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Tacoma ( tə-KOH-mə) is a mid-sized urban port city in and the county seat of Pierce County, Washington, United States. The city is on Washington's Puget Sound, 32 miles (51 km) southwest of Seattle, 31 miles (50 km) northeast of the state capital, Olympia, and 58 miles (93 km) northwest of Mount Rainier National Park. The population was 198,397, according to the 2010 census. Tacoma is the second-largest city in the Puget Sound area and the third largest in the state. Tacoma also serves as the center of business activity for the South Sound region, which has a population of around 1 million.
Tacoma adopted its name after the nearby Mount Rainier, originally called Takhoma or Tahoma. It is locally known as the "City of Destiny" because the area was chosen to be the western terminus of the Northern Pacific Railroad in the late 19th century. The decision of the railroad was influenced by Tacoma's neighboring deep-water harbor, Commencement Bay. By connecting the bay with the railroad, Tacoma's motto became "When rails meet sails". Commencement Bay serves the Port of Tacoma, a center of international trade on the Pacific Coast and Washington State's largest port.
Like most central cities, Tacoma suffered a prolonged decline in the mid-20th century as a result of suburbanization and divestment. Since the 1990s, developments in the downtown core include the University of Washington Tacoma; Tacoma Link, the first modern electric light rail service in the state; the state's highest density of art and history museums; and a restored urban waterfront, the Thea Foss Waterway. Neighborhoods such as the 6th Avenue District have been revitalized.
Tacoma has been named one of the most livable areas in the United States. In 2006, Tacoma was listed as one of the "most walkable" cities in the country. That same year, the women's magazine Self named Tacoma the "Most Sexually Healthy City" in the United States.
Tacoma gained notoriety in 1940 for the collapse of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, which earned the nickname "Galloping Gertie". Tacoma is also known for a prevalent, distinctive and pungent odor known as the Aroma of Tacoma.
reviews (22)
Tacoma, WA is in general a fairly livable city. It was once a heavily blue collar community, and is still largely that, but is increasingly becoming gentrified and white collar by an influx of those flocking to the state to avail themselves of the high tech occupations that are becoming more and more prevalent in the Seattle-Tacoma corridor, and displacing and marginalizing the blue collar people at an accelerating pace. Despite a lot of lip service given about attentiveness to the needs of the aging, seniors in this area are woefully under served. Age discrimination is rampant, especially with regard to employment, a malaise that affects the country as a whole and is in no measure exclusive to this area alone, but it is nonetheless an actively and eagerly embraced practice here. Social services purported to support seniors are a joke, only serving well those people who work for the services themselves. Persons who are both aged and disabled are reasonably well accommodated, while the simply (with emphasis on the younger) elderly are often ignored. Public transportation is not bad, but was once better and is only slowly recovering from severe cutbacks imposed during the recent great recession, and is under continuous assault from a predominantly car-cultured populace who constantly question and deride its very existence. Overall, the community and area rating might be two star at best with regard to age friendliness.
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Tacoma has been and still is a largely blue collar enclave, and has always been regarded as Seattle's "poor stepsister". With the advent of the high tech 'boom' that is enjoyed by Seattle and its immediate surrounding environs, and the attendant exorbitantly increasing cost of living associated with it, Tacoma is increasingly becoming gentrified and its blue collar base pushed out as those in high tech industries clamor and compete for more affordable living space and subsequently drive up living costs here to stratospheric levels as well. Tacoma is also the county seat for Pierce County, which is a both a dumping and breeding ground for criminal elements. Civic improvements to infrastructure are spotty and inconsistent. A "those that have, get" mentality prevails with regard to infrastructure, with some areas - particularly those more affluent sections of the city - accommodated readily while much of the rest is chronically neglected and left to decay. Transportation options, while better than many communities elsewhere, are worse than they once were, due largely to a combination of the great recession and the increasing presence of the aforementioned gentrifying demographic, who are largely 'car-centric' and much opposed to support of public transportation options. Social services are numerous, but are at least as much if not more noise than substance. Several institutions of higher learning are located in or near Tacoma, but also tends to serve and benefit a more narrow white collar base, further contributing to the class polarization that increasingly defines this area. For seniors without already substantial means it is becoming more and more and definitely not age-friendly.