Tampa Bay
The Tampa Bay is a bay on the Gulf of Mexico , located on the west coast of the peninsula Florida .
Geography and ecology
The bay has a water surface of 1031 square kilometers and an average depth of three meters. It forms part of the coastline of Pinellas , Hillsborough and Manatee Counties . The cities of Tampa , Saint Petersburg and Clearwater on the bay, each with over 100,000 inhabitants, are part of the Tampa Bay Area metropolitan area , which comprises around 2.8 million inhabitants.
About 100 small and medium-sized rivers flow into the bay. Extensive mangrove and wetlands are home to numerous animal and plant species. The bay is one of the wintering areas for manatees and a breeding area for various species of fish, birds and invertebrates. In 1990 the bay was declared an "estuary of national importance". Two zones are protected as National Wildlife Refuge : Pinellas National Wildlife Refuge and Egmont Key State Park .
traffic
There are three deep-water ports on Tampa Bay: Port of Tampa (tenth largest in the USA), Port of Manatee and Port of St. Petersburg. Bridges over Tampa Bay are:
- Sunshine Skyway Bridge between St. Petersburg and Terra Ceia, Manatee County
- Gandy Bridge between St. Petersburg and Tampa
- Howard Frankland Bridge between St. Petersburg and Tampa
- Courtney Campbell Causeway between Clearwater and Tampa
- Bayside Bridge between Clearwater and Largo, Pinellas County
Others
The bay is named after numerous sports clubs, including:
- Tampa Bay Buccaneers (American Football)
- Tampa Bay Lightning (ice hockey)
- Tampa Bay Rays (baseball)
- Tampa Bay Rebels (basketball)
- Tampa Bay Storm ( Arena Football )
- Tampa Bay Rowdies (Soccer)
- Tampa Bay Vipers (American Football)
Web links
- Tampa Bay on gulfbase.org
- Tampa Bay Estuary Atlas
- Tampa Bay Estuary Program
Coordinates: 27 ° 46 ′ N , 82 ° 33 ′ W