Miami Beach

Miami Beach City of Miami Beach
—  City  —
Southern portion of Miami Beach with downtown Miami in background
Seal
Nickname(s): The Beach
Location in Miami-Dade County and the state of Florida
U.S. Census Bureau map showing city limits
Coordinates: 25°48′46.89″N 80°8′2.63″W / 25.813025°N 80.1340639°W / 25.813025; -80.1340639Coordinates: 25°48′46.89″N 80°8′2.63″W / 25.813025°N 80.1340639°W / 25.813025; -80.1340639
Country	United States
State	Florida
County	Miami-Dade
Incorporated	March 26, 1915
Government
• Mayor	Matti Herrera Bower
Area
• City	18.7 sq mi (48.5 km2)
• Land	7.0 sq mi (18.2 km2)
• Water	11.7 sq mi (30.2 km2)  62.37%
Elevation[1]	4 ft (1.2 m)
Population (2010)
• City	87,779
• Density	12,539.8/sq mi (4,841.6/km2)
• Metro	5,564,635
Time zone	EST (UTC-5)
• Summer (DST)	EDT (UTC-4)
Zip	33109, 33139, 33140, 33141.
Area code(s)	305, 786
FIPS code	12-45025[2]
GNIS feature ID	0286750[3]
Website	www.miamibeachfl.gov

Miami Beach is a coastal resort city in Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States, incorporated on March 26, 1915.^[4] The municipality is located on a series of natural and man-made barrier islands between the Atlantic Ocean and Biscayne Bay, the latter which separates the Beach from Miami city proper. The neighborhood of South Beach, comprising the southernmost 2.5 square miles (6.5 km²) of Miami Beach, along with Downtown Miami and the port collectively form the commercial center of South Florida.^[5] As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 87,779. Miami Beach has been one of America's pre-eminent beach resorts since the early 20th century.

Description

In 1979 Miami Beach's Art Deco Historic District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Art Deco District is the largest collection of Art Deco architecture in the world^[6] and comprises hundreds of hotels, apartments and other structures erected between 1923 and 1943. Mediterranean, Streamline Moderne and Art Deco are all represented in the District. The Historic District is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean on the East, Lenox Court on the West, 6th Street on the South and Dade Boulevard along the Collins Canal to the North. The movement to preserve the Art Deco District's architectural heritage was led by former interior designer Barbara Capitman, who now has a street in the District named in her honor.

Government

Miami Beach is governed by a mayor and six commissioners. The mayor runs commission meetings and the mayor and all commissioners have equal voting power. The mayor serves for terms of two years with a term limit of three terms and commissioners serve for terms of four years and are limited to two terms. Commissioners are voted for citywide and every two years three commission seats are voted upon. A city manager is responsible for administering governmental operations.

As of November 2009 the mayor is Matti Herrera Bower. The commissioners are Michael Gongora, Jerry Libbin, Jorge Exposito, Nathan Garg, Ed Tobin, Deede Weithorn, and Jonah Wolfson.

As of November 2010 the mayor is still Matti Herrera Bower. She won with 59.47% of the vote. The commissioners are Deede Weithorn, Wilfredo "Willy" Gort, and Marc Sanoff. [4]

