Raleigh, North Carolina

Where Raleigh is

Raleigh is the seat of Wake County, at 35.78°N, 78.64°W, on the eastern edge of the Piedmont where it meets the coastal plain. The Neuse River curves past the north and east sides of the city on its way to Pamlico Sound; downtown sits on higher ground about 315 ft above sea level, drained by small creeks rather than a major river. Durham is 25 miles northwest and Chapel Hill 30 miles west, and the three cities form the Research Triangle around the research park between them. Interstate 40 and the I-440 beltline serve the city. Raleigh is on Eastern Time.

How it became the capital

New Bern, on the coast, was the colonial capital, with Tryon Palace as the governor's residence. After the Revolution the legislature wandered among towns for a decade. In 1788 the state constitutional convention decided the capital should be within ten miles of Isaac Hunter's tavern in Wake County, and in 1792 the state bought 1,000 acres from Joel Lane and laid out a town named for Sir Walter Raleigh, sponsor of the lost Roanoke colony. It is one of the few American capitals planned as a capital from the start.

Population

Raleigh had 467,665 residents in 2020, the second-largest city in North Carolina; it passed Greensboro in the 1990s and has roughly doubled since then. Charlotte, the largest, had 874,579. The Raleigh–Cary metropolitan area has about 1.4 million people, and the combined Raleigh–Durham region about 2.1 million, a fifth of the state's 10,439,388.

The capitol

The North Carolina State Capitol on Union Square was completed in 1840 after the previous building burned in 1831. It was designed by the New York firm of Ithiel Town and Alexander Jackson Davis, with construction supervised by Scottish architect David Paton, and is regarded as one of the best-preserved Greek Revival capitols in the country. The building is granite quarried east of the city and delivered by an early horse-drawn railroad. The legislature moved to a separate building in 1963, but the governor's office remains in the capitol.

Distances to other cities

The Atlantic coast at Wilmington is about 130 miles southeast.

Related maps

• North Carolina map — the whole state with borders, cities and counties.
• Raleigh city map — the city page with nearby cities and distances.
• North Carolina county map · blank North Carolina map · printable North Carolina map.
• All 50 state capitals on one map, and the state capitals quiz.
• South region · South Atlantic division · Eastern Time Zone.