Wasatch Front in the context of "Utah"

Salt Lake City, often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. It is the county seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. The population was 199,723 at the 2020 census, while the Salt Lake City metropolitan area has an estimated 1.3 million residents and is the 46th-largest metropolitan area in the United States. It is also part of the larger Salt Lake City–Ogden–Provo combined statistical area, an urban corridor along a 120-mile (190 km) segment of the Wasatch Front with a population of approximately 2.8 million. It is one of the principal urban centers within the Great Basin, along with Reno, Nevada.

Salt Lake City was founded in 1847 by settlers led by Brigham Young who were seeking to escape persecution they had experienced while living farther east. The Mormon pioneers, as they would come to be known, entered a semi-arid valley and immediately began building an extensive irrigation network that could feed the population and foster future growth. Salt Lake City's street grid system is based on a standard compass grid plan, with the southeast corner of Temple Square serving as the origin of the Salt Lake meridian. Owing to its proximity to the Great Salt Lake, the city was originally named Great Salt Lake City; the word "Great" was dropped from the city's name in 1868. Immigration of international members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), mining booms, and the construction of the first transcontinental railroad brought economic growth, and the city was nicknamed "The Crossroads of the West". It was traversed by the Lincoln Highway, the first transcontinental highway, in 1913. Two major cross-country freeways, I-15 and I-80, now intersect in the city. The city also has a belt route, I-215.

Provo (/ˈproʊ.voʊ/ PROH-voh) is a city in and the county seat of Utah County, Utah, United States. It is 43 miles (69 km) south of Salt Lake City along the Wasatch Front, and lies between the cities of Orem to the north and Springville to the south. With a population at the 2020 census of 115,162, Provo is the fourth-largest city in Utah and the principal city in the Provo-Orem metropolitan area, which had a population of 526,810 at the 2010 census. It is Utah's second-largest metropolitan area after Salt Lake City.

Provo is the home to Brigham Young University (BYU), a private higher education institution operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). Provo also has the LDS Church's largest Missionary Training Center (MTC). The city is a focus area for technology development in Utah, with several billion-dollar startups. The city's Peaks Ice Arena was a venue for the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics in 2002.

40°30′N 111°30′W / 40.500°N 111.500°W / 40.500; -111.500

The Wasatch Back is a region in the Rocky Mountains in northern Utah, United States, on the east side of the Wasatch Mountain range. The name Wasatch Back differentiates it from the Wasatch Front, which is the region on the western side of the Wasatch Mountains. The terms are commonly used in local media, and also in scholarly and scientific discussions of the region.

Utah is a state located in the Western United States. As of 2025, there are 255 municipalities in the U.S. state of Utah. A municipality is called a town if the population is under 1,000 people, and a city if the population is over 1,000 people. Incorporation means that a municipal charter has been adopted by the affected population following a referendum. In the Constitution of Utah, cities and towns are granted "the authority to exercise all powers relating to municipal affairs, and to adopt and enforce within its limits, local police, sanitary and similar regulations not in conflict with the general law" They also have the power to raise and collect taxes, to provide and maintain local public services, acquire by eminent domain any property needed to make local improvements, and to raise money by bonds.

The area had been occupied by different Native American groups dating to about 10,000 years before present. Europeans entered the region in the 1500s with the expedition of Garci-Lopez de Cardenas, as recorded by Francisco de Coronado, and in subsequent decades other Europeans had a scattered presence as mountain men or explorers but there were no large or permanent settlements. Utah was colonized by the Spanish Empire as part of the Province of Las Californias, and later Alta California. After Mexico gained independence from Spain in 1821, Utah was under Mexican control until the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 ceded the territory to the United States of America. The Spanish and Mexican legacy of the state is present in many place names, particularly in the southern portion of Utah. On July 22, 1847, the first party of Latter-day Saint pioneers arrived in the Salt Lake Valley, where they founded Salt Lake City. Over the next 22 years, more than 70,000 Mormon pioneers crossed the plains and settled in Utah. Initial colonization along the Wasatch Front was mostly made by members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), with little direct involvement from LDS leadership. Outside the Wasatch Front, many settlements were directed, planned, organized, and dispatched by leaders of the Church. Settlements were also founded by the railroads, mining companies and non-LDS settlers. Many settlements were named after leaders, history or from scriptures of the LDS Church. Natural features of the region, including rivers, mountains, lakes and flora, are also commonly used for names.

Interstate 15 (I-15) runs north–south in the U.S. state of Utah through the southwestern and central portions of the state, passing through most of the state's population centers, including St. George and those comprising the Wasatch Front: Provo–Orem, Salt Lake City, and Ogden–Clearfield. It is Utah's primary and only north–south interstate highway, as the vast majority of the state's population lives along its corridor; the Logan metropolitan area is the state's only Metropolitan Statistical Area through which I-15 does not pass. In 1998, the Utah State Legislature designated Utah's entire portion of the road as the Veterans Memorial Highway.

St. George or Saint George is a city in and the county seat of Washington County, Utah, United States. It is Utah's fifth-most populous city and the largest outside the Wasatch Front, with a population of 95,342 at the 2020 census. The St. George metropolitan statistical area has an estimated 208,000 residents. Located in southwestern Utah on the Arizona border, it lies in the northeasternmost part of the Mojave Desert, immediately south of the Pine Valley Mountains, which mark the southern boundary of the Great Basin. St. George lies slightly northwest of the Colorado Plateau, which ends at the Hurricane Fault.

St. George was settled in 1861 as a cotton mission, earning it the nickname "Dixie". While the crop never became a successful commodity, the area steadily grew in population. Today, the St. George region is well known for its warm climate relative to the rest of the state, resulting year-round outdoor recreation, and proximity to several state parks, Zion National Park, and the Grand Canyon. Utah Tech University, in St. George, is an NCAA Division I institution. The city is 118 miles (190 km) northeast of Las Vegas and 300 miles (480 km) south-southwest of Salt Lake City on Interstate 15.