History

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The first structure to be built on this uninhabited oceanfront was the Biscayne House of Refuge, constructed in 1876 by the U.S. Lifesaving Service at approximately 72nd Street. Its purpose was to provide food, water, and a return to civilization for people who were shipwrecked. The next step in the development of the future Miami Beach was the planting of a coconut plantation along the shore here in the 1880s by New Jersey entrepreneurs Ezra Osborn and Elnathan Field, but this was a failed venture. One of the investors in the project was agriculturist John S. Collins, who achieved success by buying out other partners and planting different crops, notably avocadoes, on the land that would later become Miami Beach. Meanwhile, across Biscayne Bay, the City of Miami was established in 1896 with the arrival of the railroad, and developed further as a port when the shipping channel of Government Cut was created in 1905, cutting off Fisher Island from the south end of the Miami Beach peninsula. Collins' family members saw the potential in developing the beach here as a resort. This effort got underway in the early years of the 20th century by the Collins/Pancoast family, the Lummus brothers (bankers from Miami), and Indianapolis entrepreneur Carl G. Fisher. Until then, the beach here was only the destination for day-trips by ferry from Miami, across the bay. There were bath houses and food stands here, but no hotel until Brown's Hotel was built in 1915 (still standing, at 112 Ocean Drive). Much of the interior land mass here at that time was a tangled jungle of mangroves, and clearing it was a herculean effort. The Town of Miami Beach was chartered on March 26, 1915; it grew to become a City in 1917. Carl Fisher was the main promoter of Miami Beach's development in the 1920s as the site for wealthy industrialists from the north and midwest to build their winter homes here. In addition, Fisher built five hotels here (none still surviving). In the 1920s, Fisher and others literally created much of Miami Beach as landfill by dredging Biscayne Bay; this manmade territory includes Star, Palm, and Hibiscus Islands, the Sunset Islands, much of Normandy Isle, and all of the Venetian Islands except Belle Isle. The Miami Beach peninsula became an island in April 1925 when Haulover Cut was opened, connecting the ocean to the bay, north of present-day Bal Harbour. The great hurricane of Sept. 17-18, 1926, put an end to this prosperous era of the Florida Boom, but in the 1930s, Miami Beach still attracted tourists, and investors constructed the mostly small-scale, stucco hotels and rooming houses, for seasonal rental, that comprise much of the present "Art Deco" historic district.

Middle American history

Coconut Grove golden era

The railroad, advertising by Tuttle’s robber-baron businesses, and general boosterism, brought in a new group of people to the newly established city. Much like other Southern coastal areas such Mobile, Alabama, Jacksonville, Florida, and New Orleans, Louisiana, Miami had a previous history of rowdy even outlawed behavior by a group of adventurers of mixed European and Indian nationality which had only been quieted and integrated with wider American and Southern culture in the middle 19th century. This new group was to reverse those gains as large numbers of Irish and German Catholics as well as typical Northern Yankee Americans arrived. The old Southern establishment already long crippled by the Civil War was quickly brushed aside, with the election of Miami's first mayor who also was an Irish Catholic. However, most of the early merchants remained Southern or of old Judeo-American background so Southern they became notorious in later years for their disdain and discrimination toward Jews from New York City. Additionally, the old Coconut Grove community of mixed American, Black, Indian, Anglo-Bahamians remained in politics controlling one-third of the city's incorporators. Backed by real estate boosterism, Greater Miami never lacked for forward thinkers, including John Collins (a New Jersey Quaker) and Prest-O-Lite king Carl Fisher, who together in 1913 embarked on an agriculture venture on a spit of oceanfront beach and started a bridge across the bay.

Great Depression and the new immigrant elite

Beth Jacob Social Hall and Congregation

During the Depression, Pan American Airways launched the era of modern aviation with "Flying Clippers" from Miami's Dinner Key. Even then, Pan Am advertised Miami as the "Gateway to the Americas." However, much as elsewhere the Depression significantly hit the fortunes of the North-Eastern elite and just as quickly as Miami Beach’s high-flying escapades made for movies on the silver screens so did it depart. Although the native elite of Coconut Grove and Miami Beach had certainly lost on much of the wealth creation of the Northern elite, the native Miami Beach establishment had been fairly integrated into the development and expansion of Miami Beach. Thus, whilst the loss of the money and elegance provided by the Northern elite was felt economically, Miami Beach still retained its old ways and community.

However, in the destitute period of the Great Depression, Miami Beach attracted a new group, who found its numerous vacant vacation homes and elegant hotels, and still extant working class world and old line but almost decrepit families tracing back centuries, almost impossible to resist. Thus, did the North-East’s immigrant communities of Italians, Irish and predominantly Jews, come to Miami Beach and take-over and sub-divide its large hotels and mansions into smaller hotels and town homes and finally force most of the remaining old line families to sell out their ancestral land and homes. In turn, with land so cheap, the new Jewish and Italian businessmen, bought most of the remaining farmland and beach front portages for small craft dating from the buccaneers and which dotted the inner harbor of Miami, and in turn paved them over with buildings of stark modern lines along lower Collins Avenue and Ocean Drive to create Miami Beach‘s world famous Art Deco district.

