The Changing South

Much like the south the southern part of Boise is known as the regional hub for music and performing arts. Jazz is big here, with the Gene Harris Jazz Festival happening every spring. A range of museums provide something for every art lover and history buff, including the Boise Art Museum, Idaho Historical Museum, Basque Museum and Cultural Center, and the Discovery Center of Idaho. Theater is also popular in Boise with a number of theater groups working in the city, including the Idaho Shakespeare Festival, Boise Little Theatre, and the Boise Contemporary Theatre. Boise is also home to a large Basque population, numbering 15,000, that adds to the city’s cultural diversity. Every five years, the community holds a large Basque festival called Jaialdi. http://www.citytowninfo.com/places/idaho/boise . Boise like many other cities have a cultural meaning compared to where the location of their home is. This passive about talks about how Boise is a very diverse city, and how music, art, different cultures, and physical environment help to make it a unique part in the United States. Boise also has a very good University which is located in downtown, having one of the best football programs in the country it helps build community, and makes them have a sense of coming together.

Religion

According to 2000 estimates, Idaho has about 311,425 Mormons, 18,745 adherents in the Assemblies of God, and 17,683 United Methodists. There were 130,847 Roman Catholics and an estimated 1,050 Jews (http://www.city-data.com/states/Idaho-Religions.html). Religion is very diverse in these areas of Idaho due to the different population that live in the city, and the rural parts of the towns. These different beliefs also make up the views on everyone that lives in the area and also creates boudaries among different cultures as well, but in another sense It can bring different cultures together.

Appalachia and The Ozarks

A Varied Topography

The boise region has a lot of different physical characteristic that are seen in the sorrounding areas which are quite a few. The Boise are is surrounded by rugged mountains, platues which created canyons because of the erosion from natural water, and valley low lands. In this sense we can say that Boise has a varied topography just like in the Appalachia and the Ozark regions which had their simalarities. The 2002 Census of Agriculture by the USDA reports that twenty-two percent of the land or 11.77 million acres (47,630 km²) in Idaho is used for agricultural purposes. The average farm size is 470 acres (1.9 km²) and the average age of the farm operator is 54.1 years (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_Idaho). Transportation in the Boise area is very simple and straight forward. Nampa located west lies around 10 miles west of boise, taking the 84 highway east will get to you to boise in 15 minutes. Most of the highways on the outsides of town are the ones crossing mountains , canyons, over rivers to make it easy to transport through the rugged and different aspects of the physical barrier that the environment imposes on the population.

The Bypassed East

Much like the Bypassed east the Boise region physically belongs to the northern part of a mountain range which is the Rockie Mountains. Another similarity is how due to erosion they have created plataues or rounded mountain compared to the Rockies rugget topography. Boise is also located in a valley next to mountain ranges, so there for lowlands are the primary agricultural zones , and the higher elevations are more natural resources and forestry. Therefore most of the populations are found in the lowland areas than mountanous areas due to the more ruggedness of the mountains. Fishing is also important in this region since it contains many fresh water fish, compared to the bypassed east which had more salt water fishing. Tourism is another of Boise's natural givens since it has a magnificant scenery, and outdoor environment need for rafting,skying , and snowboarding along its rivers , and mountains.

The North American Manufactoring Core

In Boise and Nampa not a lot of industrialization is seen close to the city, but you do see some plants around in the more rural areas such as Nampas northside , and some parts of the outskirts of boise. The more important things in Idaho is the Landscape and natural resourses , and the tourism with a alot of the natural outdoors sceneries and activities. "Idaho's rich tapestry of landscapes reflects an incrdible mineral weath and geologic diversity. It was the allure of gold that first drew miners to the Idaho Territory in the 1860s" (http://www.idahogeology.org/PDF/GeoNotes_(G)/geonote_40.pdf). Resource industries—food processing, chemical manufacturing, and lumber production—form the backbone of manufacturing in Idaho. Value added by manufacture increased from $1.4 billion in 1977 to $16 billion in 1995. In 1997, the value of shipments by major industries was $18 billion, reflecting the 6th-fastest growth rate in the previous five years for the nation (66.5%)(http://www.city-data.com/states/Idaho-Industry.html). It is seen that Idaho has a diverse manufactoring core which comes from different areas not only just industrial plants.

