Orange County Geography
May 13, 2008
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the canton has a absolute breadth of 2,455 km² (948 sq mi), authoritative it the aboriginal canton in Southern California. Surface baptize accounts for 411 km² (159 sq mi) of the area, 16.73% of the total; 2,045 km² (789 sq mi) of it is land.
Orange Canton is belted on the southwest by the Pacific Ocean, on the arctic by Los Angeles County, on the northeast by San Bernardino County, on the northeast by Riverside County, and on the southeast by San Diego County.
The northwestern allotment of the canton lies on the littoral credible of the Los Angeles Basin, while the southeastern end rises into the foothills of the Santa Ana Mountains. Most of Orange County’s citizenry abide in one of two bank littoral valleys that lie in the basin, the Santa Ana Valley and the Saddleback Valley. The Santa Ana Mountains lie aural the eastern boundaries of the canton and of the Cleveland National Forest. The top point is Santiago Peak (5,687 ft/1,733 m), about 20 mi (32 km) east of Santa Ana. Santiago Peak and adjacent Modjeska Peak, just 200 anxiety (60 m) shorter, anatomy a backbone accepted as Saddleback, arresting from about everywhere in the county. The Peralta Hills extend westward from the Santa Ana Mountains through the communities of Anaheim Hills, Orange, and catastrophe in Olive. The Loma Backbone is addition arresting feature, active alongside to the Santa Ana Mountains through the axial allotment of the county, afar from the taller mountains to the east by Santiago Canyon.
The Santa Ana River is the county’s arch watercourse, abounding through the average of the canton from Northeast to Southwest. Its above accessory to the South and East is Santiago Creek. Added watercourses aural the canton cover Aliso Creek, San Juan Creek, and Horsethief Creek. In the North, the San Gabriel River aswell briefly crosses into Orange Canton and exits into the Pacific on the Los Angeles-Orange Canton bandage amid the cities of Long Beach and Seal Beach. Laguna Beach is home to the county’s alone accustomed lakes, Laguna Lakes, which are formed by baptize ascent up adjoin an underground fault.
Residents sometimes figuratively bisect the canton into “North County” and “South County” (meaning Northwest and Southeast –following the county’s accustomed askew acclimatization forth the bounded coastline). This is added of a cultural and demographic acumen perpetuated by the accepted television shows “The OC” and “Laguna Beach,” amid the earlier areas afterpiece to Los Angeles, and the added flush and afresh developed areas to the South and East. A alteration amid earlier and newer development may be advised to abide almost alongside to State Route 55 (aka the Costa Mesa Freeway). This alteration is accentuated by ample crabbed tracts of sparsely developed breadth active until contempo years by agronomics and aggressive airfields.
While there is a accustomed topographical Northeast-to-Southwest alteration from civil elevations to the lower littoral band, there is no academic bounded analysis amid Arctic and South County. Perpendicular to that gradient, the Santa Ana River almost divides the canton amid northwestern and southeastern sectors (about 40% to 60% respectively, by area), but does not represent any credible economic, political or cultural differences, nor does it decidedly affect administration of travel, housing, commerce, industry or agronomics from one ancillary to the other.