With this came the final end of old Coconut Grove, which from the 1500’s had been a haunt of shipwrecked adventurers, notorious pirates, famous buccaneers, imperviously strong refugees and survivors of the Counter-Reformation and the Seminole Indian wars. Public Houses which claimed descent as Privateer dens were torn down, piers which had repaired many a sole surviving ship of a fleet destroyed by storm, and almost ancient plantation houses, all were destroyed and its former citizens thrown to the wind. Although, the changes are seen as a travesty today and a huge loss of Miami Beach‘s culture, the building boom helped bring the area out of the Depression and forty years later would become the world-famous Art Deco District, which includes the internationally renowned South Beach area.

Post World War American history

Suburbanization

After World War II, a wave of immigrants entered the area from the Northern United States. Miami Beach, like the rest of South Florida, went through a population explosion, adding hundreds of thousands of persons in only a few decades.

After Castro's rise to power in 1959, a wave of refugees entered South Florida and dramatically changed the demographic make-up of the area.

Modern American history

Culture

Image and cultural depictions

South Beach (also known as SoBe, or simply The Beach, the area from 1st street to about 25th street) is one of the more popular areas of Miami Beach. Topless sunbathing by women is illegal, but is officially tolerated on South Beach.^[7] Before the TV show Miami Vice helped make the area popular, SoBe was under urban blight, with vacant buildings and a high crime rate. Today, it is considered one of the richest commercial areas on the beach, yet poverty and crime still remain in some places near the area.^[8]

Art deco hotels in Miami Beach.

Miami Beach, particularly Ocean Drive of what is now the Art Deco District, was also featured prominently in the 1983 feature film Scarface and the 1996 comedy The Birdcage.

The New World Symphony Orchestra is based in Miami Beach, under the direction of Michael Tilson Thomas.

Lincoln Road, running east-west between 16th and 17th Streets, is a nationally known spot for outdoor dining, bicycling, rollerblading and shopping and features and galleries of well known designers, artists and photographers such as Romero Britto, Peter Lik, and Jonathan Adler.^{[citation needed]}

Jewish population

Miami Beach is home to a number of Orthodox Jewish communities with a network of well-established synagogues and yeshivas, the first of which being the Landow Yeshiva, a Chabad institution in operation for over 30 years. In addition, there is also a liberal Jewish community containing such famous synagogues as Temple Emanu-El (Miami Beach, Florida) and Cuban Hebrew Congregation. It is also a magnet for Jewish families, retirees, and particularly snowbirds when the cold winter sets in to the north. They range from the Modern Orthodox to the Haredi and Hasidic – including many rebbes who vacation there during the North American winter.

There are a number of kosher restaurants and even kollels for post-graduate Talmudic scholars, such as the Miami Beach Community Kollel. Miami Beach had roughly 60,000 people in Jewish households, 62 percent of the total population, in 1982, but only 16,500, or 19 percent of the population, in 2004, said Ira Sheskin, a demographer at the University of Miami who conducts surveys once a decade.^{[citation needed]}

Miami Beach is home to the Holocaust Memorial on Miami Beach.

LGBT community

After decades of economic and social decline, an influx of gay men and lesbians moving to South Beach in the late-1980s to mid-1990s helped contribute to Miami Beach's revitalization. The newcomers purchased and restored dilapidated Art Deco hotels and clubs, started numerous businesses, and built political power in city and county government.^[9] As South Beach became more popular as a national and international tourist destination, there have been occasional clashes between cultures and disputes about whether South Beach is as "gay friendly" as it once was.^[10]

Miami Beach is home to numerous gay bars and gay-specific events, and five service and resource organizations. The passage of progressive civil rights laws,^[9] election of outspokenly pro-gay Miami Beach Mayor Matti Bower, and the introduction of Miami Beach's Gay Pride Celebration, have reinvigorated the local LGBT community in recent years, which some argued had experienced a decline in the late 2000s.^[11] A handful of anti-gay attacks^{[citation needed]} and some instances of Miami Beach Police brutality against gay men^[12] have been at odds with Miami Beach's longstanding image as a welcoming place for gay people.^[13]

Miami Beach is home to some of the country's largest fundraisers that benefit both local and national LGBT nonprofits. As of 2011, some of the largest LGBT events in Miami Beach are:

• The Winter Party
• The White Party
• The Miami Recognition Dinner
• The Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival
• Aqua Girl

In 2008, the new Miami Beach Mayor Matti Bower created a Gay Business Development Ad Hoc Committee, with a mission to bring recommendations to the Mayor and City Commission on initiatives to be implemented and supported by the City regarding a variety of issues to ensure the welfare and future of the Miami Beach LGBT community.

