Info on Cilfton Park, Ny (Albany, Colonie: high crime, affordable houses, established neighborhood)

[lookin2move317]

We are looking for homes in Saratoga County. For our price Clifton Park keeps coming up and when I google it, it looks too good to be true. Anyone out there from there or live there now? Is it near a bad area? Bad schools? High crime? What? Cause all the info I seem to get makes it look like a magazine cover.
thanks everyone for your help!!

[Rumblebelly]

If you like the living in the burbs lifestyle, it's a nice place. Seemed safe when we rented an apt there. Convenient, lot's of shopping.

However, there is no downtown whatsoever. It's all strip malls, apt complexes, and suburban developement.

[NYS of Mind]

Decent schools, lots of shopping, the definition of suburb. Seems to still be a desirable area even though the commute in and out of there during rush hour is crazy. Think "mini LI".

[convergent]

The real question is where are you going to be commuting to? If its downtown Albany, then the traffic can be bad at rush hour because there is one main path between Clifton Park and Albany... and that goes over a 6 lane (3 on each side) bridge on I-87 that is in no plans to be expanded. But, traffic here is not bad compared to bigger cities for sure.

I lived in CP for 13 years before moving closer to Albany, and I'm very happy with the move. As far as a place to stay, it is very nice, and mostly a bedroom community. There are very affordable houses there, many of which were built years ago that are in large established neighborhoods. There are also many new developments going in as well. The school district is Shenedehoah and it is a great school district, but kind of large for my liking. It is about 9,000 kids that are primarily on one campus, with a few neighborhood K-4 elementary schools to supplement it and cut bus travel for the little kids. In the last five years, there have been a lot of resturants added, but it is still pretty limited. When we lived there, we always drove down to the Albany area for shopping, eating out, etc. We moved when we moved our kids to a private school down near Albany.

One nice thing about Clifton Park is that you can drive about 5 minutes out and be in farm land from there. There is a nice nature preserve bordering Clifton Park on the Mohawk River that is nice for biking, walking, etc.

[unionfarms]

all depends on where you are from, to me who grew up in Clifton Park I think its infested with yuppies but if you like fighting traffic with yuppie moms and have kids maybe it a great place for you. lots of changes in the last 20 years their, they keep building and prices are going up all the time I aviod making trips in that direction, you would be much better off giong 20 min. north to Saratoga Springs having the track there will always give you options if you ever wanted to sell you wouldnt lose on buying a property because it will hold its value rather than the yuppie infested CP! Everyone drives a suv and live in the same kind of house in the same looking development it like cloning all over again. hope this insight is of any help.

[irreplaceable]

Originally Posted by lookin2move317

We are looking for homes in Saratoga County. For our price Clifton Park keeps coming up and when I google it, it looks too good to be true. Anyone out there from there or live there now? Is it near a bad area? Bad schools? High crime? What? Cause all the info I seem to get makes it look like a magazine cover.
thanks everyone for your help!!

I was just up in CP yesterday and graduated from Shenendehowa. I'm not sure what you mean by to good to be true. Clifton Park is rather large. The schools are decent. You can see statistics at GreatSchools.net . The mall is kinda of crappy. They turned into a stip mall sort of idk we all prefer to go to Crossgates which is only about 15-20 minutes south. You are very centrally located to Albany or Saratoga. I would stay away from Mechanicville, that town isnt so nice. I definatly don't look at Clifton Park and think magazine cover but it is a good place to raise a family. It's safe and clean and convient. Depending on where you are working, rush hour is a head ache but I think most people deal with it everyday because it is worth it. I think CP is one of the better areas to move to around here. Hope that helped. and Good Luck! If You have any more questions please feel free to DM me.

[Rumblebelly]

Originally Posted by convergent

The real question is where are you going to be commuting to? If its downtown Albany, then the traffic can be bad at rush hour because there is one main path between Clifton Park and Albany... and that goes over a 6 lane (3 on each side) bridge on I-87 that is in no plans to be expanded. But, traffic here is not bad compared to bigger cities for sure.

Commuting to Albany or even Schenectady during rush hour is extremely painful. It's akin to what I've seen in Denver. I often had to wait 20 minutes to get onto the on-ramp from 7 to 87 north because it gets so backed up. Then if there is a wreck......If you can get south via 9 it's not too bad but you have to deal with stop lights.


The Rexford Bridge getting into Schenectady is a mess too because it's only a two lane road. As Saratoga County continues to grow, it's only going to get worse...unless of course, it starts getting more technology facilities north of the Mohawk.

Personally, I don't think the commute is worth it unless you have a damn good job to go to or you can avoid rush hour traffic.

[lookin2move317]

I can't thank you all enough for your responses!!! It really does help more than you probably know.
My hubby & I grew up in Westchester NY and when it got outreagously expensive we moved to the country (Dutchess county) Well it's not so contry anymore. Houses being built left and right and the taxes are skyrocketing quicker than you can write your check.
We have 3 kids (2,5,& 8) so I am looking for the best place to raise them. Good schools, safe and a REAL community.
When I search for houses in Saratoga (within our price range) Cifton Park pops up with very nice houses and what seems to be perfect neighborhoods.
I noticed that Troy is close by and from what I have heard its not a good area.
Thank you all again. We may be forced to move so I am looking for "plan B" and all of your opinions are really helping!!

[Zyll]

Moved from yuppie Clifton Park to Troy, I like Troy a lot better. If Clifton Park was that nice I would have stayed there. Depressing to see your childhood town turn into Long Island version of itself.

[convergent]

I lived in the Albany area for 20 years and just recently moved. I spent 13 years in Clifton Park and the last 7 in Colonie (Loudonville). I have many friends in Troy, and other parts of the Capital District. Contrary to the last post, I wouldn't label Clifton Park as yuppie-ville. I don't know why people on this forum have to bad-mouth people or create this class battle.

The biggest thing I didn't like about Clifton Park was that I had to commute to Albany and that was getting worse and worse. The main corridor from Clifton Park to Albany goes over a bridge on I-87 that is 3 lanes each way, and there are no plans to expand it. This creates a big bottleneck and it gets worse in peak seasons for travel to the north... summer to the Adirondacks and Lake George... winter to sking... etc. All the traffic to the north from NYC goes over the same bridge. If you don't need to go to Albany, then Clifton Park is a great place to live. I just found that I was traveling down to Albany County for work, recreation, and shopping... so I just moved there. I absolutely loved living where I was.. close to everything and no commute. It all depends on where you are going to work I guess.

Troy has good and bad areas. There are some parts of Troy you definitely do NOT want to be in. There are also parts that are part of RPI as it is right in the middle of Troy and integrated into a lot of it. There are some very nice old townhomes that are gorgeous, and some areas that are very run down. The general image of Troy around the area is that it is more of a "blue collar" town. Many of the factories that gave Troy that character have long ago closed and now it is a bit of a hodge-podge of different things.

If you want to be in Saratoga County, and don't need to commute to Albany, then you may want to go further north than Clifton Park. Generally the price of houses goes down as you go north... with the exception being that in Saratoga Springs near the track you will find very high prices.