasadena Freeway (SR 110).

The intersection of Fair Oaks Avenue and Colorado Boulevard in Old Pasadena is the zero-zero, east-west, north-south postal division of Pasadena.

Culture

Performing arts

The Pasadena Symphony, founded in 1862, offers several concerts a year at the Pasadena Civic Center and the Pasadena Pops plays at the Rose Bowl. The Civic Center also holds a few traveling Broadway shows each year. The legendary Pasadena Playhouse, presently in reorganization, usually presents seven shows a season, each show running six to eight weeks. The Furious Theatre Company is one of several small theatre companies in Pasadena. They are currently housed in the Carrie Hamilton Theatre adjacent to the Pasadena Playhouse. Boston Court Performing Arts Center, opened in 2003, is near Lake and Colorado. Its resident theatre company, the award-winning The Theatre @ Boston Court presents four productions a year. Music at the Court presents numerous music concerts each year, ranging from classical to jazz. The Friends of the Levitt organization presents a free summer concert series in Memorial Park, with the 2008 summer season marking its sixth year.

Beckman Auditorium and other venues on the Caltech campus present a wide range of performing arts, lectures, films, classes and entertainment events, primarily during the academic year.

The California Philharmonic performs two series in Pasadena, Cal Phil at the Ambassador Auditorium from November through April, and Cal Phil Music Martinis & the Maestro in the Romanesque Room at the Green Hotel from January to May. They also perform Cal Phil Festival on the Green at nearby Los Angeles County Arboretum & Botanic Garden in Arcadia from July to September, and from July to August Cal Phil at Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. In conjunction with The Old Mill Foundation, they perform a summer chamber concert series Cal Phil at the Mill in San Marino.

For more than ten years, twice annually Pasadena's cultural institutions have opened their doors for free during ArtNight Pasadena, offering the public a rich sampling of quality art, artifacts and music within the city. This has evolved into the yearly PasadenART Weekend, a three day citywide event which, as of 2007, encompasses ArtNight, ArtWalk, ArtHeritage, ArtMarket, and ArtPerformance, a vibrant outdoor music event showcasing emerging and nationally recognized talent. Free concerts take place on multiple stages throughout Old Pasadena.

Ambassador Auditorium was built under the guidance of Herbert W. Armstrong as both a facility to be used by the Worldwide Church of God for religious services and as a concert hall for public performances celebrating the performing arts. In 2007, the native Pasadena band Ozma reunited and produced the album Pasadena in tribute to the city. The album photos and artwork were shot at the Colorado Street Bridge.

The 1960s song "The Little Old Lady from Pasadena" parodies a popular Southern California image of Pasadena as home to a large population of aged eccentrics. In the song, Jan and Dean sing of an elderly lady who drives a powerful "Super Stock Dodge" muscle car and is "the terror of Colorado Boulevard." The Dead Kennedys payed a tribute to this archetypal song in the track "Buzzbomb From Pasadena" in the album Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death.

Visual arts

A number of artists of national repute, such as Guy Rose, Alson S. Clark, Marion Wachtel and Ernest A. Batchelder, of the Arts and Crafts Movement, made Pasadena their home in the early twentieth century. The formation of the California Art Club, Pasadena Arts Institute and the Pasadena Society of Artists heralded the city's emergence as a regional center for the visual arts.

Museums

The Norton Simon Museum collections include: European paintings, sculpture, and tapestry; sculpture from South Asia; and an extensive sculpture garden in a beautiful landscape with a pond. The Museum has the Contemporary art collection of its predecessor, the Pasadena Museum of Art, periodically on exhibit. The museum is located in Pasadena on the corner of Orange Grove Boulevard and Colorado Boulevard.

The Pacific Asia Museum, with its tranquil garden courtyard in the center, features art from the many countries and cultures of Asia. The nearby Pasadena Museum of California Art hosts many temporary exhibitions of work by contemporary Californian artists.

The Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens, with painting and sculpture galleries, is adjacent to Pasadena in the city of San Marino. The innovative Kidspace Children's Museum is located in Brookside Park.

Literature

In 2002 David Ebershoff published the novel Pasadena. The novel won praise for its accurate recreation of Pasadena before World War II.

Bungalow Heaven

Bungalow Heaven is a neighborhood of 800 small craftsman homes built from 1900 to 1930. Many of these homes are still occupied. Much of the area became a landmark district in 1989 and annual historic home tours are conducted every year since that designation. Bungalow Heaven's borders are Washington Boulevard to the north, Orange Grove Boulevard to the south, Mentor Avenue to the west, and Chester Avenue to the east. The neighborhood is usually extended to Lake Avenue to the west and Hill Avenue to the east.

