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The city, especially the East Boston neighborhood, has a significant Hispanic community. Hispanics in Boston are mostly of Puerto Rican (30,506 or 4.9% of total city population), Dominican (25,648 or 4.2% of total city population), Salvadoran (10,850 or 1.8% of city population), Colombian (6,649 or 1.1% of total city population), Mexican (5,961 or 1.0% of total city population), and Guatemalan (4,451 or 0.7% of total city population) ethnic origin. When including all Hispanic national origins, they number 107,917. In Greater Boston, these numbers grow significantly with Puerto Ricans numbering 175,000+, Dominicans 95,000+, Salvadorans 40,000+, Guatemalans 31,000+, Mexicans 25,000+, and Colombians numbering 22,000+.
According to a 2014 study by the Pew Research Center, 57% of the population of the city identified themselves as Christians, with 25% professing attendance at a variety of churches that could be considered Protestant, and 29% professing Roman Catholic beliefs. while 33% claim no religious affiliation. The same study says that other religions (including Judaism, Buddhism, Islam, and Hinduism) collectively make up about 10% of the population.
As of 2010 the Catholic Church had the highest number of adherents as a single denomination in the Boston-Cambridge-Newton Metro area, with more than two million members and 339 churches, followed by the Episcopal Church with 58,000 adherents in 160 churches. The United Church of Christ had 55,000 members and 213 churches. The UCC is the successor of the city's Puritan religious traditions. Old South Church in Boston is one of the oldest congregations in the United States. It was organized in 1669 by dissenters from the First Church in Boston (1630). Notable past members include Samuel Adams, William Dawes, Benjamin Franklin, Samuel Sewall, and Phillis Wheatley. In 1773, Adams gave the signals from the Old South Meeting House that started the Boston Tea Party.
A global city, Boston is placed among the top 30 most economically powerful cities in the world. Encompassing $363 billion, the Greater Boston metropolitan area has the sixth-largest economy in the country and 12th-largest in the world.
Boston's colleges and universities have a significant effect on the regional economy. Boston attracts more than 350,000 college students from around the world, who contribute more than $4.8 billion annually to the city's economy. The area's schools are major employers and attract industries to the city and surrounding region. The city is home to a number of technology companies and is a hub for biotechnology, with the Milken Institute rating Boston as the top life sciences cluster in the country. Boston receives the highest absolute amount of annual funding from the National Institutes of Health of all cities in the United States.
The city is considered highly innovative for a variety of reasons, including the presence of academia, access to venture capital, and the presence of many high-tech companies. The Route 128 corridor and Greater Boston continue to be a major center for venture capital investment, and high technology remains an important sector.
Tourism also composes a large part of Boston's economy, with 21.2 million domestic and international visitors spending $8.3 billion in 2011; excluding visitors from Canada and Mexico, over 1.4 million international tourists visited Boston in 2014, with those from China and the United Kingdom leading the list. Boston's status as a state capital as well as the regional home of federal agencies has rendered law and government to be another major component of the city's economy. The city is a major seaport along the United States' East Coast and the oldest continuously operated industrial and fishing port in the Western Hemisphere.
Other important industries are financial services, especially mutual funds and insurance. Boston-based Fidelity Investments helped popularize the mutual fund in the 1980s and has made Boston one of the top financial cities in the United States. The city is home to the headquarters of Santander Bank, and Boston is a center for venture capital firms. State Street Corporation, which specializes in asset management and custody services, is based in the city. Boston is a printing and publishing center — Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is headquartered within the city, along with Bedford-St. Martin's Press and Beacon Press. Pearson PLC publishing units also employ several hundred people in Boston. The city is home to three major convention centers—the Hynes Convention Center in the Back Bay, and the Seaport World Trade Center and Boston Convention and Exhibition Center on the South Boston waterfront. The General Electric Corporation announced in January 2016 its decision to move the company's global headquarters to the Seaport District in Boston, from Fairfield, Connecticut, citing factors including Boston's preeminence in the realm of higher education.
The Boston Public Schools enrolls 57,000 students attending 145 schools, including the renowned Boston Latin Academy, John D. O'Bryant School of Math & Science, and Boston Latin School. The Boston Latin School, established 1635, is the oldest public high school in the US; Boston also operates the United States' second oldest public high school, and its oldest public elementary school. The system's students are 40% Hispanic or Latino, 35% Black or African American, 13% White, and 9% Asian. There are private, parochial, and charter schools as well, and approximately 3,300 minority students attend participating suburban schools through the Metropolitan Educational Opportunity Council.
Some of the most renowned and highly ranked universities in the world are located in the Boston area. Four members of the Association of American Universities are in Greater Boston (more than any other metropolitan area): Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston University, and Brandeis University. Hospitals, universities, and research institutions in Greater Boston received more than $1.77 billion in National Institutes of Health grants in 2013, more money than any other American metropolitan area. Greater Boston has more than 100 colleges and universities, with 250,000 students enrolled in Boston and Cambridge alone. Its largest private universities include Boston University (the city's fourth-largest employer) with its main campus along Commonwealth Avenue and a medical campus in the South End; Northeastern University in the Fenway area; Suffolk University near Beacon Hill, which includes law school and business school; and Boston College, which straddles the Boston (Brighton)–Newton border. Boston's only public university is the University of Massachusetts Boston, on Columbia Point in Dorchester. Roxbury Community College and Bunker Hill Community College are the city's two public community colleges. Altogether, Boston's colleges and universities employ over 42,600 people, accounting for nearly 7 percent of the city's workforce.
