San Mateo is a diverse community and the second-largest city in San Mateo County.

In recent years, the city has revamped its downtown, adding a movie theater complex and relocating and improving its Caltrain station. The downtown overhaul isn't over, as city officials plan in 2007 to update their long-term specific plan for the area.

The county's population boom is having a major effect in San Mateo, where a focus on transit-oriented housing has led to the approval of several major residential developments.

One of those developments, Bay Meadows Phase II, pits the city's past versus its future.

The mixed-use project would add 1,250 residential units near the Hillsdale Caltrain station. The development has been praised by environmentalists, but it will require tearing down the historic Bay Meadows horseracing track.

Though San Mateo does not have the high-tech cache of other county locales, the city recently served as an incubator for one of Silicon Valley's most-watched companies, YouTube.

http://www.smccd.net/accounts/smccd/
[San Mateo County Community College District]