While being a gay mecca of the 1980s and 1990s, Miami Beach never had a city sanctioned Gay Pride Parade until April 2009.^[14] With strong support from the newly elected mayor Matti Bower.,^[15] Miami Beach had its first Gay Pride Festival in April 2009.^[16] It is now an annual event. The 2010 Pride drew tens of thousands of people.^[17]

In 2009, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) began looking into instances of Miami Beach Police Department (MBPD) targeting gay men for harassment.^[18] In February 2010, the ACLU announced that it will sue the City of Miami Beach for an ongoing targeting and arrests of gay men in public.^[19] According to the ACLU, Miami Beach police have a history of arresting gay men for simply looking “too gay”.^[20]

The incidents between gay men and MBPD resulted in negative publicity for the city.^[21] At the meeting with the local gay leaders, Miami Beach Police Chief Carlos Noriega claimed that the incidents were isolated, and promised increased diversity training for police officers. He also announced that captain, who is a lesbian, would soon be reassigned to internal affairs to handle complaints about cops accused of harassing gays. Some members of the committee were skeptical of Noriega's assertion that the recent case wasn't indicative of a larger problem in the MBPD, and provided examples of other cases.^[22]

In January 2010, Miami Beach passed a revised Human Rights Ordinance that strengthens enforcement of already existing human rights laws and adds protections for transgendered people,^[23] making Miami Beach’s human rights laws some of the most progressive in the state.^[9] Both residents of, and visitors to, Miami Beach have been able to register as domestic partners since 2004;^[24] in 2008 this benefit was extended to all of Miami-Dade County.^[25]

In 2010, the Miami-Dade Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce, with support from the City of Miami Beach, opened an LGBT Visitor Center at Miami Beach's Old City Hall.

The arts

Each December, the City of Miami Beach hosts Art Basel Miami Beach, one of the largest art shows in the United States. Art Basel Miami Beach, the sister event to the Art Basel event held each June in Basel, Switzerland, combines an international selection of top galleries with a program of special exhibitions, parties and crossover events featuring music, film, architecture and design. Exhibition sites are located in the city's Art Deco District, and ancillary events are scattered throughout the greater Miami metropolitan area.

Miami Beach is home to the New World Symphony, established in 1987 under the artistic direction of Michael Tilson Thomas. In January 2011, the New World Symphony made a highly publicized move into the New World Center building designed by Canadian American Pritzker Prize-winning architect Frank Gehry. Gehry is famous for his design of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California. The new Gehry building offers Live Wallcasts™, which allow visitors to experience select events throughout the season at the half-acre, outdoor Miami Beach SoundScape through the use of visual and audio technology on a 7,000-square-foot (650 m²) projection wall.

The Miami City Ballet, a ballet company founded in 1985, which is housed in a 63,000-square-foot (5,900 m²) building near Miami Beach's Bass Museum of Art.

The Miami Beach Festival of the Arts is an annual outdoor art festival that was begun in 1974.

In November 2007 and 2009, a multi-media art festival ("Sleepless Night") was held based on Nuit Blanche.^[26][27] The festival returns on November 5, 2011.[5]

Geography

South Beach in March 2008

Miami Beach is located at 25°48′47″N 80°08′03″W / 25.813025°N 80.134065°W / 25.813025; -80.134065 (25.813025, −80.134065).^[28]

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 18.7 square miles (48.5 km²), of which 7.0 square miles (18.2 km²) is land and 11.7 square miles (30.2 km²) (62.37%) is water.

Climate

It has a Tropical monsoon climate (Köppen Am),^[29] with hot humid summers and warm winters. There is a marked wet season during the summer months, with dry winters that feature much lower humidity. Miami Beach is one of only a handful of U.S. locales that has never recorded snow or snow flurries in its weather history.