Smaller private schools include Babson College, Bentley University, Boston Architectural College, Emmanuel College, Fisher College, MGH Institute of Health Professions, Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, Simmons College, Wellesley College, Wheelock College, Wentworth Institute of Technology, New England School of Law (originally established as America's first all female law school), and Emerson College.
Metropolitan Boston is home to several conservatories and art schools, including Lesley University College of Art and Design, Massachusetts College of Art, the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, New England Institute of Art, New England School of Art and Design (Suffolk University), Longy School of Music of Bard College, and the New England Conservatory (the oldest independent conservatory in the United States). Other conservatories include the Boston Conservatory and Berklee College of Music, which has made Boston an important city for jazz music.
Several universities located outside Boston have a major presence in the city. Harvard University, the nation's oldest institute of higher education, is centered across the Charles River in Cambridge but has the majority of its land holdings and a substantial amount of its educational activities in Boston. Its business, medical, dental, and public health schools are located in Boston's Allston and Longwood neighborhoods. Harvard has plans for additional expansion into Allston. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which originated in Boston and was long known as "Boston Tech", moved across the river to Cambridge in 1916. Tufts University, whose main campus is north of the city in Somerville and Medford, locates its medical and dental school in Boston's Chinatown at Tufts Medical Center, a 451-bed academic medical institution that is home to both a full-service hospital for adults and the Floating Hospital for Children.
Like many major American cities, Boston has seen a great reduction in violent crime since the early 1990s. Boston's low crime rate since the 1990s has been credited to the Boston Police Department's collaboration with neighborhood groups and church parishes to prevent youths from joining gangs, as well as involvement from the United States Attorney and District Attorney's offices. This helped lead in part to what has been touted as the "Boston Miracle". Murders in the city dropped from 152 in 1990 (for a murder rate of 26.5 per 100,000 people) to just 31—not one of them a juvenile—in 1999 (for a murder rate of 5.26 per 100,000).
In 2008, there were 62 reported homicides. Through December 20 each of 2014 and 2015, the Boston Police Department reported 52 and 39 homicides, respectively.
Boston shares many cultural roots with greater New England, including a dialect of the non-rhotic Eastern New England accent known as Boston English, and a regional cuisine with a large emphasis on seafood, salt, and dairy products. Irish Americans are a major influence on Boston's politics and religious institutions. Boston also has its own collection of neologisms known as Boston slang.
Boston has been called the "Athens of America" for its literary culture, earning a reputation as "the intellectual capital of the United States." In the nineteenth century, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Margaret Fuller, James Russell Lowell, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote in Boston. Some consider the Old Corner Bookstore, where these writers met and where The Atlantic Monthly was first published, to be "cradle of American literature. In 1852, the Boston Public Library was founded as the first free library in the United States. Boston's literary culture continues today thanks to the city's many universities and the Boston Book Festival.
Music is cherished in Boston. The Boston Symphony Orchestra is one of the "Big Five," a group of the greatest American orchestras, and the classical music magazine Gramophone called it one of the "world's best" orchestras. Symphony Hall (located west of Back Bay) is home to the Boston Symphony Orchestra, (and the related Boston Youth Symphony Orchestra, which is the largest youth orchestra in the nation) and the Boston Pops Orchestra. The British newspaper The Guardian called Boston Symphony Hall "one of the top venues for classical music in the world," adding that "Symphony Hall in Boston was where science became an essential part of concert hall design." Other concerts are held at the New England Conservatory's Jordan Hall. The Boston Ballet performs at the Boston Opera House. Other performing-arts organizations located in the city include the Boston Lyric Opera Company, Opera Boston, Boston Baroque (the first permanent Baroque orchestra in the US), and the Handel and Haydn Society (one of the oldest choral companies in the United States). The city is a center for contemporary classical music with a number of performing groups, several of which are associated with the city's conservatories and universities. These include the Boston Modern Orchestra Project and Boston Musica Viva. Several theaters are located in or near the Theater District south of Boston Common, including the Cutler Majestic Theatre, Citi Performing Arts Center, the Colonial Theater, and the Orpheum Theatre.
There are several major annual events such as First Night, which occurs on New Year's Eve, the Boston Early Music Festival, the annual Boston Arts Festival at Christopher Columbus Waterfront Park, and Italian summer feasts in the North End honoring Catholic saints. The city is the site of several events during the Fourth of July period. They include the week-long Harborfest festivities and a Boston Pops concert accompanied by fireworks on the banks of the Charles River.
Because of the city's prominent role in the American Revolution, several historic sites relating to that period are preserved as part of the Boston National Historical Park. Many are found along the Freedom Trail, which is marked by a red line of bricks embedded in the ground. The city is also home to several art museums, including the Museum of Fine Arts and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. The Institute of Contemporary Art is housed in a contemporary building designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro in the Seaport District. The University of Massachusetts Boston campus on Columbia Point houses the John F. Kennedy Library. The Boston Athenaeum (one of the oldest independent libraries in the United States), Boston Children's Museum, Bull & Finch Pub (whose building is known from the television show Cheers), Museum of Science, and the New England Aquarium are within the city.
