section_path: Component counties, subregions, and cities/Orange County
section_name: Orange County
paragraph_text: Orange County
  
  Orange County was originally an agricultural area dependent on citrus crops, avocados, and oil extraction, and became a bedroom community for Los Angeles when I–5, the Santa Ana Freeway, linked it to the city in the 1950s. The growth of Los Angeles initially fueled population growth in Orange County, but by the 1970s it had become an important economic center in its own right, with tourism and electronics industries, among others. Today, Orange County is known for its tourist attractions, such as the Disneyland Resort, Knott's Berry Farm, its several pristine beaches and coastline, and its wealthier areas, featured in television shows such as The O.C. None of the original downtowns serves as the central urban core for the county, but there are important clusters of business and culture in Downtown Santa Ana and in three edge cities: the Anaheim–Santa Ana edge city from the Disneyland Resort to the Orange Crush interchange (Orange, Santa Ana), the South Coast Plaza–John Wayne Airport edge city (Santa Ana, Costa Mesa, Irvine), and Irvine's Spectrum edge city.
  
  Orange County is sometimes figuratively divided into "North County" and "South County", with North Orange County including cities such as Anaheim, Fullerton, and Santa Ana, and is the older, more ethnically diverse and more densely built-up area both geographically and culturally closer to Los Angeles. South County, defined variously as beginning with either Costa Mesa or Irvine and includes cities to the east and south such as Laguna Beach, Mission Viejo, Newport Beach, and San Clemente, is more residential, affluent, recently developed, and has a mostly white population. Irvine is an exception, as it is a center of employment and is ethnically diverse. A growing alternative dividing marker between north and south is the El Toro Y interchange. Orange Coast or South Coast area is defined instead as consisting of some or all of the cities lining the coast.