Geography and climate
Minneapolis history and the city's economic growth are tied to water, the city's defining physical characteristic, which was sent to the region during the last ice age. Fed by receding glaciers and Lake Agassiz ten thousand years ago, torrents of water from a glacial river undercut the Mississippi and Minnehaha riverbeds, creating waterfalls important to modern Minneapolis. Lying on an artesian aquifer and otherwise flat terrain, Minneapolis has a total area of 58.4 mi² (151.3 km²) and of this 6% is water. Water is managed by watershed districts that correspond to the Mississippi and the city's three creeks.
The city center is located just south of 45° N latitude. The city's lowest elevation of 686 ft (209 m) is near where Minnehaha Creek meets the Mississippi River. The site of the Prospect Park Water Tower is often cited as the city's highest point and a placard in Deming Heights Park denotes the highest elevation, but a spot at 974 ft (296.8 m) in or near Waite Park in Northeast Minneapolis is corroborated by Google Earth as the highest ground.
The climate of Minneapolis is typical of the Upper Midwestern United States. Winters are bitterly cold and dry, while summer is warm, sometimes hot, and frequently humid. On the Köppen climate classification, Minneapolis falls in the warm summer humid continental climate zone (Dfa). The city experiences a full range of precipitation and related weather events, including snow, sleet, ice, rain, thunderstorms, tornadoes, and fog. The warmest temperature ever recorded in Minneapolis was 108 °F (42.2 °C) in July 1936, and the coldest temperature ever recorded was -41 °F (-40.6 °C), in January 1888. The snowiest winter of record was 1983–84, when 98.4 in (2.5 m) of snow fell.
Because of its northerly location in the United States and lack of large bodies of water to moderate the air, Minneapolis is frequently subjected to cold arctic air masses throughout the winter months. The average annual temperature of 45.4 °F (7 °C) gives the Minneapolis–St.Paul metropolitan area the coldest annual mean temperature of any major metropolitan area in the continental U.S.
(Source: Wikipedia.org)