Boston has been a noted religious center from its earliest days. The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston serves nearly 300 parishes and is based in the Cathedral of the Holy Cross (1875) in the South End, while the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, with the Cathedral Church of St. Paul (1819) as its episcopal seat, serves just under 200 congregations. Unitarian Universalism has its headquarters on Beacon Hill. The Christian Scientists are headquartered in Back Bay at the Mother Church (1894). The oldest church in Boston is First Church in Boston, founded in 1630. King's Chapel, the city's first Anglican church, was founded in 1686 and converted to Unitarianism in 1785. Other churches include Christ Church (better known as Old North Church, 1723), the oldest church building in the city, Trinity Church (1733), Park Street Church (1809), Old South Church (1874), Jubilee Christian Church and Basilica and Shrine of Our Lady of Perpetual Help on Mission Hill (1878).
Air quality in Boston is generally very good: during the ten-year period 2004–2013, there were only 4 days in which the air was unhealthy for the general public, according to the EPA.
Some of the cleaner energy facilities in Boston include the Allston green district, with three ecologically compatible housing facilities. Boston is also breaking ground on multiple green affordable housing facilities to help reduce the carbon footprint of the city while simultaneously making these initiatives financially available to a greater population. Boston's climate plan is updated every three years and was most recently modified in 2013. This legislature includes the Building Energy Reporting and Disclosure Ordinance, which requires the city's larger buildings to disclose their yearly energy and water use statistics and partake in an energy assessment every five years. These statistics are made public by the city, thereby increasing incentives for buildings to be more environmentally conscious.
Another initiative, presented by the late Mayor Thomas Menino, is the Renew Boston Whole Building Incentive, which reduces the cost of living in buildings that are deemed energy efficient. This, much like the green housing developments, gives people of low socioeconomic status an opportunity to find housing in communities that support the environment. The ultimate goal of this initiative is to enlist 500 Bostonians to participate in a free, in-home energy assessment.
Many older buildings in certain areas of Boston are supported by wooden piles driven into the area's fill; these piles remain sound if submerged in water, but are subject to dry rot if exposed to air for long periods. Groundwater levels have been dropping, to varying degrees, in many areas of the city, due in part to an increase in the amount of rainwater discharged directly into sewers rather than absorbed by the ground. A city agency, the Boston Groundwater Trust, coordinates monitoring of groundwater levels throughout the city via a network of public and private monitoring wells. However, Boston's drinking water supply, from the Quabbin and Wachusett Reservoirs to the west, is one of the very few in the country so pure as to satisfy federal water quality standards without filtration.
Boston has teams in the four major North American professional sports leagues plus Major League Soccer, and has won 36 championships in these leagues, As of 2014[update]. It is one of six cities (along with Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles, New York and Philadelphia) to have won championships in all four major sports. It has been suggested that Boston is the new "TitleTown, USA", as the city's professional sports teams have won nine championships since 2001: Patriots (2001, 2003, 2004, and 2014), Red Sox (2004, 2007, and 2013), Celtics (2008), and Bruins (2011). This love of sports has made Boston the United States Olympic Committee's choice to bid to hold the 2024 Summer Olympic Games, but the city cited financial concerns when it withdrew its bid on July 27, 2015.
The Boston Red Sox, a founding member of the American League of Major League Baseball in 1901, play their home games at Fenway Park, near Kenmore Square in the city's Fenway section. Built in 1912, it is the oldest sports arena or stadium in active use in the United States among the four major professional American sports leagues, encompassing Major League Baseball, the National Football League, National Basketball Association, and the National Hockey League. Boston was the site of the first game of the first modern World Series, in 1903. The series was played between the AL Champion Boston Americans and the NL champion Pittsburgh Pirates. Persistent reports that the team was known in 1903 as the "Boston Pilgrims" appear to be unfounded. Boston's first professional baseball team was the Red Stockings, one of the charter members of the National Association in 1871, and of the National League in 1876. The team played under that name until 1883, under the name Beaneaters until 1911, and under the name Braves from 1912 until they moved to Milwaukee after the 1952 season. Since 1966 they have played in Atlanta as the Atlanta Braves.
The TD Garden, formerly called the FleetCenter and built to replace the old, since-demolished Boston Garden, is adjoined to North Station and is the home of two major league teams: the Boston Bruins of the National Hockey League and the Boston Celtics of the National Basketball Association. The arena seats 18,624 for basketball games and 17,565 for ice hockey games. The Bruins were the first American member of the National Hockey League and an Original Six franchise. The Boston Celtics were founding members of the Basketball Association of America, one of the two leagues that merged to form the NBA. The Celtics have the distinction of having won more championships than any other NBA team, with seventeen.
While they have played in suburban Foxborough since 1971, the New England Patriots of the National Football League were founded in 1960 as the Boston Patriots, changing their name after relocating. The team won the Super Bowl after the 2001, 2003, 2004, and 2014 seasons. They share Gillette Stadium with the New England Revolution of Major League Soccer. The Boston Breakers of Women's Professional Soccer, which formed in 2009, play their home games at Dilboy Stadium in Somerville.
The area's many colleges and universities are active in college athletics. Four NCAA Division I members play in the city—Boston College, Boston University, Harvard University, and Northeastern University. Of the four, only Boston College participates in college football at the highest level, the Football Bowl Subdivision. Harvard participates in the second-highest level, the Football Championship Subdivision.
