31 Facts About Yangon

Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the administrative functions to the purpose-built capital city of Naypyidaw in north central Myanmar.

Yangon was the city where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live in exile after the Indian Rebellion of 1857.

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia, such as Jakarta, Bangkok or Hanoi.

Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885.

Yangon was under Japanese occupation, and incurred heavy damage during World War II.

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Yangon became the capital of the Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country gained independence from British rule.

Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres .

Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence.

Yangon remains the largest city and the most important commercial, economic and cultural center of Myanmar.

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Koppen climate classification system.

Yangon is prone to tropical cyclones every time of the year.

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon, and Hlaing Rivers.

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siecle architecture.

Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings.

In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years.

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee .

Yangon Region is divided into four districts, which overlap with the city's jurisdiction.

Yangon is a member of the Asian Network of Major Cities 21.

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

Yangon Urban Mass Rapid Transit is a proposed rapid transit system, due to begin construction in 2022 and be complete by 2027.

Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets.

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country.

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper, and book publishing industries, and is the country's cultural center.

Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of internet control.

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Yangon is home to pagoda festivals, held during dry-season months .

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

Until April 2009, the now-defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma.

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon.

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism.

Yangon is a member of the Asian Network of Major Cities 21.