Hometown Glory

The hottest city in America? A national magazine falls in love with Houston'ssteamy economics

I've heard the iconic Forbes building on New York's Fifth Avenue was just sold. Based on the magazine's listicle love for Texas, I can't help but wonder if the company is planning a move south.

The July 16 issue of Forbes includes a feature about Houston's booming economic powerhouse. (It includes a partial title of "Houston Gets Hot" that could only be funny to a writer sitting in an air-conditioned office in Manhattan. Seriously, Kurt Badenhausen, it is very hot here right now. Don't push us.)

Badenhausen's piece is in some ways a compilation of all the Forbes economic lists that Houston has topped in recent months, pointing out our dozen resident billionaires, as well as the benefits of having the world's largest medical center, one of the country's busiest ports and the technological prestige of a NASA headquarters.

Though there are multiple examples of energy companies bringing headquarters and jobs to Houston, Badenhausen also points out that the city's economy is more diverse than ever.

Oil and gas drive the Houston economy and are responsible for 50% of the jobs related to the export of goods and services outside the area. But that’s gone way down over the past 30 years. Energy represented 87% in the early 1980s. That diversification helped Houston emerge from the recent recession faster than any other large U.S. city. Houston’s employment dropped 16 straight months from its peak in August 2008. Yet the carnage was much worse in other major metros like Riverside, Calif. (48 straight down months), Phoenix (38), Los Angeles (36) and Minneapolis (36). Houston and Washington, D.C. are the only major metros to have recovered all the jobs they lost in the recession."

Despite Houston's economy growing at an impressive 8.5 percent this year (on top of 8.6 percent growth in 2011), Forbes has the city at No. 20 in its annual ranking of The Best Places for Business and Careers. That's well below other Texas cities like Dallas, Austin, Fort Worth and San Antonio, despite having a higher projected annual growth rate than any of the cities in the top five spots.

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Found Footage

Texas hiker discovers impressively intact dinosaur track near Austin

Photo via KVUE

It may look plain, but this footprint tells an exciting story.

A dinosaur track discovered along Brushy Creek in Hutto near Austin is offering a glimpse into Texas’ prehistoric past.

For Gio Bernabe, walking along Brushy Creek is a chance to explore, fish, and look for anything interesting.

But during a recent Saturday afternoon walk, she came across something she never expected to find.

“And then I saw there was like this huge imprint of kind of like a foot, like a three-toed foot,” Bernabe said. “So I looked at it and I kind of cleaned it up and it looked like a dinosaur foot.”

Bernabe posted a photo of the print on social media, where it quickly attracted attention from the community.

“I was so excited because this is honestly one of my biggest dreams,” Bernabe said. “I've always wanted to find something like, really cool like this, like fossil-related, and I found it in Hutto, Texas.”

Chris Sagebiel with the Jackson School of Geosciences’ Texas Vertebrate Paleontology Collections examined the tracks and confirmed they belonged to a dinosaur. He said the tracks are particularly well preserved.

“I can only think of a couple of places where, in this area, where we have tracks that are that age, that are that well preserved,” Sagebiel said. “We get a lot of really faint tracks or partial tracks, but a beautiful one like that is a very nice find.”

Dinosaur tracks are relatively common around Austin, according to Sagebiel. However, they are more often found west of Interstate 35, where older rock formations are exposed.

The size and spacing of the tracks can help researchers identify the type of dinosaur that made them.

Sagebiel said the tracks likely came from a large, plant-eating, two-legged dinosaur — possibly a Hadrosaur, also known as a duck-billed dinosaur.

Hadrosaur illustration This distinctive dino from North America is a member of the family hadrosauridae.Getty Images

Read the full story at our news partner KVUE.com.

science dinosaurs hiking history nature

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Found Footage

Texas hiker discovers impressively intact dinosaur track near Austin