One of the best known sporting events in the city is the Boston Marathon, the 26.2-mile (42.2 km) race which is the world's oldest annual marathon, run on Patriots' Day in April. On April 15, 2013, two explosions killed three people and injured hundreds at the marathon. Another major annual event is the Head of the Charles Regatta, held in October.
Boston Common, located near the Financial District and Beacon Hill, is the oldest public park in the United States. Along with the adjacent Boston Public Garden, it is part of the Emerald Necklace, a string of parks designed by Frederick Law Olmsted to encircle the city. The Emerald Necklace includes Jamaica Pond, Boston's largest body of freshwater, and Franklin Park, the city's largest park and home of the Franklin Park Zoo. Another major park is the Esplanade, located along the banks of the Charles River. The Hatch Shell, an outdoor concert venue, is located adjacent to the Charles River Esplanade. Other parks are scattered throughout the city, with the major parks and beaches located near Castle Island; in Charlestown; and along the Dorchester, South Boston, and East Boston shorelines.
Boston's park system is well-reputed nationally. In its 2013 ParkScore ranking, The Trust for Public Land reported that Boston was tied with Sacramento and San Francisco for having the third-best park system among the 50 most populous US cities. ParkScore ranks city park systems by a formula that analyzes the city's median park size, park acres as percent of city area, the percent of residents within a half-mile of a park, spending of park services per resident, and the number of playgrounds per 10,000 residents.
Boston has a strong mayor – council government system in which the mayor (elected every fourth year) has extensive executive power. Marty Walsh became Mayor in January 2014, his predecessor Thomas Menino's twenty-year tenure having been the longest in the city's history. The Boston City Council is elected every two years; there are nine district seats, and four citywide "at-large" seats. The School Committee, which oversees the Boston Public Schools, is appointed by the mayor.
In addition to city government, numerous commissions and state authorities—including the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation, the Boston Public Health Commission, the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA), and the Massachusetts Port Authority (Massport)—play a role in the life of Bostonians. As the capital of Massachusetts, Boston plays a major role in state politics.
The city has several federal facilities, including the John F. Kennedy Federal Office Building, the Thomas P. O'Neill Federal Building, the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, and the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
Federally, Boston is split between two congressional districts. The northern three-fourths of the city is in the 7th district, represented by Mike Capuano since 1998. The southern fourth is in the 8th district, represented by Stephen Lynch. Both are Democrats; a Republican has not represented a significant portion of Boston in over a century. The state's senior member of the United States Senate is Democrat Elizabeth Warren, first elected in 2012. The state's junior member of the United States Senate is Democrat Ed Markey, who was elected in 2013 to succeed John Kerry after Kerry's appointment and confirmation as the United States Secretary of State.
The Boston Globe and the Boston Herald are two of the city's major daily newspapers. The city is also served by other publications such as Boston magazine, The Improper Bostonian, DigBoston, and the Boston edition of Metro. The Christian Science Monitor, headquartered in Boston, was formerly a worldwide daily newspaper but ended publication of daily print editions in 2009, switching to continuous online and weekly magazine format publications. The Boston Globe also releases a teen publication to the city's public high schools, called Teens in Print or T.i.P., which is written by the city's teens and delivered quarterly within the school year.
The city's growing Latino population has given rise to a number of local and regional Spanish-language newspapers. These include El Planeta (owned by the former publisher of The Boston Phoenix), El Mundo, and La Semana. Siglo21, with its main offices in nearby Lawrence, is also widely distributed.
Various LGBT publications serve the city's large LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) community such as The Rainbow Times, the only minority and lesbian-owned LGBT newsmagazine. Founded in 2006, The Rainbow Times is now based out of Boston, but serves all of New England.
Boston is the largest broadcasting market in New England, with the radio market being the 11th largest in the United States. Several major AM stations include talk radio WRKO, sports/talk station WEEI, and CBS Radio WBZ. WBZ (AM) broadcasts a news radio format. A variety of commercial FM radio formats serve the area, as do NPR stations WBUR and WGBH. College and university radio stations include WERS (Emerson), WHRB (Harvard), WUMB (UMass Boston), WMBR (MIT), WZBC (Boston College), WMFO (Tufts University), WBRS (Brandeis University), WTBU (Boston University, campus and web only), WRBB (Northeastern University) and WMLN-FM (Curry College).
The Boston television DMA, which also includes Manchester, New Hampshire, is the 8th largest in the United States. The city is served by stations representing every major American network, including WBZ-TV and its sister station WSBK-TV (the former a CBS O&O, the latter an MyNetwork TV affiliate), WCVB-TV (ABC), WHDH (NBC), WFXT (Fox), and WLVI (The CW). The city is also home to PBS station WGBH-TV, a major producer of PBS programs, which also operates WGBX. Spanish-language television networks, including MundoFox (WFXZ-CD), Univision (WUNI), Telemundo (WNEU), and Telefutura (WUTF-DT), have a presence in the region, with WNEU and WUTF serving as network owned-and-operated stations. Most of the area's television stations have their transmitters in nearby Needham and Newton along the Route 128 corridor. Six Boston television stations are carried by Canadian satellite television provider Bell TV and by cable television providers in Canada.
