In recent years, some Austinites have adopted the unofficial slogan "Keep Austin Weird",[21] which refers to the desire to protect small, unique, and local businesses from being overrun by large corporations.

A number of Fortune 500 companies have headquarters or regional offices in Austin, including 3M, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Agilent Technologies, Amazon, Apple, Dell, Expedia, Facebook (Meta), General Motors, Google, IBM, Intel, NXP Semiconductors, Oracle, Tesla, and Texas Instruments.

The African American population of Austin swelled dramatically after the enforcement of the Emancipation Proclamation in Texas by Union General Gordon Granger at Galveston, in an event commemorated as Juneteenth.

The opening of the Houston and Texas Central Railway (H&TC) in 1871[44] turned Austin into the major trading center for the region, with the ability to transport both cotton and cattle.

[34] In the late 19th century, Austin expanded its city limits to more than three times its former area, and the first granite dam was built on the Colorado River to power a new street car line and the new "moon towers".

[34] During the early 20th century, a three-way system of social segregation emerged in Austin, with Anglos, African Americans and Mexicans being separated by custom or law in most aspects of life, including housing, health care, and education.

[61] Because the hills to the west are primarily limestone rock with a thin covering of topsoil, portions of the city are frequently subjected to flash floods from the runoff caused by thunderstorms.

[62][63] To help control this runoff and to generate hydroelectric power, the Lower Colorado River Authority operates a series of dams that form the Texas Highland Lakes.

[86] However, severe weather and/or supercell thunderstorms can occur multiple times per year, bringing damaging winds, lightning, heavy rain, and occasional flash flooding to the city.

From October 2010 through September 2011, both major reporting stations in Austin, Camp Mabry and Bergstrom Int'l, had the least rainfall of a water year on record, receiving less than a third of normal precipitation.

[109] Along the shores of Lady Bird Lake is the 350 acres (140 hectares) Zilker Park, which contains large open lawns, sports fields, cross country courses, historical markers, concession stands, and picnic areas.

The Greenbelt, which begins at Zilker Park and stretches South/Southwest to the Woods of Westlake subdivision, is characterized by large limestone cliffs, dense foliage, and shallow bodies of water.

[148] In early October 2019, Texas Governor Greg Abbott sent a letter to Mayor Steve Adler threatening to deploy state resources to combat the camping ban repeal.

The ban introduces penalties for camping, sitting, or lying down on a public sidewalk or sleeping outdoors in or near Downtown Austin or the area around the University of Texas campus.

[153] Other high-tech companies with operations in Austin include 3M, Apple (the largest campus outside of Cupertino), Amazon, AMD, Apartment Ratings, Applied Materials, Arm, Bigcommerce, BioWare, Blizzard Entertainment, Buffalo Technology, Cirrus Logic, Cisco Systems, Cloudflare, Crowdstrike, Dropbox, eBay, Electronic Arts, Flextronics, Facebook, Google, Hewlett-Packard, Hoover's, HomeAway, HostGator, Indeed, Intel Corporation, Meta, National Instruments, Nintendo, Nvidia, Oracle, PayPal, Polycom, Qualcomm, Rackspace, RetailMeNot, Rooster Teeth, Samsung Group, Silicon Labs, Spansion, TikTok, United Devices, VMware, X (formerly Twitter), Xerox, and Zoho Corporation.

US 183 runs from northwest to southeast, and SH 71 crosses the southern part of the city from east to west, completing a rough "box" around central and north-central Austin.

Amtrak's Austin station is located in west downtown and is served by the Texas Eagle which runs daily between Chicago and San Antonio, continuing on to Los Angeles several times a week.

[203] The term "Old Austin" refers to a time when the city was smaller and more bohemian with a considerably lower cost of living and better known for its lack of traffic, hipsters, and urban sprawl.

Originally conceived as a summer tourism draw, the multi-day event evolved from water-themed activities to a broader civic festival due to growth and community interest.

A movie theater chain by the name of Alamo Drafthouse Cinema was founded in Austin in 1997; the South Lamar location of which is home to the annual week-long Fantastic Fest film festival.

Films produced in Austin include The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), Songwriter (1984), Man of the House, Secondhand Lions, Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, Nadine, Waking Life, Spy Kids, The Faculty, Dazed and Confused, The Guards Themselves, Wild Texas Wind, Office Space, The Life of David Gale, Miss Congeniality, Doubting Thomas, Slacker, Idiocracy, Death Proof, The New Guy, Hope Floats, The Alamo, Blank Check, The Wendall Baker Story, School of Rock, A Slipping-Down Life, A Scanner Darkly, Saturday Morning Massacre, and most recently, the Coen brothers' True Grit, Grindhouse, Machete, How to Eat Fried Worms, Bandslam and Lazer Team.

A volunteer-run arts organization supporting creative expression and counter-culture community - Church of the Friendly Ghost (COTFG) helped many experimental programs get their start in Austin,TX.

Also known as "Castle Hill" or simply "Graffiti Park", the site on Baylor Street was closed to the public in early January 2019 but remained intact, behind a fence and with an armed guard, in mid-March 2019.

Natural features like the bicycle-friendly Texas Hill Country and generally mild climate make Austin the home of several endurance and multi-sport races and communities.

[274] Austin is home to the Circuit of the Americas (COTA), a grade 1 Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile specification 3.427-mile (5.515 km) motor racing facility which hosts the Formula One United States Grand Prix.

[291] Antoine Predock and Cotera Kolar Negrete & Reed Architects designed a new city hall building, which was intended to reflect what The Dallas Morning News referred to as a "crazy-quilt vitality, that embraces everything from country music to environmental protests and high-tech swagger.

[315][316] One of the first American mass school shooting incidents took place in Austin on August 1, 1966, when Charles Whitman shot 43 people, killing 13 from the top of the University of Texas tower.

The Austin Monitor is an online outlet that specializes in insider reporting on City Hall, Travis County Commissioners Court, AISD, and other related local civics beats.

Smith co-founded the Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, non-partisan public media organization, with Austin venture capitalist John Thornton and veteran journalist Ross Ramsey.

Network television stations (affiliations in parentheses) include KTBC (Fox O&O), KVUE (ABC), KXAN (NBC), KEYE-TV (CBS), KLRU (PBS), KNVA (The CW), KBVO (MyNetworkTV), and KAKW (Univision O&O).