Merced, California, United States

🇺🇸 Merced is a city in, and the county seat of, Merced County, California, United States, in the San Joaquin Valley. Merced is a charter city that operates under a council-manager government. It is named after the Merced River, which flows nearby. Merced, known as the "Gateway to Yosemite", is less than two hours by automobile from Yosemite National Park to the east and Monterey Bay, the Pacific Ocean, and multiple beaches to the west. The community is served by the passenger rail service Amtrak, a minor, heavily subsidized airline through Merced Regional Airport, and three bus lines. It is approximately 110 miles (180 km) from Sacramento, 130 miles (210 km) from San Francisco, 45 miles (72 km) from Fresno, and 270 miles (430 km) from Los Angeles. In 2005, the city became home to the 10th University of California campus, University of California, Merced (UC Merced), the first research university built in the U.S. in the 21st century.

History The first Merced post office opened in 1870. Merced incorporated in 1889 and now operates under the council-manager form of government.

During World War II, the Merced County fairgrounds were the site of a temporary "assembly center" where Japanese Americans were detained after being removed from their West Coast homes under Executive Order 9066. 4,669 men, women and children from central California (with most coming from Merced County) were confined in the Merced Assembly Center from May 6 to September 15, 1942, when they were transferred to the more permanent Granada internment camp in Colorado.

Since 2005, Merced has been home to the University of California, Merced. Current recreational opportunities in the city include Regal Cinemas, Oh Wow Nickel Arcade, Rollerland, The Castle Air Museum, a zoo, a skate park and basketball court in Applegate park, The Mainzer Theater which is known for its historic and architectural value, the County Courthouse Museum circa 1889, the Merced Multicultural Arts Center and the County Library. Merced has several shopping areas including the Merced Mall, anchored by Target, JCPenney and Kohl's, a strip mall located on the city's north-west side which includes Barnes & Noble, Lowe's, Walmart, and a few restaurants. Merced's Main Street contains a movie theater, a music store, a shoe cobbler and other assorted shops.

Also within a short distance from the city limits are the Castle Air Museum, Lake Yosemite, and Merced Falls. The city of Merced along with its surrounding cities are serviced by the Merced Sun-Star and the Merced County Times. The Merced Sun-Star daily newspaper has a circulation of 14,219 daily and 18,569 Saturday in the Merced area. The paper was sold to U.S. Media in 1985 and was acquired by The McClatchy Company in January 2004.

Homes at the median level in Merced had lost 62% of their value from the second quarter of 2006, when they peaked at $336,743, the biggest drop anywhere in the country, according to data provided to Forbes by Local Market Monitor, a Cary, North-Carolina-based real-estate research firm. Home prices have since rebounded, with the median sale price in April 2018 at $247,000. The current average being $358,000. Terry Ruscoe of Merced-Yosemite Realty, noted investors from outside of the Valley were helping to drive up home prices. Ruscoe said, "A tremendous amount of out-of-town buyers. Our primary client comes from the LA area or the Bay Area. We see a lot of them coming in and buying properties, even coming in now when the prices are moving up quickly because they know they can rent those".

The metro area went to a 14.2% unemployment rate in December 2013. Having since recovered to a rate of 8.7% in April 2018. Some efforts have been directed towards diversifying its economy and are showing a lowering trend in the overall unemployment rate, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

During the Great Recession Merced suffered one of the greatest property price collapses in the country and house prices at the end of 2009 had fallen to 1998 levels, according to Zillow, making housing affordable compared to many other California locations.

The economy has traditionally relied upon agribusiness and upon the presence of Castle Air Force Base. Over the past twenty years, more diversified industry has entered the area, including printing, fiberglass boat building, warehousing and distribution, and packaging industries.

In September 1995, Castle Air Force Base closed after phasing down over the previous three years. This affected residential real estate and some sectors of the retail and service economies, but overall retail continued to increase. Industrial development is increasing in the area. It is now known as the Castle Airport Aviation and Development Center. The Castle Air Museum remains at the site.

Major highways • State Route 59 • State Route 99 • State Route 140 • Interstate I-80

Transport: Air • Merced Regional Airport offers passenger service provided by Advanced Air, offering daily flights to Las Vegas International Airport (LAS) and Los Angeles International Airport (LAX.) • Castle Airport in nearby Atwater, California.