Miami Beach's location on the Atlantic Ocean, near its confluence with the Gulf of Mexico, make it extraordinarily vulnerable to hurricanes and tropical storms. It has experienced two direct hits from major hurricanes in recorded weather history; the 1926 Miami hurricane and Hurricane Cleo in 1964. The area has seen indirect contact from hurricanes Betsy (1965), Andrew (1992), Irene (1999), Michelle (2001), Katrina (2005), and Wilma (2005).

Water temperature

This chart shows the average coastal water temperature for the Atlantic Ocean by month in degrees Fahrenheit for Miami Beach based on historical measurements.^[31]

Surrounding areas

Surrounding areas of Miami Beach

	Biscayne Bay	Indian Creek, Surfside	Atlantic Ocean
	Biscayne Bay, North Bay Village, Miami, Fisher Island		Atlantic Ocean
		Miami Beach
	Fisher Island	Government Cut, Fisher Island	Atlantic Ocean

Demographics

As of 2000, there were 46,194 households out of which 14.0% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 27.4% were married couples living together, 8.5% had a female householder with no husband present, and 60.3% were non-families. 48.7% of all households were made up of individuals and 14.8% had someone living alone who was sixty-five years of age or older. The average household size was 1.87 and the average family size was 2.76.

In the city the population was spread out with 13.4% under the age of 18, 7.8% from 18 to 24, 38.2% from 25 to 44, 21.3% from 45 to 64, and 19.2% who were sixty-five years of age or older. The median age was thirty-nine years. For every 100 females there were 105.0 males. For every 100 females age eighteen and over, there were 105.4 males.

The median income for a household in the city was $27,322, and the median income for a family was $33,440. Males had a median income of $33,964 versus $27,094 for females. The per capita income for the city was $27,853. About 17.0% of families and 21.8% of the population were below the poverty line, including 25.2% of those under age 18 and 24.5% of those age sixty-five or over.

As of 2000, speakers of Spanish as a first language accounted for 55% of residents, while English made up 33%, Portuguese was at 3.4%, French was at 1.7%, German at 1.1%, Italian 1%, and Russian was 0.85% of the population. Due to the large Jewish community, Yiddish was spoken at the home of 0.81% of the population, and Hebrew was the mother tongue of 0.74%.^[32]

As of 2000, Miami Beach had the 22nd highest concentration of Cuban residents in the United States, at 20.5% of the population.^[33] It had the 28th highest percentage of Colombian residents, at 4.4% of the city's population,^[34] and the 14th highest percentage of Brazilian residents, at 2.2% of the its population (tied with Hillside, New Jersey and Hudson, Massachusetts.)^[35] It also had the 27th largest concentration of Peruvian ancestry, at 1.85%,^[36] and the 27th highest percentage of people of Venezuelan heritage, at 1.79%.^[37] Miami Beach also has the 33rd highest concentration of Honduran ancestry (1.03%)^[38] and the 41st-highest percentage of Nicaraguan residents, which made up 1% of the population.^[39]

Transportation

Public Transportation in Miami Beach is operated by Miami-Dade Transit (MDT). Along with neighborhoods such as Downtown and Brickell, public transit is heavily used in Miami Beach, and is a vital part of city life. Although Miami Beach has no direct Metrorail stations, numerous Metrobus lines, connect to Downtown Miami and Metrorail (i.e., the 'S' bus line). The 'South Beach Local' or 'SBL' is one of the most heavily-used lines in Miami, and connects all major points of South Beach to other major bus lines in the city. Metrobus ridership in Miami Beach is high, with some of the routes, such as the L and S alone being the busiest Metrobus routes.^[40]

The Airport-Beach Express (Route 150), operated by MDT, is a direct-service bus line that connects Miami International Airport to major points in South Beach. The ride costs $2.35, and runs every 30 minutes from 6:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. seven days a week.^[41]

Bicycling

In recent years, bicycling has grown in popular in Miami Beach. Due to its dense, urban nature, and pedestrian-friendly streets, many Miami Beach residents get around by bicycle.