Megalopolis

The same way the Megalopolis is composed of a region characteristics, the Boise/Nampa area have similar physical characteristics among their region. We can say that the Megalopolis that exist in Idaho runs from west to east along the Snake river basin. A lot of water ways are also present in the Boise and Nampa areas , but they dont always provide traviling through them. Boise City-Nampa is the biggest metropolitan area between Portland, Oregon and Salt Lake City, Utah(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boise#Demographics). Boise being the biggest metropolitan city in all of Idaho serves as a urban center in the middle of a mostly rural and natural place bringing in companies such as Micron Technology. All the other small cities around Boise which are growing around the area making it the center of all the cities. Cities like Boise, Idaho, Denver, Colorado, and Minneapolis, Minnesota dominate cultural lives well outside of their home states; regions with multiple big cities in close proximity, such as along the northern east coast of the US, find that their footprints are much smaller, even if the populations are far larger (http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/003651.html). Here it shows how even much smaller cities in a proximity of each other have the same effect that the Megalopolis in the east coast has on their regions which are similar.

Foundations of Human Activity

European Settlement and Native Americans
American Indian tibes predominat in the are in historic times included the Nez Perce and the Coer d' Alene in the north: and the northern and western Shoshone and Bannock peoples in the south. Mormons are found in idaho because in early times they believe it was still part of Utah. Mormon pioneers would go on to establish the majority of historic and modern communities in Southeastern Idaho. Irish people moved into Idaho looking for agricultural land , and because catholics were already present in the northern and eastern parts of Idaho which moved them west. The first african american in Idaho came with the Lewis and Clark Expedition , but most african americans came to the area after the civil war when slavery was abolished.Blacks are the fourth largest ethnic group in Idaho according to the 2000 census. Mountain home,Boise, and Garden City have significant African American populations.The Basque people  from the Iberian penisula in Spain and southern France were traditionally  shepherds in Europe. They came to Idaho, offering hard work and perseverance in exchange for opportunity. One of the largest Basque communities in the US is in Boise, and I was able to attend one of the festivals held in Boise by the basque people.
Population/Urbanization
Through the 90's Boise's population has grown by about 48%. It is estimated that in the first 5 years of the past decade the population of Boise has grown by about 4%. Since 2005 Boise's population has grown by about 3%. (www.idcide.com/citydata/id/boise.htm) The population is growin in Boise and Nampa , which is seen when you leave the town where you see a alot of contruction of new homes, and the city growing. The city is growing amoung a mostly rural environment. The Boise area is a more diverse place , but whites are still the main race in both the city and the rural parts.

Race

Population by Race
	White	92%
	African American	1%
	Native American	1%
	Asian	2%
	Hawaiian	0%
	Other/Mixed	4%

As % of Population

The Physical Environment

Topography of Boise/Nampa
Boise/Nampa region is composed of a intermontaine Basins and platateaus according to the map from our textbook figure 2.1, and also being bordered by the Rocky Montains. With the Rockie Mountains east, a series of high, heavily dissected plateaus west of the Rockies (pg 23 textbook). This shows how the Boise/Nampa region is surrounded by mountains, and river going through or around them have caused erosion making up canyons, valleys , and Plateaus.  Many of Idaho's major cities are in the Snake River Plain, as is much of its agricultural land. Also located within Snake River Plain. Boise is located north of the Snake river , making it a part of this snake river portion which most of the major cities are located in Idaho. The Boise River is a tributary of the Snake river, approximately 75 miles (121km) long(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boise_River). The Boise River runs through a portion of downtown Boise.



Climate
The climate in Boise/Nampa area is very different depending on either winter or summer. During the Summer it is very hot and dry with low humidity making it better to withstand, and during the winter it gets cold with some snowfall. In the chart it shows the average temperature for every month of  the year showing that low temperature during winter and high during summer.

http://www.realidaho.com/images/weather/boise-average-temperature.gif

Regions and Themes

Boise  is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Idaho as well as the country seat of Ada County. Located on the Boise River, this is the principal city of the Boise City-Nampa metropolitan area and the largest city between Salt Lake City, Utah and Portland, Oregon. As of the 2008 Census Bureau estimates, Boise's city population was 205,314, making it the third largest city in the Northwest United States. The Boise Metropolitan area is estimated to have 585, 207 inhabitants, by far the most populous metropolitan area in Idaho. It is also the 98th largest US city by population.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boise,_Idaho