The Longwood Medical and Academic Area, adjacent to the Fenway district, is home to a large number of medical and research facilities, including Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Children's Hospital Boston, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School, Joslin Diabetes Center, and the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences. Prominent medical facilities, including Massachusetts General Hospital, Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary and Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital are located in the Beacon Hill area. St. Elizabeth's Medical Center is in Brighton Center of the city's Brighton neighborhood. New England Baptist Hospital is in Mission Hill. The city has Veterans Affairs medical centers in the Jamaica Plain and West Roxbury neighborhoods. The Boston Public Health Commission, an agency of the Massachusetts government, oversees health concerns for city residents. Boston EMS provides pre-hospital emergency medical services to residents and visitors.
Many of Boston's medical facilities are associated with universities. The facilities in the Longwood Medical and Academic Area and in Massachusetts General Hospital are affiliated with Harvard Medical School. Tufts Medical Center (formerly Tufts-New England Medical Center), located in the southern portion of the Chinatown neighborhood, is affiliated with Tufts University School of Medicine. Boston Medical Center, located in the South End neighborhood, is the primary teaching facility for the Boston University School of Medicine as well as the largest trauma center in the Boston area; it was formed by the merger of Boston University Hospital and Boston City Hospital, which was the first municipal hospital in the United States.
Logan Airport, located in East Boston and operated by the Massachusetts Port Authority (Massport), is Boston's principal airport. Nearby general aviation airports are Beverly Municipal Airport to the north, Hanscom Field to the west, and Norwood Memorial Airport to the south. Massport also operates several major facilities within the Port of Boston, including a cruise ship terminal and facilities to handle bulk and container cargo in South Boston, and other facilities in Charlestown and East Boston.
Downtown Boston's streets grew organically, so they do not form a planned grid, unlike those in later-developed Back Bay, East Boston, the South End, and South Boston. Boston is the eastern terminus of I-90, which in Massachusetts runs along the Massachusetts Turnpike. The elevated portion of the Central Artery, which carried most of the through traffic in downtown Boston, was replaced with the O'Neill Tunnel during the Big Dig, substantially completed in early 2006.
With nearly a third of Bostonians using public transit for their commute to work, Boston has the fifth-highest rate of public transit usage in the country. Boston's subway system, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA—known as the "T") operates the oldest underground rapid transit system in the Americas, and is the fourth-busiest rapid transit system in the country, with 65.5 miles (105 km) of track on four lines. The MBTA also operates busy bus and commuter rail networks, and water shuttles.
Amtrak's Northeast Corridor and Chicago lines originate at South Station, which serves as a major intermodal transportation hub, and stop at Back Bay. Fast Northeast Corridor trains, which serve New York City, Washington, D.C., and points in between, also stop at Route 128 Station in the southwestern suburbs of Boston. Meanwhile, Amtrak's Downeaster service to Maine originates at North Station, despite the current lack of a dedicated passenger rail link between the two railhubs, other than the "T" subway lines.
Nicknamed "The Walking City", Boston hosts more pedestrian commuters than do other comparably populated cities. Owing to factors such as the compactness of the city and large student population, 13 percent of the population commutes by foot, making it the highest percentage of pedestrian commuters in the country out of the major American cities. In 2011, Walk Score ranked Boston the third most walkable city in the United States. As of 2015[update], Walk Score still ranks Boston as the third most walkable US city, with a Walk Score of 80, a Transit Score of 75, and a Bike Score of 70.
Between 1999 and 2006, Bicycling magazine named Boston three times as one of the worst cities in the US for cycling; regardless, it has one of the highest rates of bicycle commuting. In 2008, as a consequence of improvements made to bicycling conditions within the city, the same magazine put Boston on its "Five for the Future" list as a "Future Best City" for biking, and Boston's bicycle commuting percentage increased from 1% in 2000 to 2.1% in 2009. The bikeshare program called Hubway launched in late July 2011, logging more than 140,000 rides before the close of its first season. The neighboring municipalities of Cambridge, Somerville, and Brookline joined the Hubway program in summer 2012.
The BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS, simplified Chinese: 北斗卫星导航系统; traditional Chinese: 北斗衛星導航系統; pinyin: Běidǒu wèixīng dǎoháng xìtǒng) is a Chinese satellite navigation system. It consists of two separate satellite constellations – a limited test system that has been operating since 2000, and a full-scale global navigation system that is currently under construction.
The first BeiDou system, officially called the BeiDou Satellite Navigation Experimental System (simplified Chinese: 北斗卫星导航试验系统; traditional Chinese: 北斗衛星導航試驗系統; pinyin: Běidǒu wèixīng dǎoháng shìyàn xìtǒng) and also known as BeiDou-1, consists of three satellites and offers limited coverage and applications. It has been offering navigation services, mainly for customers in China and neighboring regions, since 2000.
The second generation of the system, officially called the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) and also known as COMPASS or BeiDou-2, will be a global satellite navigation system consisting of 35 satellites, and is under construction as of January 2015[update]. It became operational in China in December 2011, with 10 satellites in use, and began offering services to customers in the Asia-Pacific region in December 2012. It is planned to begin serving global customers upon its completion in 2020.
In-mid 2015, China started the build-up of the third generation BeiDou system (BDS-3) in the global coverage constellation. The first BDS-3 satellite was launched 30 September 2015. As of March 2016, 4 BDS-3 in-orbit validation satellites have been launched.
According to China daily. Fifteen years after the satellite system was launched, it is now generating $31.5 billion for major companies such as China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp, AutoNavi Holdings Ltd, and China North Industries Group Corp.