In March 2011 a public bike sharing program named Decobike was launched, one of only a handful of such programs in the United States. The program is operated by a private corporation, Decobike, LLC, but is partnered with the City of Miami Beach in a revenue sharing model.^[42] Once fully implemented, the program hopes to have around 1000 bikes accessible from 100 stations throughout Miami Beach, from around 85th Street on the north side of Miami Beach all the way south to South Pointe Park.^[43]

Education

Miami-Dade County Public Schools serves Miami Beach.

• North Beach Elementary
• South Pointe Elementary
• Biscayne Elementary
• Feinberg/Fisher K - 8 Center
• Treasure Island Elementary in nearby North Bay Village
• Ruth K. Broad/ Bay Harbor Elementary in nearby Bay Harbor Islands
• Matter Beach Academy Charter School
• Nautilus Middle School (which is the only Public middle school for the Miami Beach area)
• Miami Beach Senior High School (which is the only Public high school for the Miami Beach area)

Private schools include Alexander S. Gross Hebrew Academy, St. Patrick Catholic School, Landow Yeshiva – Lubavitch Educational Center (Klurman Mesivta High School for Boys and Beis Chana Middle and High School for Girls), and Mechina High School.

Colleges and universities

The Florida International University School of Architecture has a sister campus at 420 Lincoln Road in South Beach, with classroom spaces for FIU architecture, art, music and theater graduate students^[44]

Neighborhoods

A portion of the southern part of the South Beach skyline as seen from Biscayne Bay. Photo: Marc Averette

The northernmost section of the city referred to as North Beach

South Beach

• Bayshore
• Belle Isle
• City Center
• Di Lido Island
• Flagler Monument Island
• Flamingo/Lummus
• Hibiscus Island
• Palm Island
• Rivo Alto Island
• San Marino Island
• Star Island

North Beach

• Biscayne Point
• Isle of Normandy
• La Gorce

Points of interest

The Fillmore

• Fillmore Miami Beach at the Jackie Gleason Theatre
• Eden Roc (hotel)
• Flagler Monument Island
• Fontainebleau Hotel
• Versace Mansion (Casa Casuarina)
• Holocaust Memorial
• Lincoln Road
• Miami Beach Architectural District
• Miami Beach Botanical Garden
• Ocean Drive
• South Beach
• Wolfsonian-FIU Museum

Notable residents

Historical

• George Ade, writer
• Moses Annenberg, newspaper publisher
• Desi Arnaz, entertainer
• John Jacob Astor, businessman
• Walter Briggs, Sr., entrepreneur, owner of The Detroit Tigers
• Al Capone, mobster
• John S. Collins, horticulturist
• Kent Cooper, Associated Press
• James M. Cox, Governor of Ohio and presidential candidate
• Harvey Firestone, Firestone Tires
• Carl Graham Fisher, developer of Miami Beach
• Frank Gannett, Gannett Media Corporation
• Gabriel Heatter, radio commentator
• John D. Hertz, Hertz Rental Cars
• Howard Hughes, businessman
• S.S. Kresge, retailer
• Albert Lasker, businessman
• Nunnally Johnson, film director
• Ring Lardner, writer
• Bernarr MacFadden, bodybuilder, owner of the Deauville Hotel
• James Cash Penney, department store magnate
• Irving Jacob Reuter, General Motors
• Grantland Rice, sportswriter
• Knute Rockne, football player and coach
• Damon Runyon, newspaperman and writer
• Nicholas Schenck, MGM studios
• Dutch Schultz, mobster
• Albert Warner, Warner Brothers studio founder
• Walter Winchell, columnist
• Garfield Wood, inventor

