Lafayette

City of Lafayette
Ville de Lafayette
City
Downtown Lafayette
Flag
Nickname : Hub City
Motto : The Heart of Cajun Country
Country	United States
State	Louisiana
Parish	Lafayette
Area	47.7 sq mi (123.5 km²)
- land	47.6 sq mi (123.3 km²)
- water	0.1 sq mi (0.3 km²), 0.21%
- metro	5,252 sq mi (13,602.6 km²)
Center
- coordinates	30°12′50″N 92°01′46″W / 30.21389°N 92.02944°W / 30.21389; -92.02944Coordinates: 30°12′50″N 92°01′46″W / 30.21389°N 92.02944°W / 30.21389; -92.02944
- elevation	36 ft (11 m)
Population	110,275 (2000)
- metro	512,720 (2000)
Density	2,316.7 /sq mi (894.5 /km²)
- metro	98 /sq mi (37.8 /km²)
Founded	1821
Mayor	Joey Durel
Time zone	CST (UTC-6)
- summer (DST)	CDT (UTC-5)
ZIP codes	70501-9, 70593, 70596, 70598
Area code	337
Location of Lafayette in Louisiana
Location of Louisiana in the United States
Website : http://www.lafayettela.gov

Lafayette is a city in and the parish seat of Lafayette Parish, Louisiana, United States,^[1] on the Vermilion River. The population was 110,257 at the 2000 census; a 2007 census estimate put the metropolitan area's population at 256,494.^[2] It is the fourth largest city in the state. It is the larger principal city of the Lafayette-Acadiana, LA Combined Statistical Area, which, in 2007, had an estimated total population of 538,470.^[3]

The city was founded as Vermilionville in 1821 by a French-speaking Acadian named Jean Mouton. In 1884, it was renamed for General Lafayette, a French military hero who fought with and significantly aided the American Army during the American Revolutionary War. ^[4] The city's economy was primarily based on agriculture until the 1940s, when the petroleum and natural gas industry became dominant.

Lafayette has a strong tourism industry, attracted by the Cajun and Creole cultures of the surrounding region. Perhaps because of the Cajun reputation for good food, it has one of the highest numbers of restaurants per capita of any U.S. city.

St John's Cathedral of Roman Catholic Diocese of Lafayette in Louisiana

History

See History of Lafayette, Louisiana for main article.

Geography

Lafayette is located at 30°12′50″N 92°1′46″W / 30.21389°N 92.02944°W / 30.21389; -92.02944 (30.213901, -92.029363)^[5] and has an elevation of 36 feet (11.0 m)^[6].

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 47.7 square miles (123.5 km²), of which, 47.6 square miles (123.3 km²) of it is land and 0.1 square miles (0.2 km²) of it (0.19%) is water.

The Vermilion River runs through the center of Lafayette. Other significant waterways in the city are Isaac Verot Coulee, Coulee Mine, Coulee des Poches and Coulee Ile des Cannes, which are natural drainage canals that lead to the Vermilion River.

Demographics

Isaac Verot Coulee

As of the census^[7] of 2000, there were 110,257 people, 43,506 households, and 27,104 families residing in the city. The population density was 2,316.7 people per square mile (894.5/km²). There were 46,865 housing units at an average density of 984.7/sq mi (380.2/km²). The racial makeup of the city was 68.23% White, 28.51% African American, 0.25% Native American, 1.44% Asian, 0.02% Pacific Islander, 0.58% from other races, and 0.97% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 1.88% of the population. In 2005, 84.2% of the population over the age of five spoke English at home, and 11.5% of the population spoke French or Cajun.^[8]

There were 43,506 households out of which 31.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 43.9% were married couples living together, 14.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 37.7% were non-families. Nearly 29.4% of all households were made up of individuals, and 8.0% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.43 and the average family size was 3.07.

In the city the population was spread out with 25.1% under the age of 18, 13.3% from 18 to 24, 29.5% from 25 to 44, 20.9% from 45 to 64, and 11.2% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 33 years. For every 100 females there were 93.1 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 90.9 males.

The median income for a household in the city was $35,996, and the median income for a family was $47,783. Males had a median income of $37,729 versus $23,606 for females. The per capita income for the city was $21,031. About 11.6% of families and 16.3% of the population were below the poverty line, including 18.3% of those under age 18 and 14.5% of those age 65 or over.