The official English name of the system is BeiDou Navigation Satellite System. It is named after the Big Dipper constellation, which is known in Chinese as Běidǒu. The name literally means "Northern Dipper", the name given by ancient Chinese astronomers to the seven brightest stars of the Ursa Major constellation. Historically, this set of stars was used in navigation to locate the North Star Polaris. As such, the name BeiDou also serves as a metaphor for the purpose of the satellite navigation system.
The original idea of a Chinese satellite navigation system was conceived by Chen Fangyun and his colleagues in the 1980s. According to the China National Space Administration, the development of the system would be carried out in three steps:
The first satellite, BeiDou-1A, was launched on 30 October 2000, followed by BeiDou-1B on 20 December 2000. The third satellite, BeiDou-1C (a backup satellite), was put into orbit on 25 May 2003. The successful launch of BeiDou-1C also meant the establishment of the BeiDou-1 navigation system.
On 2 November 2006, China announced that from 2008 BeiDou would offer an open service with an accuracy of 10 meters, timing of 0.2 microseconds, and speed of 0.2 meters/second.[citation needed]
In February 2007, the fourth and last satellite of the BeiDou-1 system, BeiDou-1D (sometimes called BeiDou-2A, serving as a backup satellite), was sent up into space. It was reported that the satellite had suffered from a control system malfunction but was then fully restored.
In April 2007, the first satellite of BeiDou-2, namely Compass-M1 (to validate frequencies for the BeiDou-2 constellation) was successfully put into its working orbit. The second BeiDou-2 constellation satellite Compass-G2 was launched on 15 April 2009. On 15 January 2010, the official website of the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System went online, and the system's third satellite (Compass-G1) was carried into its orbit by a Long March 3C rocket on 17 January 2010. On 2 June 2010, the fourth satellite was launched successfully into orbit. The fifth orbiter was launched into space from Xichang Satellite Launch Center by an LM-3I carrier rocket on 1 August 2010. Three months later, on 1 November 2010, the sixth satellite was sent into orbit by LM-3C. Another satellite, the Beidou-2/Compass IGSO-5 (fifth inclined geosynchonous orbit) satellite, was launched from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center by a Long March-3A on 1 December 2011 (UTC).
In September 2003, China intended to join the European Galileo positioning system project and was to invest €230 million (USD296 million, GBP160 million) in Galileo over the next few years. At the time, it was believed that China's "BeiDou" navigation system would then only be used by its armed forces. In October 2004, China officially joined the Galileo project by signing the Agreement on the Cooperation in the Galileo Program between the "Galileo Joint Undertaking" (GJU) and the "National Remote Sensing Centre of China" (NRSCC). Based on the Sino-European Cooperation Agreement on Galileo program, China Galileo Industries (CGI), the prime contractor of the China’s involvement in Galileo programs, was founded in December 2004. By April 2006, eleven cooperation projects within the Galileo framework had been signed between China and EU. However, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reported in January 2008 that China was unsatisfied with its role in the Galileo project and was to compete with Galileo in the Asian market.
BeiDou-1 is an experimental regional navigation system, which consists of four satellites (three working satellites and one backup satellite). The satellites themselves were based on the Chinese DFH-3 geostationary communications satellite and had a launch weight of 1,000 kilograms (2,200 pounds) each.
Unlike the American GPS, Russian GLONASS, and European Galileo systems, which use medium Earth orbit satellites, BeiDou-1 uses satellites in geostationary orbit. This means that the system does not require a large constellation of satellites, but it also limits the coverage to areas on Earth where the satellites are visible. The area that can be serviced is from longitude 70°E to 140°E and from latitude 5°N to 55°N. A frequency of the system is 2491.75 MHz.
The first satellite, BeiDou-1A, was launched on October 31, 2000. The second satellite, BeiDou-1B, was successfully launched on December 21, 2000. The last operational satellite of the constellation, BeiDou-1C, was launched on May 25, 2003.
In 2007, the official Xinhua News Agency reported that the resolution of the BeiDou system was as high as 0.5 metres. With the existing user terminals it appears that the calibrated accuracy is 20m (100m, uncalibrated).
In 2008, a BeiDou-1 ground terminal cost around CN¥20,000RMB (US$2,929), almost 10 times the price of a contemporary GPS terminal. The price of the terminals was explained as being due to the cost of imported microchips. At the China High-Tech Fair ELEXCON of November 2009 in Shenzhen, a BeiDou terminal priced at CN¥3,000RMB was presented.
According to Sun Jiadong, the chief designer of the navigation system, "Many organizations have been using our system for a while, and they like it very much."
BeiDou-2 (formerly known as COMPASS) is not an extension to the older BeiDou-1, but rather supersedes it outright. The new system will be a constellation of 35 satellites, which include 5 geostationary orbit satellites for backward compatibility with BeiDou-1, and 30 non-geostationary satellites (27 in medium Earth orbit and 3 in inclined geosynchronous orbit), that will offer complete coverage of the globe.
The ranging signals are based on the CDMA principle and have complex structure typical of Galileo or modernized GPS. Similar to the other GNSS, there will be two levels of positioning service: open and restricted (military). The public service shall be available globally to general users. When all the currently planned GNSS systems are deployed, the users will benefit from the use of a total constellation of 75+ satellites, which will significantly improve all the aspects of positioning, especially availability of the signals in so-called urban canyons. The general designer of the COMPASS navigation system is Sun Jiadong, who is also the general designer of its predecessor, the original BeiDou navigation system.
