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Katy is a city located in the U.S. state of Texas within the Houston–Sugar Land–Baytown metropolitan area. It is located partially in the counties of Fort Bend, Waller, and Harris. As of the 2000 U.S. Census, the city population was 11,775.Katy is named for the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad (commonly referred to at the "Katy Railroad", now a part of Union Pacific) that ran through it in the 19th century. Katy was once known as Cane Island. The name is derived from Cane Island Creek which runs just west of downtown, a branch of Buffalo Bayou. The origins of the name Cane Island are believed to be from the fact that Katy was once a major sugar cane producer. The Houston suburb's prime attraction is the Katy Mills Mall. A secondary attraction is an unusual outdoor museum of Chinese culture and history called the Forbidden Gardens.
Katy has three shopping centers. Only one is finished, that one is called Katy Mills Mall which is one of the largest malls in Texas. The two others are The Village of Katy, a shopping and business center, and West Grand Promenade, that is being developed by Simon, the same operator of the Houston Galleria. One store has been finished, J.C. Penney, at the unnamed shopping center.
Katy
residents often split the city into two informal sections: "Old Katy" (or Katy
Proper) and "Katy Area." Old Katy is basically the actual city limits of Katy
and lies for the most part north of Interstate 10. This is the original Katy
from before the 1970s when Houston's Energy Corridor made its way west on I-10
and the development that came with it.
The "Katy area" is made up of large sections of unincorporated Harris and Fort
Bend counties and for the most part sits east and southeast of the city limits
of Katy. This area is within the Katy Independent School District and nearly
everyone in this area has a Katy postal address.
The Katy area includes newer developments such as Cinco Ranch and Grand Lakes,
while also encompassing developments from the 1970s and 1980s such as Memorial
Parkway and Nottingham Country. All of the "Katy area" lies in the city of
Houston's extraterritorial jurisdiction (ETJ), not Katy's ETJ. This means that
the areas of "Katy area" are controlled by the city of Houston and the city has
the ability to annex it in the future. The city of Katy can not annex this area
unless the city of Houston releases the area's ETJ to Katy, which has occurred
in several small chunks in recent years. The most recent instance of this was in
2001 when Houston ceded about 400 acres (1.6 km) of ETJ to the City of Katy to
allow the Katy Mills Mall and surrounding parking lot to be built entirely
within the City of Katy.
The Greater Katy area, which encompasses both the actual City of Katy along with
the unincorporated suburban areas around the City, has approximately 175,000
residents total.