It is the capital city of the State of New York situated in the United States of America. Albany is also the Albany County’s seat and spreads across an area of approximately 21.8 sq mi or 56.6 km². the city is situated a t a distance of about 136 miles from the city of New York towards north and lies just south of the midway between the two rivers called Hudson River and the Mohawk River. The population of the city of Albany as estimated by a census in 2006 is 93,963.
Albany forms an area called the Capital District along with the neighboring cities of Saratoga Springs, Troy and Schenectady. The four cities together unite as the Albany Schenectady Troy Metropolitan Area and have a combined population of 850,957 residing within the Metropolitan Area. The urban area of Albany ranks on number 4th within the state of New York and on number 56 amongst all the metropolitan areas of the United States of America. The area of the present day city of Albany was occupied by the Dutch in the early seventeenth century and was called the Dutch Fort Orange. This and the area nearby forming the community of Beverwyck are all included in today’s capital city of Albany. The olden day Albany or the Dutch Fort Orange had fallen to the British Colonials and these had renamed it as Albany to honor James II who was the Duke of Albany. The city is on number two amongst the cities that were granted an official charter and thus is one of the oldest capital cities of the present day union. The date of incorporation is 22 of July and the year is 1686.
The city was preceded only by New Amsterdam s a capital city to be incorporated as well as three other non capital cities namely St. Augustine, Santa Fe and Hampton.