Arlington County, Virginia

Arlington County is a county of about 210,000 residents in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is located directly across the Potomac River to the southwest of Washington, D.C. Formerly part of the District of Columbia, the land now composing the county was retroceded to Virginia on July 9, 1846, in an act of Congress that took effect in 1847. It was called Alexandria County from that date until March 16, 1920, when an act of the General Assembly changed its name to Arlington County. Despite being organized politically as a "county" in Virginia, it is considered a Central City of the Washington Metropolitan Area by the Census Bureau, along with the adjacent cities of Washington and Alexandria, Virginia. At a land area of 26 square miles (67 km), it is geographically the smallest self-governing county in the United States. In 2005 Arlington was ranked first among walkable cities in the United States by the American Podiatric Medical Association. CNN Money ranked Arlington as the most educated city in 2006 with 35.7% of residents having held graduate degrees. In October 2008, BusinessWeek ranked Arlington as the safest city in which to weather a recession, with a 49.4% share of jobs in 'strong industries'. In July 2009, CNN Money ranked Arlington second in the country in its listing of "Best Places for the Rich and Single. " Along with five other Northern Virginia counties, Arlington ranked among the twenty U.S. counties with the highest median household income in 2006. Arlington is the location of Arlington National Cemetery, Reagan National Airport, the Pentagon, Fort Myer, the Pentagon Memorial, the USMC War Memorial, the Air Force Memorial, and numerous other monuments.