Also, the population of the Lafayette area has increased in recent years since Hurricane Katrina. Many refugees from the Greater New Orleans either have permanently relocated to Lafayette or have stayed there for a prolonged period of time.

Education

University of Louisiana at Lafayette

Public Schools

• Lafayette Parish Public Schools

Private Schools

• Cathedral Carmel School
• Ascension Episcopal School
• Academy of the Sacred Heart (not in Lafayette Parish but most students are Lafayette residents)
• St. Genevieve Catholic School (Middle and Elementary)
• Sts. Leo-Seton Catholic School
• Our Lady of Fatima School
• Lafayette Christian Academy
• St. Thomas More School
• Teurlings Catholic High School
• Episcopal School of Acadiana
• Lafayette Lutheran School
• Family Life Christian Academy
• Holy Family Catholic School
• Immaculate Heart of Mary School
• First Baptist Christian School
• St. Pius
• Westminster Christian Academy

University and colleges

• The University of Louisiana at Lafayette
• South Louisiana Community College (Lafayette campus)
• Louisiana Technical College (Lafayette campus)
• Remington College (Lafayette campus)

Public Library System

• Lafayette Public Library System

Health and medicine

Lafayette is served by the following hospitals.

• Lafayette General Medical Center - 1214 Coolidge Street
• Lafayette General Surgical Hospital - 1000 West Pinhook Road
• Lafayette Surgical Specialty Hospital - 1101 Kaliste Saloom Road
• University Medical Center - 2390 West Congress Street
• Womens and Childrens Hospital - 4600 Ambassador Caffery Parkway
• Medical Center of Southwest Louisiana - 2810 Ambassador Caffery Parkway
• Our Lady of Lourdes Regional Medical Center - 611 Saint Landry Street

Lafayette is also the Home Office of LHC Group, Inc. (a nation-wide home health, hospice, and long-term acute care provider with over 250 locations in 17 states) - 420 West Pinhook Road.

Sports

Lafayette is home to the Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns, the athletic teams of The University of Louisiana at Lafayette. It is also home to the Lafayette Bayou Bulls semi-pro football program which started in 2003. It is home to the Louisiana Hurricanes, a semi-pro football team that plays at STM Stadium. Between the years of 1995 and 2005, Lafayette was home to the Louisiana IceGators ECHL hockey team; in 2009, the IceGators will return as a member of the Southern Professional Hockey League.^[9] Also starting in 2009, Lafayette is be home to the Acadiana Mudbugs of the Southern Indoor Football League. Lafayette is home to three large sports venues: the Cajundome, Cajun Field and Blackham Coliseum.

Military

Lafayette is the home of the National Guard headquarters of the 256th Infantry Brigade, a military unit of over 3,000 soldiers that served in Iraq in the years of 2004-2005.

Lafayette is also home to the United States Marine Corps Reserve Unit, D. Co. AT Battalion. This unit has been on several deployments and currently have assets in Iraq.

Government and politics

Since the consolidation of city and parish governments, Lafayette has had a city-parish president as its chief executive, rather than a mayor as it had previously. The current Republican city-parish president is Joey Durel.

See also Notable local politicians

Media

Print

• Lafayette Grapevine: local website [1]
• Acadiana Profile magazine, established in 1968 by Robert Angers
• Lafayette Daily Advertiser: The Daily Advertiser, daily Gannett newspaper
• The Independent Weekly, weekly newspaper
• The Times of Acadiana, weekly newspaper
• The Advocate, daily newspaper
• The Vermillion, UL Lafayette student newspaper

Television

Lafayette is home to KATC-TV, Channel 3, an (ABC) affiliate, KLFY-TV Channel 10 (CBS), KADN-TV, Channel 15 (Fox), and KLWB, Channel 50 (CW). KPLC-TV, Channel 7 and WVLA, Channel 33, are NBC affiliates, located in nearby Lake Charles and Baton Rouge, respectively, but serve Lafayette as well.

