Trenton is a city located in Mercer County in the US state of New Jersey, and the state capital. In 2010 it had a population of 84,913 inhabitants and a population density of 4,024 inhab/km². It is located on the left bank of the Delaware River, which separates it from Pennsylvania.
The first white settlement on the site of today's Trenton was founded
by a group of Quakers from Sheffield in 1679. Quakers were being
persecuted in England at the time, and North America allowed them to
freely practice their religious views.
By 1719, the city had
adopted the name "Trent Town," after the county's largest landowner,
William Trent. The name was later shortened to "Trenton".
During
the Revolutionary War, it was here that the famous Battle of Trenton
took place on December 26, 1776, in which American troops participated
under the leadership of George Washington. After the war, Trenton became
briefly (in November and December 1784) the capital of the United
States. Initially, the city was considered as a future permanent
capital, but the southern states were in favor of moving it closer to
the Mason-Dixon line.
In 1790, Trenton became the capital of New
Jersey.
Trenton is located on the Delaware River and is one of two state
capitals (along with Carson City) located on the border with another
state (Alaska's capital, Juneau, borders the Canadian province of
British Columbia).
Trenton lies on the border of the temperate
continental and subtropical oceanic climate zones. All four seasons are
distinct, winters are cool, summers are hot and rainy.
As of the 2010 census, Trenton had a population of 84,913, 28,578
households, and 17,747 families.
The racial composition of the
population:
whites - 13.5% (in 1950 - 88.6%)
African Americans -
52.0%
Hispanics (all races) - 33.7%
Asians - 1.2%
The
ethnic composition of Trenton has undergone significant changes
throughout its history. The city was founded by immigrants from England
almost 350 years ago, in the second half of the 19th century the Irish
and Italians were the majority in it, today's Trenton is a city of
African and Latin Americans. The largest national community is Puerto
Ricans (15%). English Americans, who represented the vast majority when
Trenton briefly became the capital of the United States, now make up
only 1.5% of the city's residents.
The average annual per capita
income is $17,400. The average age of citizens is 32.6 years. The crime
rate is very high, 3.7 times the American average and 4.6 times the New
Jersey average.
Politically, most citizens support the US
Democratic Party.
In the second half of the 19th and the first half of the 20th
centuries, Trenton was a major industrial center that occupied one of
the leading places in the United States in the production of rubber,
electrical wiring and ceramics. Today, the only vestige of those times
is the slogan “Trenton Makes, The World Takes” on a bridge across the
Delaware River.
Since the 1960s, the city has entered a period of
decline and deindustrialization. Industries closed, white workers left
the city, company offices were moved from downtown Trenton to more
attractive suburbs. Attempts to revitalize downtown Trenton by state and
city governments in the 1990s did not produce the expected results.
Today, the city's largest employer is the state of New Jersey, and many
citizens are heavily dependent on social programs.
The city is served by a municipal airport (IATA: TTN, ICAO: KTTN)
located 6 kilometers northwest of downtown. Regular flights were
discontinued in the late 1970s due to the general decline of the city.
However, due to the congestion of the nearest major airports - Newark
and Philadelphia, in 2012 Frontier Airlines began flying from Trenton to
Orlando, and in 2013 it is planned to open 10 more routes, including to
Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit and New Orleans .
The Trenton railway
station is located on the so-called. "Northeast Corridor" - an
all-electric, very busy line linking Boston, New York, Philadelphia,
Baltimore and Washington. Dozens of trains to these cities stop at the
station every day.
The area around Trenton is home to Interstate
95, as well as US 1 and US 206.
Public transport of the city, as
well as the entire state as a whole, is managed by the New Jersey
Transit organization and is represented primarily by buses. There is
also a 55 km light rail line linking Trenton with Camden.