Despite being named after the Algonquian word for skunk, Chicago is one of America’s most thriving and spectacular cities. Spanning 22 miles along the southwest shore of Lake Michigan, the city itself holds nearly 2.9 million people and sits in the center of a metropolitan area containing more than 8 million.

Looking at the image, some of Chicago’s famous sites can be made out. The long black line coming into the center of the city from the southwest is the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal. In the center of the city, just right of where the canal banks north to become the Chicago River, sits a small pier on Lake Michigan, perpendicular to the city, known as Meigs Field. Just to the left of the pier is Soldier Field. Scanning north of Meigs Field, another pier juts out onto the lake. This is Navy Pier. Though it cannot be made out in the image, the Water Tower District and the John Hancock Building sit between Navy Pier and the Chicago River. South of this area is downtown Chicago and the Sears Tower.

This simulated-color scene was acquired by the Landsat 7 Enhanced Thematic Mapper plus (ETM+) on September 14, 2001.
Image courtesy Ron Beck, USGS Land Processes Data Center, Satellite Systems Branch

SOURCE: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/NewImages/images.php3?img_id=11277

”The purpose of NASA's Earth Observatory is to provide a freely-accessible publication on the Internet where the public can obtain new satellite imagery and scientific information about our home planet. The focus is on Earth's climate and environmental change. In particular, we hope our site is useful to public media and educators. Any and all materials published on the Earth Observatory are freely available for re-publication or re-use, except where copyright is indicated. We ask that NASA's Earth Observatory be given credit for its original materials.”

Picture prepared for Wikipedia by Adrian Pingstone in November 2003.

Uploaded to en: by en:User:Arpingstone on November 8, 2003

	This file is in the public domain in the United States because it was solely created by NASA. NASA copyright policy states that "NASA material is not protected by copyright unless noted". (See Template:PD-USGov, NASA copyright policy page or JPL Image Use Policy.)
	Warnings: Use of NASA logos, insignia and emblems is restricted per U.S. law 14 CFR 1221. The NASA website hosts a large number of images from the Soviet/Russian space agency, and other non-American space agencies. These are not necessarily in the public domain. Materials based on Hubble Space Telescope data may be copyrighted if they are not explicitly produced by the STScI.[1] See also {{PD-Hubble}} and {{Cc-Hubble}}. The SOHO (ESA & NASA) joint project implies that all materials created by its probe are copyrighted and require permission for commercial non-educational use. [2] Images featured on the Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) web site may be copyrighted. [3] The National Space Science Data Center (NSSDC) site has been known to host copyrighted content. Its photo gallery FAQ states that all of the images in the photo gallery are in the public domain "Unless otherwise noted."

en:Image:Chicago.landsat.750pix.jpg