There are two levels of service provided — a free service to civilians and licensed service to the Chinese government and military. The free civilian service has a 10-meter location-tracking accuracy, synchronizes clocks with an accuracy of 10 nanoseconds, and measures speeds to within 0.2 m/s. The restricted military service has a location accuracy of 10 centimetres, can be used for communication, and will supply information about the system status to the user. To date, the military service has been granted only to the People's Liberation Army and to the Military of Pakistan.
Frequencies for COMPASS are allocated in four bands: E1, E2, E5B, and E6 and overlap with Galileo. The fact of overlapping could be convenient from the point of view of the receiver design, but on the other hand raises the issues of inter-system interference, especially within E1 and E2 bands, which are allocated for Galileo's publicly regulated service. However, under International Telecommunication Union (ITU) policies, the first nation to start broadcasting in a specific frequency will have priority to that frequency, and any subsequent users will be required to obtain permission prior to using that frequency, and otherwise ensure that their broadcasts do not interfere with the original nation's broadcasts. It now appears that Chinese COMPASS satellites will start transmitting in the E1, E2, E5B, and E6 bands before Europe's Galileo satellites and thus have primary rights to these frequency ranges.
Although little was officially announced by Chinese authorities about the signals of the new system, the launch of the first COMPASS satellite permitted independent researchers not only to study general characteristics of the signals, but even to build a COMPASS receiver.
Compass-M1 is an experimental satellite launched for signal testing and validation and for the frequency filing on 14 April 2007. The role of Compass-M1 for Compass is similar to the role of the GIOVE satellites for the Galileo system. The orbit of Compass-M1 is nearly circular, has an altitude of 21,150 km and an inclination of 55.5 degrees.
Compass-M1 transmits in 3 bands: E2, E5B, and E6. In each frequency band two coherent sub-signals have been detected with a phase shift of 90 degrees (in quadrature). These signal components are further referred to as "I" and "Q". The "I" components have shorter codes and are likely to be intended for the open service. The "Q" components have much longer codes, are more interference resistive, and are probably intended for the restricted service. IQ modulation has been the method in both wired and wireless digital modulation since morsetting carrier signal 100 years ago.
The investigation of the transmitted signals started immediately after the launch of Compass -M1 on 14 April 2007. Soon after in June 2007, engineers at CNES reported the spectrum and structure of the signals. A month later, researchers from Stanford University reported the complete decoding of the “I” signals components. The knowledge of the codes allowed a group of engineers at Septentrio to build the COMPASS receiver and report tracking and multipath characteristics of the “I” signals on E2 and E5B.
Characteristics of the "I" signals on E2 and E5B are generally similar to the civilian codes of GPS (L1-CA and L2C), but Compass signals have somewhat greater power. The notation of Compass signals used in this page follows the naming of the frequency bands and agrees with the notation used in the American literature on the subject, but the notation used by the Chinese seems to be different and is quoted in the first row of the table.
In December 2011, the system went into operation on a trial basis. It has started providing navigation, positioning and timing data to China and the neighbouring area for free from 27 December. During this trial run, Compass will offer positioning accuracy to within 25 meters, but the precision will improve as more satellites are launched. Upon the system's official launch, it pledged to offer general users positioning information accurate to the nearest 10 m, measure speeds within 0.2 m per second, and provide signals for clock synchronisation accurate to 0.02 microseconds.
The BeiDou-2 system began offering services for the Asia-Pacific region in December 2012. At this time, the system could provide positioning data between longitude 55°E to 180°E and from latitude 55°S to 55°N.
In December 2011, Xinhua stated that "[t]he basic structure of the Beidou system has now been established, and engineers are now conducting comprehensive system test and evaluation. The system will provide test-run services of positioning, navigation and time for China and the neighboring areas before the end of this year, according to the authorities." The system became operational in the China region that same month. The global navigation system should be finished by 2020. As of December 2012, 16 satellites for BeiDou-2 have been launched, 14 of them are in service.
The first satellite of the second-generation system, Compass-M1 was launched in 2007. It was followed by further nine satellites during 2009-2011, achieving functional regional coverage. A total of 16 satellites were launched during this phase.
In 2015, the system began its transition towards global coverage with the first launch of a new-generation of satellites, and the 17th one within the new system.
On July 25, 2015, the 18th and 19th satellites were successfully launched from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center, marking the first time for China to launch two satellites at once on top of a Long March 3B/Expedition-1 carrier rocket. The Expedition-1 is an independent upper stage capable of delivering one or more spacecraft into different orbits.
The three latest satellites will jointly undergo testing of a new system of navigation signaling and inter-satellite links, and start providing navigation services when ready.
Canon law is the body of laws and regulations made by ecclesiastical authority (Church leadership), for the government of a Christian organization or church and its members. It is the internal ecclesiastical law governing the Catholic Church (both Latin Church and Eastern Catholic Churches), the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches, and the individual national churches within the Anglican Communion. The way that such church law is legislated, interpreted and at times adjudicated varies widely among these three bodies of churches. In all three traditions, a canon was originally a rule adopted by a church council; these canons formed the foundation of canon law.
Greek kanon / Ancient Greek: κανών, Arabic Qanun / قانون, Hebrew kaneh / קנה, "straight"; a rule, code, standard, or measure; the root meaning in all these languages is "reed" (cf. the Romance-language ancestors of the English word "cane").
