Victoria, Texas map
28.81° N · 97.00° W · Victoria County seat · elev. ~90 ft · Central Time
Victoria stands on the west bank of the Guadalupe River, about 30 miles inland from San Antonio Bay. Martín De León founded it in 1824 as the capital of his colony — one of the few Mexican-era Texas settlements with a mostly Mexican population — and named it for Guadalupe Victoria, the first president of Mexico. It is one of the oldest towns in the state.
Centered on downtown, with the Guadalupe River curving along the east side. Loop 463 rings the north half of the city.
Where Victoria is in Texas
Victoria is roughly equidistant from three big cities, which is the whole point of the place: 125 miles southwest of Houston on US-59, 85 miles northeast of Corpus Christi on US-77, and about 115 miles southeast of San Antonio on US-87. Four US highways cross here and none of them is an interstate, so Victoria is where coastal traffic between those cities changes direction. The area calls itself the Crossroads for that reason.
Victoria County covers 889 square miles and holds about 91,000 people, two-thirds of them in the city. Its neighbors are Lavaca to the north, Jackson northeast, Calhoun southeast, Refugio south, Goliad southwest and DeWitt northwest. The coast itself is 30 to 40 miles away at Port Lavaca and Seadrift.
The river and the barge canal
The Guadalupe rises in the Hill Country near Kerrville and reaches the sea at San Antonio Bay below Victoria; the stretch through town is lined by Riverside Park, a long municipal park with the Texas Zoo, a rose garden and river trails. Because the river is not navigable for barges, the city built the Victoria Barge Canal, a channel about 35 miles long running southeast to the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway near Port Lavaca. It carries the chemical traffic for the plants on the east side of the county and links Victoria to the coastal industry at Point Comfort.
Downtown keeps its original Spanish-colonial plan around De Leon Plaza, and the 1892 Victoria County courthouse still faces it. The University of Houston–Victoria has its campus a few blocks away, sharing the neighborhood with Victoria College.
Highways
- US-59 / I-69 – northeast to Edna, Wharton and Houston; southwest to Goliad, Beeville and Laredo.
- US-77 – north to Hallettsville and I-10 at Schulenburg; south to Refugio, Kingsville and the Rio Grande Valley.
- US-87 – northwest to Cuero and on toward San Antonio; southeast to Port Lavaca on the bay.
- US-183 – north to Cuero, Gonzales, Lockhart and Austin.
- SH-185 – southeast to Bloomington and Seadrift, the back road to the bays.
- Loop 463 – the divided loop carrying US-59 and US-77 around the north side of the city.
Around Victoria County
The country south and west of the city is where Texas independence was decided. Goliad, 25 miles southwest on US-59, holds Presidio La Bahía and the Goliad State Park mission; the Fannin Battleground at Coleto Creek, between Victoria and Goliad, marks the 1836 surrender that led to the executions there. Coleto Creek Reservoir, a power plant cooling lake with a park and boat ramps, is on the same road about 15 miles out.
Downstream, the Guadalupe joins the San Antonio River near the county line and empties into San Antonio Bay, whose marshes at Aransas National Wildlife Refuge are the wintering ground of the whooping cranes. Victoria Regional Airport, east of town, still uses the runways of the World War II air station that trained pilots here.
Areas and neighborhoods
| Area | What's there |
|---|---|
| Downtown | De Leon Plaza, the 1892 courthouse, Main Street, University of Houston–Victoria |
| Riverside Park | Guadalupe River frontage, the Texas Zoo, golf course and trails on the southeast side |
| North Navarro Street | The main retail corridor running north from downtown to Loop 463; Victoria Mall |
| Victoria College / Detar | Community college campus and the main hospitals, west of Navarro |
| Airport / east side | Victoria Regional Airport off US-59 northeast, a former World War II training field |
| Bloomington | Town 15 miles southeast on SH-185, toward the bay |
| Inez and Dacosta | Unincorporated communities east and south of the city along US-59 and US-87 |
| Nursery | Small community northwest on US-87, named for the nineteenth-century tree nurseries there |
Distances from Victoria
| City | Road miles | Route |
|---|---|---|
| Corpus Christi | 85 | US-77 S |
| Sugar Land | 105 | US-59 NE |
| San Antonio | 115 | US-87 NW / I-10 W |
| New Braunfels | 115 | US-87 NW / I-10 W |
| Houston | 125 | US-59 NE |
| San Marcos | 125 | US-183 N / SH-80 W |
| Austin | 130 | US-183 N |
Hurricane Harvey came ashore near Rockport in 2017 and passed directly over Victoria; the city is far enough inland to avoid surge but not wind.