Houston: City overview

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Houston embodies some sort of slightly retrospective vision of how the 21st century was supposed to be; a disarming urban landscape of soaring skyscrapers, underground tunnels and rumbling freeways. Once an old-style Texan town of just 45,000, the arrival of the oil derricks and the miracle of air-conditioning triggered a steroid-enhanced expansion, transforming it into the unashamed energy capital of the U.S. Awash with corporate money and lacking the cultural clout of New York or Los Angeles, Houston has long been an easy target for those looking for a symbol of the worst excesses of American power. Houston was the setting for the dystopic fantasy "Rollerball" in which the tentacular Energy Corporation ruled the planet. Following the demise of former corporate citizen Enron, the city has its very own real life corporate bad guy. The late Hunter S. Thompson described it as a "cruel and crazy town on a filthy river in East Texas with no zoning laws and a culture of sex, money and violence. It's a shabby sprawling metropolis ruled by brazen women, crooked cops and super-rich pansexual cowboys who live by the code of the West." In fact, it's one of the most cultured and cosmopolitan cities in the U.S., with more theatre and cinema seats than any other city in the country other than New York, a world-renowned art scene and some of the best restaurants between the Atlantic and the Pacific. But you can still spot people wearing cowboy boots with their business suits - this is Texas after all.

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