Orange Grove Boulevard

The Norton Simon Museum is at the intersection of Orange Grove and Colorado Boulevards. This corner is the official start of the Rose Parade route and the museum can be quite clearly seen every year during the parade television broadcast.

Orange Grove Boulevard is one of several exclusive residential districts in Pasadena, and has been a home for the rich and famous since the early 20th century. Because of the number of landmark mansions, the street earned the name Millionaire's Row, an appropriate sobriquet considering that the estates that once lined this spacious boulevard and the surrounding neighborhood read like a Who's Who of American consumer products.

Historical estates

The maker of Wrigley's chewing gum, William Wrigley Jr.'s, substantial home was offered to the city of Pasadena after Mrs. Wrigley's death in 1958, under the condition that their home would be the Rose Parade's permanent headquarters. The stately Tournament House stands today, and serves as the headquarters for the Tournament of Roses Parade. Adolphus Busch, co-founder of Anheuser-Busch, brewer of Budweiser beer, established the first of a series of Busch Gardens in Pasadena. When Busch, died at his Pasadena estate his wife generously offered the property to the City of Pasadena, an offer the city inexplicably refused. Henry Markham, who lived adjacent to Busch, was the 18th Governor of the state of California (1891–1895) and wrote Pasadena: Its Early Years. The home of David Gamble, son of consumer product maker James Gamble of Procter & Gamble, is located on the north end of Orange Grove Boulevard.

The Gamble House, an American Craftsman masterpiece, was built in 1908, by architects Charles and Henry Greene, as an exemplification of their ultimate bungalow. It is open to the public as both an architectural conservancy and museum. The Gamble House is a California Historical Landmark and a National Historic Landmark on the National Register of Historic Places. In 1966, it was deeded to the city of Pasadena in a mutual agreement with the University of Southern California School of Architecture. Every year, two fifth year USC architecture students live in the house full-time. The carefully selected students change yearly.

The home of Anna Bissell McCay, daughter of carpet sweeper magnate Melville Bissell is a four-story Victorian home, on the border of South Pasadena. Today the Bissell House is a Bed and Breakfast. Thaddeus S. C. Lowe's home was on South Orange Grove. The 24,000 square-foot (2200 m2) house included a sixth story solarium which he converted into an observatory. Lowe was also a generous patron of the astronomical sciences. He started a water-gas company, founded the Citizens Bank of Los Angeles, built numerous ice plants, and purchased a Pasadena opera house. He also established the Mount Lowe Railway in the mountains above Pasadena and eventually lost his fortune. The brilliant, but troubled, rocket scientist John Whiteside Parsons. Parsons sometimes shared his residence with other noteworthy people, including L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology. Parsons died in an explosion while testing a new rocket fuel in his Pasadena home laboratory, in 1952.

Education

The California Institute of Technology is in the southern-central area of Pasadena. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (managed for NASA by Caltech) is in Pasadena. Caltech's 31 Nobel Laureates have brought 32 Nobel Prizes home to Pasadena. In 2005, Caltech dedicated an on-campus weather station honoring the late Nobel laureate geneticist and meteorologist Ed Lewis. The Ed Lewis Memorial Weather Station generates weather information for KNBC and thousands of other Web sites on school campuses in Pasadena and all over the nation. Fuller Theological Seminary, one of the largest multidenominational seminaries in the world, sits just east of downtown Pasadena. The Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts (formerly known as the California School of Culinary Arts) is located at East Green Street and South Madison Avenue. The school offers the Le Cordon Bleu accreditation and has two campuses in Pasadena. Pacific Oaks College is located next to Pasadena's National Historic Landmark, the Gamble House. The Art Center College of Design is in the San Rafael Hills overlooking the Rose Bowl, and ranks as one of the top five art schools in the United States and one of the top 10 art schools worldwide; it is particularly known for its design programs.

Los Angeles Music Academy College of Music, founded in 1996, is a contemporary music school whose acclaimed faculty of experienced professionals are active in the film, television and recording industries. The school is located between Colorado and California Boulevards on South Fair Oaks Boulevard.

Pasadena City College is a highly rated community college founded in 1924 and located on Colorado Boulevard, slightly northeast of Caltech. The college will celebrate its 85th Anniversary in 2012. Until about 1970, the Rose Parade Queen's court was exclusively selected from its students. Two of the most outstanding alumni of PCC are: Jackie Robinson, and Jaime Escalante.

The Pasadena Unified School District encompasses 76 square miles and includes Pasadena, Altadena and Sierra Madre. There are 17 K-5 elementary schools, five middle schools, and four high schools. There are also a number of private and parochial schools in the city.