Post-World War II

• Ellen Barkin, actress
• David Brinkley, newsman
• Edna Buchanan, journalist
• Luther Campbell, rap performer
• Frank Costello, mobster
• Terry Cousin, football player, The Miami Dolphins
• Frank Erickson, bookmaker
• Gloria Estefan, entertainer
• Joan Field, concert violinist
• Roy Firestone, sportscaster and entertainer
• Andy Garcia, actor
• Barry Gibb and Maurice Gibb, singers, members of The Bee Gees
• Mitch Glazer, writer and producer
• Jackie Gleason, comedian and actor
• Thomas Harris, writer
• Maida Heatter, chef and author
• Kim Hunter, actress
• Dan Gelber, judge and Florida state senator
• Chubby Jackson, jazz musician
• Larry King, television host
• Gerald Kogan, Chief Justice, Florida Supreme Court
• Morris Lapidus, architect
• Meyer Lansky, mobster
• William Lehman, U.S. Representative
• Jennifer Lopez, entertainer
• Sheila MacRae, actress
• Mark Medoff, playwright, screenwriter and director
• Bob Mover, jazz musician
• Murph the Surf, surfer and criminal
• Chad Ochocinco, football player, The Cincinnati Bengals
• Brett Ratner, film director
• Martha Raye, entertainer, night club owner
• Samari Rolle, football player, The Baltimore Ravens
• Elliot Roosevelt, Miami Beach mayor, son of Franklin Delano Roosevelt
• Stephen M. Ross, real estate developer, owner of The Miami Dolphins
• Mickey Rourke, actor
• Robert Rubin, former United States Secretary of the Treasury
• Porfirio Rubirosa, diplomat
• Duane Starks, football player, The Baltimore Ravens
• Daniel Taradash, screenwriter
• Dave Thomas, football player, The Dallas Cowboys
• Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor
• Neal Walk, NBA basketball player
• Barbara Walters, television journalist
• Louis Wolfson, financier, racehorse owner
• Mitchell Wolfson, Jr., businessman, philanthropist
• Mana Zucca, composer
• Hal Prewitt, race car driver, inventor of personal computer products and early pioneer in the personal computer revolution

Sister cities

Miami Beach has 11 sister cities^[45]

• Brampton, Canada^[46]
• Almonte, Spain
• Marbella, Spain
• Fortaleza, Brazil
• Santa Marta, Colombia
• Ceský Krumlov, Czech Republic
• Nahariya, Israel
• Pescara, Italy
• Fujisawa, Japan
• Cozumel, Mexico
• Ica, Peru

See also

Miami portal

• Neighborhoods of Miami Beach, Florida
• List of upscale shopping districts
• South Florida
• Miami-Dade County
• Miami Beach Police Department
• Miami Modern Architecture
• John S. Collins
• Carl G. Fisher
• Collins Bridge
• Rosie the Elephant
• A Hole in the Head
• The Bellboy
• Fair Game (1995 film)
• Doral Hotel
• Ocean Drive
• Julia Tuttle Causeway
• Macarthur Causeway
• Venetian Causeway
• Spring Break
• 8th & Ocean

References

Further reading

• Kennedy, Patricia, Miami Beach, Arcadia Publishing, Images of America series, 2006
• Lavender, Abraham D., Miami Beach in 1920: The Making of a Winter Resort, Arcadia Publishing, The Making of America Series, 2002

Gallery

• 

  The historical Art Deco District at South Beach during the night.

• 

  The Art Deco District at South Beach during the day.

• 

  Colorful new building blends in with the historic Art Deco

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Miami Beach, Florida

Official sites

• City of Miami Beach

Photos

• Miami Beach Architecture Photos
• The lifeguard towers of Miami Beach
• Photographs of Miami Beach From the State Library & Archives of Florida
• Photos of Miami Beach, Miami and surrounding areas

Other

• Miami Design Preservation League – Non-profit Organization for the preservation of Miami Beach Architectural History
• Miami's Southeast Coast – Biscayne Bay Watershed – Florida DEP

v d e Neighborhoods of Miami Beach South Beach Belle Isle • City Center • Di Lido Island • Flagler Monument Island • Flamingo/Lummus • Hibiscus Island • Palm Island • Rivo Alto Island • San Marino Island • Star Island Mid-Beach Bayshore • Nautilus North Beach Biscayne Point • Isle of Normandy • La Gorce