Radio

• List of Lafayette radio stations
• Radiolicious, internet radio

Points of interest

• Acadian Village is a reconstructed Cajun bayou community (of moved and reassembled authentic buildings) and has a representative collection of Cajun furnishings. Website
• Acadiana Center for the Arts
• Alexandre Mouton House Museum was home to Louisiana's first Democratic governor, Alexandre Mouton, who once lived in this antebellum town house. It is now a museum and contain collection of antiques, historical documents, and old mardi gras costumes.
• Cajundome, home to the Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns basketball teams, serves as a convention space.
• Cajun Field also nicknamed "the Swamp" is home to the Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns football team.
• Children's Museum of Acadiana
• Cité des Arts
• Acadiana Center for the Arts
• Cypress Lake
• Heymann Center A performing arts center.
• Jean Lafitte National Park Acadian Cultural Center
• Jefferson Street Market has 65 shops under one roof, offering everything from fine French antiques to fine art by regional artists.
• Lafayette Natural History Museum & Planetarium is a combination museum and planetarium, which houses over 1,000 paintings, prints and sculpture of Louisiana artists and regularly changing exhibits and planetarium programs.
• Louisiana Immersive Technologies Enterprise (LITE) is a state-of-the-art resource center encompassing the world's first six-sided, digital virtual reality cube as well as the world's largest digital 3-D auditorium.
• Mall of Acadiana - Contains a Dillards, Sears, JCPenny, Macy's, and over 120 specialty stores and services.
• Paul and Lulu Hillard University Art Museum has a Permanent Collection consisting of more than 2000 works of art, including paintings, prints, drawings, sculpture, and photographs that represent 18th, 19th and 20th century Louisiana, in addition to works from around the world.
• University of Louisiana at Lafayette
• National Wetlands Research Center is a research facility operated by the U.S. Geological Survey that focuses on estuarine, marine, and freshwater wetlands.
• Vermilionville is a reconstruction of a Cajun-Creole settlement from the 1765-to-1890 era
• Zoo of Acadiana is located nearby in Broussard.
• Lafayette Public Library System

The Lafayette High School Marching Band-The Lafayette High School Band has competed nationally and locally, placing 1st in the Louisiana Showcase of Marching Bands for 6 straight years and was ranked 12th in the nation at the Bands of America competition in Indianapolis,IN. Events

• Festivals Acadiens
• Festival International
• Festival de Musique Acadienne
• MechaCon (Louisiana's longest running Anime and Japanese Cultural Convention)
• Mardi Gras (the second largest Mardi Gras celebration in Louisiana)

Downtown Lafayette

Retail and Shopping

Lafayette serves as the retail and shopping hub of the Acadiana area, serving an eight parish area. The seat of this retail is the Mall of Acadiana. The mall features department stores Macy's, Dillards, JC Penney, and Sears. It also includes over 100 specialty stores, such as Express, Abercrombie & Fitch, American Eagle Outfitters, Talbots, Chico's, Nine West, and Coldwater Creek. Other retailers/stores that have recently located in Lafayette include Kohl's, Incredible Pizza Co., and Plato's Closet. Academy Sports and Outdoors recently built a new building for its Lafayette location to become the largest store in the Academy chain.

More specialty boutique shopping can be found in areas such as the Oil Center.

Transportation

• Air: Lafayette Regional Airport (LFT) is on US Highway 90, on the southeast side of the city.
• Interstate Highway: I-10 and I-49 (Lafayette serves as I-49's southern terminus, at its intersection with I-10)
• Passenger Rail: The Amtrak Sunset Limited offers service from New Orleans, Louisiana and Los Angeles, California with selected stops in Louisiana, Texas, Arizona and California. The 2004 Route Guide describes service eastward to Orlando, Florida, but this has not been restored in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
• Public Transit: Lafayette Transit System[2] provides bus service.

Lafayette is also served by U.S. Routes 90 (known as the Evangeline Thruway for part of its route) and 167 (also known as Johnston Street). Ambassador Caffery Parkway, named for Jefferson Caffery, serves as a partially completed loop around Lafayette. Other arterial roads serving Lafayette include Verot School Road (LA 339), Congress Street, Kaliste Saloom Road (LA 3095), Carmel Dr. (LA 94), University Avenue (LA 182), and Pinhook Road (LA 182).

See also

• List of people from Lafayette, Louisiana

References

External links

• Lafayette Consolidated Government
• Lafayette Conventions and Visitors Center
• Downtown Alive
• Pelicans on Parade in Lafayette

v • d • e Municipalities and communities of Lafayette Parish, Louisiana Parish seat: Lafayette Cities Broussard‡ | Carencro | Lafayette | Scott | Youngsville Town Duson‡ Unincorporated community Milton Footnotes ‡This populated place also has portions in an adjacent parish or parishes

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v • d • e Mayors of cities with populations of 100,000 in Louisiana     Ray Nagin (New Orleans) Kip Holden (Baton Rouge) Cedric Glover (Shreveport) Joey Durel (Lafayette)