Pasadena had a public library before it was incorporated as a city. The Pasadena Central Library was designed by architect Myron Hunt and dedicated in 1927. The 110,000-square-foot library was recently renovated without damaging any of its historic integrity. Paseo Colorado is an upscale shopping mall designed to be a modern urban village. An open-air mall that covers three city blocks, Paseo Colorado is anchored on the west end by upscale grocery store Gelson's, on the east end by Macy's and Arclight Cinemas centers the middle portion of the mall. Another shopping district is located in the South Lake Avenue neighborhood. On Lake Avenue, an old Macy's department store and furniture gallery is in a registered California historical landmark. The building was originally designed and built as the fourth Bullock's department store in the mid 1950s (the last freestanding store they constructed).

Rose Bowl Flea Market

The Rose Bowl Flea Market is a large swap meet that involves thousands of dealers and tens of thousands of visitors in and around the grounds of the Rose Bowl. The merchandise on display ranges from old world antiques to California pottery to vintage clothing. The flea market has been held every second Sunday of the month, rain or shine, since 1967.

Climate

Pasadena has a Mediterranean climate (Köppen climate classification Csa).

The wettest year was 1983 with and the driest year was 1947 with . The most rainfall in one month was in February 1980. The most rainfall in 24 hours was on March 2, 1938. Pasadena averages 20 inches of rain a year, about 6 inches more than nearby Los Angeles due to the rain shadow effect created by the San Gabriel Mountains. Situated at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains, snow is known to fall occasionally in Pasadena. The heaviest snowfall in Pasadena history occurred on January 11, 1949; 6 inches fell at Pasadena's city hall and more than 12 inches fell in the foothills of the city.

Media

Civic Auditorium venue

The Civic Auditorium is on Green Street. It was designed to be the south cornerstone of Pasadena's Civic Plaza. Every year, the popular television competition, American Idol films their "Hollywood Week" show there. It was also the venue for the Miss Teen USA 2007 pageant. The main auditorium is large enough to have been home to the annual Emmy Awards ceremony for nearly 25 years, from 1977 to 2001.

Television

Pasadena is the setting of many TV shows including Brothers & Sisters and The Big Bang Theory. Pasadena Community Access Corporation oversees four television stations: The Arroyo Channel (Channel 32), KPAS (Channel 3), KLRN (Channel 95) and PCC TV (Channel 96).

Radio

Pasadena has been home to a number of notable radio stations. In 1967 radio iconoclasts Tom and Raechel Donahue took over an aging studio in the basement of the Pasadena Presbyterian Church and introduced Los Angeles to FM freeform radio. Broadcasting under the KPPC-FM call sign at 106.7 FM it quickly became the voice of the counterculture and provided the soundtrack to LA's hippie era. Early on-air personalities included Michael McKean, David Lander, Harry Shearer, and Dr. Demento. The staff was fired en masse in 1971 and the station lost its distinctive personality.

Today the primary radio station in Pasadena goes by the call sign KPCC located at 89.3 FM. Broadcasting from the Pasadena City College campus, this public radio station carries many shows from National Public Radio but maintains an independent streak, committing a large chunk of air time to presenting local and state news. Accordingly, the station has received numerous awards for journalistic excellence and continues to be an important part of the city's heritage.

Newspaper

Pasadena's largest newspaper is the Pasadena Star-News, which was first published in 1884. The alternative Pasadena Weekly is published by Southland Publishing.

Notable residents

See List of Pasadena, California people

Parrots

Pasadena has a large, non-indigenous population of naturalized parrots. According to the "Parrot Project of Los Angeles", the parrots are of at least five species. Residents have come to enjoy the birds as part of their unique city's culture, and like other SoCal residents they have become "local icons" to the citizens there. Many theories surround the mystery of how the parrots landed in Pasadena and claimed the area as their own. A widely accepted story is that they were part of the stock that were set free for their survival from the large pet emporium at Simpson's Garden Town on East Colorado Boulevard, which burned down in 1959.

Sister cities

Järvenpää, Finland Ludwigshafen am Rhein, Germany Poznań, Poland Mishima, Japan Vanadzor, Armenia Xicheng District, Beijing, China Tangier, Morocco

References

Further reading

External links

Neighborhood Association home page

Pasadena city website

Pasadena Museum of History

Pasadena USGS

KPAS (Channel 3)

Category:History of Pasadena, California Category:Neighborhoods in Pasadena, California Category:Transportation in Pasadena, California Category:Cities in Los Angeles County, California Category:Cities in Southern California Category:Cities in California Category:Communities on U.S. Route 66