The Pacific Northwest, sometimes referred to as Cascadia, is a geographic region in Western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Though no official boundary exists, the most common conception includes the U.S. states of Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and the Canadian province of British Columbia. Some broader conceptions reach north into Alaska and Yukon, south into northern California, and east into western Montana. Other conceptions may be limited to the coastal areas west of the Cascade and Coast mountains.
The West Coast of the United States, also known as the Pacific Coast and the Western Seaboard, is the coastline along which the Western United States meets the North Pacific Ocean. The term typically refers to the contiguous U.S. states of California, Oregon, and Washington, but it occasionally includes Alaska and Hawaii in bureaucratic usage. For example, the U.S. Census Bureau considers both states to be part of a larger U.S. geographic division.
Cascadia and Cascadian are terms that derive from the Cascade Range and may refer to:
Bioregionalism is a philosophy that suggests that political, cultural, and economic systems are more sustainable and just if they are organized around naturally defined areas called bioregions. Bioregions are defined through physical and environmental features, including watershed boundaries and soil and terrain characteristics. Bioregionalism stresses that the determination of a bioregion is also a cultural phenomenon, and emphasizes local populations, knowledge, and solutions.
A bioregion is a geographical area, on land or at sea, defined not by administrative boundaries but by distinct characteristics such as plant and animal species, ecological systems, soils and landforms, human settlements and cultures those attributes give rise to, and topographic features such as watersheds. The idea of bioregions were adopted and popularized in the mid-1970s by a school of philosophy called Bioregionalism, which includes the concept that human culture, in practice, can influence bioregional definitions. Bioregions are part of a nested series of ecological scales, generally starting with local watersheds, growing into larger river systems, then Level III or IV Ecoregions, bioregions, then biogeographical Realm, followed by the continental-scale and ultimately the biosphere.
The 1700 Cascadia earthquake occurred along the Cascadia subduction zone on January 26, 1700, with an estimated moment magnitude of 8.7–9.2. The megathrust earthquake involved the Juan de Fuca plate from mid-Vancouver Island, south along the Pacific Northwest coast as far as northern California. The plate slipped an average of 20 meters (66 ft) along a fault rupture about 1,000 kilometers long.
The Northwest Territorial Imperative was a white separatist idea put forward in the 1970s–80s by white nationalist, white supremacist, white separatist and neo-Nazi groups within the United States. According to it, members of these groups were encouraged to relocate to a region of the Northwestern United States—Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Western Montana—with the intention to eventually turn the region into an Aryan ethnostate. Some definitions of the project include the entire states of Montana and Wyoming, plus Northern California.
The Cascadia Cup is the name of the trophy created in 2004 by supporters of the Portland Timbers, Seattle Sounders, and Vancouver Whitecaps, which is awarded each season to the best soccer team in the Pacific Northwest. The cup is named for the Cascadia region. The Timbers, Sounders, and Whitecaps have roots dating to the days of the original North American Soccer League. It was first contested in 2004, and was claimed by the Whitecaps. In 2011 the competition continued with the now Major League Soccer (MLS) sides Portland Timbers, Seattle Sounders FC, and Vancouver Whitecaps FC.
Pacific Northwest English is a variety of North American English spoken in the U.S. states of Washington and Oregon, sometimes also including Idaho. Due to the internal diversity within Pacific Northwest English, current studies remain inconclusive about whether it is best regarded as a dialect of its own, separate from Western American English or even California English and/or influenced by Canadian English with which it shares its major phonological features. The dialect region contains a highly diverse and mobile population, which is reflected in the historical and continuing development of the variety.
The city flag of Portland, Oregon, consists of a green field on which is placed a white four-pointed star from which radiate blue stripes, each bordered by L-shaped yellow elements (esquarres). Narrow white fimbriations separate the blue and yellow elements from each other and from the green background. The official ordinance specifies a height of 3 feet and a length of 5 feet for the flag.
Vexillography is the art and practice of designing flags; a person who designs flags is a vexillographer. Vexillography is allied with vexillology, the scholarly study of flags, but is not synonymous with that discipline.
The Cascadia movement is a bioregional independence movement based in the Cascadia bioregion of western North America. Potential boundaries differ, with some drawn along existing political state and provincial lines, and others drawn along larger ecological, cultural, political, and economic boundaries.
The Cascadia bioregion is the Pacific Northwest as defined through the watersheds of the Columbia, Fraser and Snake Rivers, as defined through the geology of the region. It extends for more than 2,500 miles (4,000 km) from the Copper River in Southern Alaska, to Cape Mendocino, approximately 200 miles north of San Francisco, and east as far as the Yellowstone Caldera and continental divide and contains 75 distinct ecoregions.
Ecotrust is a nonprofit organization based in Portland, Oregon, working to create social, economic, and environmental benefits.
The Pacific Northwest Corridor or the Pacific Northwest Rail Corridor is one of eleven federally designated higher-speed rail corridors in the United States and Canada. The 466-mile (750 km) corridor extends from Eugene, Oregon, to Vancouver, British Columbia, via Portland, Oregon; and Seattle, Washington, in the Pacific Northwest region. It was designated a high-speed rail corridor on October 20, 1992, as the one of five high-speed corridors in the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 (ISTEA).
The Portland Timbers are an American professional soccer club based in Portland, Oregon. The Timbers compete in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Western Conference. The Timbers have played their home matches at Providence Park since 2011, when the team began play as an expansion team in the league.
The Cascadia national soccer team is a soccer team representing the men's side of the Cascadia region of the United States and Canada and is controlled by the Cascadia Association Football Federation (CAFF). The team is composed of players from the U.S states of Oregon, Washington and the Canadian province of British Columbia. The stated mission of the team is "...to allow Cascadia as a distinct cultural entity, isolated bioregion and growing society with common interests to be represented at the international level in the sport we are all passionate about." CAFF is a member of ConIFA. Cascadia is not a member of FIFA or any confederation or sub-confederation as the region is wholly a part of both the United States or Canada. However, CAFF is not opposed to those organizations and sees itself coexisting as a non-FIFA regional representative team.
Music of the Pacific Northwest encompasses many musical styles from prehistory to the modern Pacific Northwest.
New religious movements in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States have a history going back to the 19th century.
The Seattle Sounders–Vancouver Whitecaps rivalry is a soccer rivalry between Seattle Sounders FC and Vancouver Whitecaps FC, both based in the Pacific Northwest region. The rivalry originated in the North American Soccer League of the 1970s, with both cities reviving expansion teams, and has carried into lower-level leagues, including the A-League and USL First Division. The rivalry moved to Major League Soccer, the top division of soccer in the United States and Canada, in 2011. The two clubs are part of the Cascadia Cup, the trophy and competition created in 2004 by supporters of the Portland Timbers, Vancouver Whitecaps, and the Seattle Sounders which is awarded each season to the best top-flight soccer team in the Cascadia region.
