Glendale is a city in Maricopa County, Arizona, USA, located about 9 miles northwest from Downtown Phoenix. According to 2006 Census Bureau estimates, the population of the city is 246,531. Glendale is located at 33° 32' 19"N 112° 11' 11"W (33.53861, -112.18639). According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 55.8 square miles, of which, 55.7 square miles of it is land and 0.1 square miles of it (0.13%) is water.
The NHL's Phoenix Coyotes and NLL's Arizona Sting began playing in Glendale when Jobing.com Arena (formerly the Glendale Arena) opened in December 2003. Also in Glendale is the new University of Phoenix Stadium, home of the NFL's Arizona Cardinals and the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, which opened in August 2006. In 2008, Super Bowl XLII was played there when the Giants faced the Patriots. Both venues are part of the Westgate City Center development plan, meant to spur growth in the sparsely inhabited Yucca district. The Chicago White Sox and Los Angeles Dodgers of Major League Baseball both moved to Glendale and share a facility, known as Camelback Ranch, for spring training 2009.
Glendale bills itself as "Arizona’s Antique Capital," with support for its claim from both Sunset Magazine (2004) and a 1998 article in USA Today. Glendale is home to the popular Arrowhead Towne Center mall in the northwest part of the city. Glendale also is home to the metro Phoenix area's first medical school, Midwestern, as well as a major post-graduate international business school, the Thunderbird School of Global Management.
The city will have an extension of the Valley Metro light rail transit line which has been completed earlier in the year 2009, 2 years prior to the estimated year 0f 2011.