Brazos County Texas map
30.66° N · 96.30° W · County seat: Bryan · 591 sq mi · Central Time
Two rivers give Brazos County its shape: the Brazos runs down the western border and the Navasota down the eastern one, and they meet at the county's southern tip. Inside that wedge sit Bryan and College Station, which between them hold more than 87 percent of the county's people and the main campus of Texas A&M University.
Centered between Bryan and College Station. The wooded strips on the left and right edges of the county are the Brazos and Navasota river bottoms.
Where Brazos County sits
The county lies between Austin, Waco and Houston, off every interstate. Leon County is north and Madison County northeast; Grimes County is east across the Navasota River; Washington County is south and Burleson County southwest across the Brazos; Robertson County is northwest.
By straight line from the county center, Conroe is 56 miles southeast, The Woodlands 61 miles southeast, Temple 69 miles northwest and Waco 79 miles northwest. There is no interstate in the county at all; SH-6 does the work of one.
The legislature created the county in 1841 out of Washington County and called it Navasota County, after the river on its eastern edge. The name changed to Brazos in 1842, for the river on the western edge — Los Brazos de Dios, "the arms of God," in the Spanish name. The county was organized in 1843. Only about 5 of its 591 square miles are water, which is unusual for a county defined by two rivers: neither one is dammed here.
Cities and towns
| Place | Type | 2020 population in county |
|---|---|---|
| College Station | City | 120,523 |
| Bryan | City (seat) | 83,988 |
| Kurten | Town | 401 |
| Wixon Valley | City | 228 |
Four incorporated places, and two of them account for nearly everyone. Navasota, just across the Grimes County line, extends a small piece into Brazos County.
Roads
- SH-6 – the spine of the county, a freeway between Bryan and College Station. North it runs to Calvert and on toward Waco; south it crosses the Navasota to Navasota and continues toward Hempstead and Houston.
- SH-21 – the old El Camino Real alignment, entering from Caldwell in the southwest, crossing the Brazos and running northeast through Bryan toward Madisonville.
- US-190 – shares pavement with SH-6 through the county on its way east to Madisonville.
- SH-30 – east out of College Station toward Huntsville, crossing the Navasota River bottom.
- SH-47 and SH-40 – the western and southern bypass pair. SH-40 is Harvey Mitchell Parkway South, connecting SH-6 to SH-47 on the western edge of College Station.
- SH-OSR – the Old San Antonio Road, forming much of the county's northwestern boundary with Robertson County.
- FM-60 – University Drive, the east–west street through the Texas A&M campus, continuing west across the Brazos toward Snook.
The Aggie Expressway (SH-249) does not reach Brazos County. It ends at SH-105 in Grimes County below Navasota, which puts a second, faster route to Houston about 20 miles from College Station by way of SH-6.
Texas A&M and a county with two downtowns
Texas A&M University opened at College Station in 1876 as the first public institution of higher education in Texas. Its enrollment is now larger than the population of any city in the county, and the campus, the Texas A&M University System offices and the university's research agencies are the county's dominant employer. The George Bush Presidential Library and Museum stands on the west side of campus.
Bryan and College Station grew separately and still run separately. Bryan is the older of the two, laid out along the Houston and Texas Central Railway in the 1860s and named for William Joel Bryan; it holds the courthouse, the historic Downtown Bryan district and most of the county's industry. College Station incorporated in 1938 around the campus and the railway stop that gave it its name. Texas Avenue runs continuously from one to the other, and the boundary between them is invisible on the ground.
Easterwood Airport sits on university land on the west side of the campus, off SH-47, with scheduled service to Dallas–Fort Worth and Houston. It is the only commercial airport in the Brazos Valley, and the nearest alternative is more than an hour away by road.