Miami

Miami is a city in Florida. It is warm there all year.

Tall buildings stand next to a big blue bay. Long bridges cross the water.

Miami is a city in southeastern Florida, on the shore of Biscayne Bay. The U.S. Census Bureau estimated that 489,812 people lived there on 1 July 2025, which makes it the second-largest city in Florida after Jacksonville.

Miami is quite a young city. It became a city in 1896, just after the first train arrived. Long before that, the Tequesta people or their ancestors probably built an important building where the Miami River flows into the bay.

Miami lies on Biscayne Bay at the mouth of the Miami River in southeastern Florida. The Census Bureau's estimates for 1 July 2025 give the city 489,812 residents, behind Jacksonville (1,017,689) and ahead of Tampa (413,554); the estimates have risen every year since 2021, from 442,275 to 489,812.

The city is young: it was incorporated on 28 July 1896, three months after the first train of Henry Flagler's Florida East Coast Railway arrived. Its site is far older. In 1998 archaeologists found the Miami Circle at Brickell Point, a ring of holes cut into the limestone that experts concluded was probably the footprint of an important building of the Tequesta or their ancestors.

Long ago, people cut holes into the rock by the river. The holes make a big circle.

Today the circle is under a park. It is covered to keep it safe.

In 1998, before two new towers were to be built at Brickell Point, archaeologists dug at the spot where the Miami River meets Biscayne Bay. They found 24 holes cut into the limestone rock, forming a perfect circle 38 feet (about 11.6 meters) across. Charcoal from the site is about 1,800 to 2,000 years old. Experts think the holes were the footprint of an important building made by the Tequesta or their ancestors.

The Miami Circle became a National Historic Landmark in 2009. A waterfront park opened there in 2011, while the circle itself stays covered to protect it.

The Miami Circle was found during a salvage excavation in 1998, led by Robert S. Carr of Miami-Dade's Historic Preservation Division, before two high-rise buildings were to go up at Brickell Point. His team found black-earth middens with Glades culture and Tequesta artifacts of shell, stone, bone and pottery, and holes cut in the Miami oolite limestone. The surveyor Ted Riggs worked out that the holes lay on a circle 38 feet across; digging then revealed 24 holes in a perfect ring.

An independent review in 1999 judged it probably the footprint of an important Tequesta structure. Radiocarbon dates on charcoal gave 1,800 to 2,000 years, and the Florida Geological Survey's study of mineral crust on the cut faces supported that age. The land was bought for the public with county and state money, the site became a National Historic Landmark in 2009, and a park run by HistoryMiami opened in 2011 with the circle kept buried.

Across the river, Julia Tuttle's 644 acres included Fort Dallas, whose remodeled officers' quarters became her home.

Miami's trains run up high, above the streets.

Trains with no driver loop around the middle of the city.

Miami's Metrorail trains run mostly on tracks raised high above the ground. Building them up in the air was the only choice, because the water underground lies close to the surface. The first line opened on 21 May 1984 and is about 36 kilometers long.

Downtown, the Metromover carries people around on automated cars with no driver. It opened in 1986 and runs 8 to 15 meters above the street. Since 2012, a Metrorail branch has also reached Miami International Airport.

UrbanRail.Net explains that an elevated metro was the only option for Miami because of the high groundwater level. Metrorail's Green Line, begun in 1979, opened between Dadeland South and Overtown on 21 May 1984; it is 36 km long, elevated except for 2 km at grade, with 22 stations about 1.7 km apart, so trains average more than 60 km/h. The 3.8 km airport branch, served by the Orange Line, opened on 28 July 2012.

The Metromover, opened on 21 April 1986, is an elevated, rubber-tired, fully automated people mover. Its 3 km downtown ring gained an Omni Loop to the north and a Brickell Loop to the south in May 1994; it runs 8 to 15 m above street level and connects with Metrorail at Government Center and Brickell.

Near Miami there is a park that is almost all water. Fish and sea turtles swim over its coral reefs.

Another big park has wide wet grasslands and forests.

Two national parks lie near Miami. Biscayne National Park, within sight of the city, is 95% water. It protects blue water, green islands, mangrove shores and coral reefs full of fish, and loggerhead, green and hawksbill sea turtles are often seen there.

To the west, Everglades National Park was set up in 1947 to protect 1.5 million acres of wetlands, forests and coastal waters. It is also a major source of drinking water for people in South Florida.

The National Park Service describes Biscayne National Park as within sight of Miami yet worlds away: a park that is 95% water, protecting aquamarine bay waters, islands that include the northernmost Florida Keys, mangrove-fringed shores and coral reefs. Loggerhead, green and hawksbill turtles are commonly seen in its waters, and it holds evidence of 10,000 years of human history, from prehistoric peoples to shipwrecks and pineapple farms.

Everglades National Park, established in 1947, was the first U.S. national park created for its biodiversity. It protects 1.5 million acres of wetland, forest and marine habitats, carries several international designations, and provides a major source of drinking water for South Florida's residents.