That reinvention is why Arlington calls itself "The American Dream City." Today it is the third-largest city in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, a city of nearly 400,000 sitting squarely between Dallas and Fort Worth, with a General Motors assembly plant, the University of Texas at Arlington, Lake Arlington, the Trinity River woods of River Legacy Parks, and an entertainment district that draws visitors from across the country. The prairie practicality is still there underneath the bright lights — a hardworking Texas city that also happens to throw a very large party.
Then Arlington discovered it had water worth selling. A downtown artesian well drilled in 1892 brought up mineral water, and for nearly sixty years the town marketed itself as a health resort, with a bathhouse and pavilion and visitors who came to "take the waters." The interurban electric railway that linked Dallas and Fort Worth ran right through town, carrying day-trippers to the wells. The well stayed at the center of downtown civic life until it was capped in 1951; a memorial plaza marks the spot today. The health-resort decades gave Arlington its first taste of being a destination rather than a way station.
Why People Visit Arlington
Arlington rewards travelers who want big-event energy with Texas convenience — the stadiums and theme parks of the Entertainment District, set between Dallas and Fort Worth and easy to reach from either. People come for the games, the coasters, and the concerts, and stay for the river-and-lake parks and the offbeat heritage of a prairie town that talked itself into becoming the American Dream City.