The Apostolic Canons or Ecclesiastical Canons of the Same Holy Apostles is a collection of ancient ecclesiastical decrees (eighty-five in the Eastern, fifty in the Western Church) concerning the government and discipline of the Early Christian Church, incorporated with the Apostolic Constitutions which are part of the Ante-Nicene Fathers In the fourth century the First Council of Nicaea (325) calls canons the disciplinary measures of the Church: the term canon, κανὠν, means in Greek, a rule. There is a very early distinction between the rules enacted by the Church and the legislative measures taken by the State called leges, Latin for laws.
In the Catholic Church, canon law is the system of laws and legal principles made and enforced by the Church's hierarchical authorities to regulate its external organization and government and to order and direct the activities of Catholics toward the mission of the Church.
The Roman Catholic Church canon law also includes the main five rites (groups) of churches which are in full union with the Roman Catholic Church and the Supreme Pontiff:
In the Roman Church, universal positive ecclesiastical laws, based upon either immutable divine and natural law, or changeable circumstantial and merely positive law, derive formal authority and promulgation from the office of pope, who as Supreme Pontiff possesses the totality of legislative, executive, and judicial power in his person. The actual subject material of the canons is not just doctrinal or moral in nature, but all-encompassing of the human condition.
The Catholic Church has what is claimed to be the oldest continuously functioning internal legal system in Western Europe, much later than Roman law but predating the evolution of modern European civil law traditions. What began with rules ("canons") adopted by the Apostles at the Council of Jerusalem in the first century has developed into a highly complex legal system encapsulating not just norms of the New Testament, but some elements of the Hebrew (Old Testament), Roman, Visigothic, Saxon, and Celtic legal traditions.
The history of Latin canon law can be divided into four periods: the jus antiquum, the jus novum, the jus novissimum and the Code of Canon Law. In relation to the Code, history can be divided into the jus vetus (all law before the Code) and the jus novum (the law of the Code, or jus codicis).
The canon law of the Eastern Catholic Churches, which had developed some different disciplines and practices, underwent its own process of codification, resulting in the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches promulgated in 1990 by Pope John Paul II.
It is a fully developed legal system, with all the necessary elements: courts, lawyers, judges, a fully articulated legal code principles of legal interpretation, and coercive penalties, though it lacks civilly-binding force in most secular jurisdictions. The academic degrees in canon law are the J.C.B. (Juris Canonici Baccalaureatus, Bachelor of Canon Law, normally taken as a graduate degree), J.C.L. (Juris Canonici Licentiatus, Licentiate of Canon Law) and the J.C.D. (Juris Canonici Doctor, Doctor of Canon Law). Because of its specialized nature, advanced degrees in civil law or theology are normal prerequisites for the study of canon law.
Much of the legislative style was adapted from the Roman Law Code of Justinian. As a result, Roman ecclesiastical courts tend to follow the Roman Law style of continental Europe with some variation, featuring collegiate panels of judges and an investigative form of proceeding, called "inquisitorial", from the Latin "inquirere", to enquire. This is in contrast to the adversarial form of proceeding found in the common law system of English and U.S. law, which features such things as juries and single judges.
The institutions and practices of canon law paralleled the legal development of much of Europe, and consequently both modern civil law and common law (legal system) bear the influences of canon law. Edson Luiz Sampel, a Brazilian expert in canon law, says that canon law is contained in the genesis of various institutes of civil law, such as the law in continental Europe and Latin American countries. Sampel explains that canon law has significant influence in contemporary society.
Canonical jurisprudential theory generally follows the principles of Aristotelian-Thomistic legal philosophy. While the term "law" is never explicitly defined in the Code, the Catechism of the Catholic Church cites Aquinas in defining law as "...an ordinance of reason for the common good, promulgated by the one who is in charge of the community" and reformulates it as "...a rule of conduct enacted by competent authority for the sake of the common good."
The law of the Eastern Catholic Churches in full union with Rome was in much the same state as that of the Latin or Western Church before 1917; much more diversity in legislation existed in the various Eastern Catholic Churches. Each had its own special law, in which custom still played an important part. In 1929 Pius XI informed the Eastern Churches of his intention to work out a Code for the whole of the Eastern Church. The publication of these Codes for the Eastern Churches regarding the law of persons was made between 1949 through 1958 but finalized nearly 30 years later.
The first Code of Canon Law, 1917, was mostly for the Roman Rite, with limited application to the Eastern Churches. After the Second Vatican Council, (1962 - 1965), another edition was published specifically for the Roman Rite in 1983. Most recently, 1990, the Vatican produced the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches which became the 1st code of Eastern Catholic Canon Law.
The Greek-speaking Orthodox have collected canons and commentaries upon them in a work known as the Pēdálion (Greek: Πηδάλιον, "Rudder"), so named because it is meant to "steer" the Church. The Orthodox Christian tradition in general treats its canons more as guidelines than as laws, the bishops adjusting them to cultural and other local circumstances. Some Orthodox canon scholars point out that, had the Ecumenical Councils (which deliberated in Greek) meant for the canons to be used as laws, they would have called them nómoi/νόμοι (laws) rather than kanónes/κανόνες (rules), but almost all Orthodox conform to them. The dogmatic decisions of the Councils, though, are to be obeyed rather than to be treated as guidelines, since they are essential for the Church's unity.