Transport: Bus • Greyhound, Intercalifornias, TUFESA and Fronteras del Norte serve Merced. • YARTS provides scheduled service into Yosemite National Park. • Merced County Transit, "The Bus", operates both regularly scheduled fixed route bus service and Dial-A-Ride (demand response) transportation services throughout Merced County. • CatTracks is UC Merced's bus service, which connects students, staff and faculty at the university to off-campus apartments, the off-campus Castle facilities, local amenities, the Amtrak station, and the downtown area. CatTracks also has a live map.

Transport: Rail • Amtrak San Joaquins provides passenger service.

Map of proposed route, also including the proposed Brightline West to Las Vegas

High-speed rail The California High-Speed Rail Authority February 2016 draft business plan, outlined the Merced station as not beginning service at the same time as the initial San Jose to Bakersfield route in 2025, but would likely open in 2029 instead. This would make the leg between the Central Valley and Pacheco Pass the first to be constructed. The Merced City Council vigorously opposed the delay in their city's station opening, noting Merced's volume of commuters seeking high-speed rail to access jobs in Silicon Valley. In response, the April 2016 revisions to the business plan indeed included Merced in the initial construction segment, initially as a single-track spur connecting only to the westbound track to the Bay Area, with build out of the full Wye happening later. The system will run from San Francisco to the Los Angeles basin in under three hours at speeds capable of over 200 miles per hour. In August 2022, the CAHSRA announced that it had received a $25,000,000 RAISE Grant to advance design work from Madera to Merced.

Sample trips in the California High Speed rail would include: • Merced to Fresno - 30 minutes • Merced to Sacramento – 43 minutes • Merced to San Jose – 45 minutes • Merced to San Francisco – 1 hour and 15 minutes • Merced to Los Angeles – 1 hour and 40 minutes

Altamont Corridor Express Extension The ACE regional rail system is pursuing an extension to Merced as a part of its broader Altamont Corridor Vision plan. The Final Environmental Impact Report for the Ceres-Merced extension was approved on December 3, 2021.

Geography According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 23.3 square miles (60 km²).

Merced is approximately 110 miles (180 km) south-east of San Francisco and 275 miles (443 km) north-west of Los Angeles.

A major groundwater plume containing the contaminant PCE was discovered in Merced in 1987. Subsequently, drilling of new water wells was severely restricted.

Economy: Top employers According to the city's Official Website the top employers in the city include: County of Merced; Merced City School District; Merced Union High School District; Merced College; Quad Graphics; University of California, Merced; City of Merced; Scholle Corporation; WalMart.

Agriculture Merced is ranked as the sixth-top producing county in California. In 2019, Merced County generated $3.271 billion in total value of production. The top five commodities from 2019 in Merced are: Milk; Almonds; Cattle; Chickens; Potatoes.

Education Merced is home to a community college, Merced College and the University of California Merced. UC Merced now enrolls 8,321 undergraduate and 772 graduate students for a total of 9,093 students, as reported in the university's fall 2021 census. Of the 2021-2022 undergraduate degrees awarded, the top degrees were: 19% Biological Sciences, 16% Psychology, 11% Management, and 10% Computer Science Engineering. The University of California, Merced campus opened in late 2005 north-east of the city limits. UC Merced enrolled about 7,967 students during the 2017–2018 academic year. Merced is served by the Merced City School District, which has five main middle schools, Cruickshank Middle School, Herbert Hoover Middle School, Rivera Middle School, Weaver Middle School and Tenaya Middle School. There are also 14 elementary schools in this district. Merced Union High School District has three major public high school campuses, Merced High School, Golden Valley High School, and El Capitan High School as well as a few smaller campuses offering alternative education. Merced's community college, Merced College, has an enrollment of 8,996 students as of January 2021.

Health Mercy Medical Center Merced. A 2016 Community Health Assessment prepared by the Merced County Department of Public Health (MCDPH), determined that top health topics that affect Merced and Merced county are heart disease and stroke; diabetes; access to health care; and drug and alcohol abuse. In 2017 the MCDPH published the Merced County Community Health Improvement Plan in an effort to "address health disparities and to promote health equity with the goal of health and wellness for all county residents".

Sport Merced has a history of minor league baseball including the California League Merced Bears (1940s) and Atwater Angels (1970s) in nearby Atwater, California. There were the defunct Merced Black Bears of the Horizon Air Summer Series and the current Atwater Aviators of the Golden State Collegiate Baseball League.