v d e Municipalities and communities of Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States County seat: Miami Cities Aventura Coral Gables Doral Florida City Hialeah Hialeah Gardens Homestead Islandia Miami Miami Beach Miami Gardens Miami Springs North Bay Village North Miami North Miami Beach Opa-locka South Miami Sunny Isles Beach Sweetwater West Miami Towns Bay Harbor Islands Cutler Bay Golden Beach Medley Miami Lakes Surfside Villages Bal Harbour Biscayne Park El Portal Indian Creek Key Biscayne Miami Shores Palmetto Bay Pinecrest Virginia Gardens CDPs Brownsville Coral Terrace Country Club Country Walk Fisher Island Fountainbleau Gladeview Glenvar Heights Golden Glades Goulds Homestead Base Ives Estates Kendale Lakes Kendall Kendall West Leisure City Naranja Ojus Olympia Heights Palm Springs North Palmetto Estates Pinewood Princeton Richmond Heights Richmond West South Miami Heights Sunset Tamiami The Crossings The Hammocks Three Lakes University Park West Little River West Perrine Westchester Westview Westwood Lakes Former CDPs Cutler Bay: Lakes by the Bay Miami Gardens: Andover Bunche Park Carol City Lake Lucerne Norland Opa-locka North Scott Lake Palmetto Bay: Cutler East Perrine Unincorporated communities Aladdin City Biscayne Gardens Coopertown Coral Way Village Deering Bay Fairlawn Fortymile Bend Frog City Glenwood Heights Green-Mar Acres Hawley Heights Highland Lakes Howard Ludlam Redland Silver Palm West Kendall

v d e Greater Miami Miami (center city) Central business district Downtown Miami (Brickell · Omni · Park West) Urban centers Aventura · Civic Center · Coconut Grove · Coral Gables · Dadeland · South Beach · Wynwood Major thoroughfares North 36th Street · North 79th Street · North 103rd Street · North 125th Street · West 7th Avenue · West 27th Avenue · West 107th Avenue · Allapattah Road · Alton Road · Bird Road · Biscayne Boulevard · Broad Causeway · Collins Avenue · Coral Reef Drive · Coral Way · County Line Road · Flagler Street · Galloway Road · Gratigny · Ives Dairy Road · Julia Tuttle Causeway · Kendall Drive · John F. Kennedy Causeway · Killian · Krome Avenue · William H. Lehman Causeway · LeJeune Road · Ludlam Road · MacArthur Causeway · Miami Avenue · Miami Gardens Drive · Milam Dairy Road · Miracle Mile · Ocean Drive · Okeechobee Road · Old Cutler Road · Port Boulevard · Red Road · Rickenbacker Causeway · South Dixie Highway · Sunset Drive · Tamiami Trail · Venetian Causeway Colleges and universities Barry University · Carlos Albizu University · Florida International University · Florida Memorial University · Johnson & Wales University · University of Miami · Miami Dade College · Miami International University of Art & Design · St. Thomas University Parks and recreation Amelia Earhart Park · Arch Creek · The Barnacle Historic State Park · Bayfront Park · Bicentennial Park · Big Cypress National Preserve · Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park · Biscayne National Park · Chapman Field Park · Crandon Park · Dinner Key · Everglades National Park · Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden · Fort Dallas · Fruit and Spice Park · Greynolds Park · Haulover Park · The Kampong · Matheson Hammock Park · Oleta River State Park · Peacock Park · Shark Valley · South Pointe Park · Tamiami Park · Tropical Park · Virginia Key · Zoo Miami Major districts and attractions Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts · American Airlines Arena · Boca Chita Key Historic District · Coral Castle · Design District · Downtown Miami Historic District · Jungle Island · Lummus Park · Homestead Historic Downtown District · MacFarlane Homestead District · Miami Art Deco District · Miami Seaquarium · Monkey Jungle · Normandy Isles Historic District · North Shore Historic District · Miami Riverwalk · South Beach · Villa Vizcaya Major shopping centers Aventura Mall · Bal Harbour Shops · Bayside Marketplace · CocoWalk · Dadeland Mall · Dadeland Station · Dolphin Mall · The Falls · Lincoln Road Mall · The Mall at 163rd Street · Mall of the Americas · Mary Brickell Village · Metrofare Shops & Cafe · Miami International Mall · Miracle Marketplace · The Shops at Sunset Place · Southland Mall · Village of Merrick Park · Westland Mall Primary modes of transport Miami International Airport · Port of Miami · Miami Central Station · Miami-Dade Transit (Metrobus · Metrorail · Metromover) · Tri-Rail South Florida · Broward County · Palm Beach County · Portal · WikiProject