Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Sean, unfortunately at the moment I'm unable to access your map(s) as I'm online via a dial-up modem.
The county Planning Commission/Department are Constitutionally required to supply the NYS Secretary of State with maps of their respective county. It is these maps and the accompanying list of villages and hamlets that are, albeit somewhat crudely, reprinted in the Annual Population Survey. More precise wall-sized maps, that clearly show individual streets, are available at the respective Planning Commission/Department.
North Valley Stream and South Valley Stream are hamlets. There is no North Woodmere, that area is part of South Valley Stream (I was told that the name North Woodmere was a developer's marketing device in order to attract Jewish buyers and thus sell for a higher price than if the area where he had built houses was thought to be in South Valley Stream, its actual community).
Over time, there have been many name changes, such as Smithville South becoming North Bellmore. One of the latest is South Westbury is now Salisbury.
Also over time, hamlets have absorbed other hamlets, such as when Syosset absorbed Locust Grove, and hamlets have separated to form two or more hamlets, such as when Baldwin Harbor separated from Baldwin.
By the way, in which hamlet is the neighborhood of Meadowmere Park? Inwood? Woodmere?
Walter I'll try to break down my understanding of Hamlet vs. CDP....
Since "hamlet" isn't defined in NYS law at all other than "an unincorporated section of a town" (which is the same NYS definition for CDP) it's hard to really say what gets called a hamlet specifically and why...but the trend seems to be that a hamlet will have somewhat uniform governmental functions...ie school district, postal code, precinct, etc.. Since this view of hamlets are generally unique to NYS, and also since the Census Bureau refers to CDPs as "an area defined for statistical purpose only" I think it's fair to say that ALL NYS hamlets are CDPs, while there are CDPs that are not in fact hamlets. Wantagh is a hamlet and CDP, North Wantagh is solely a CDP as far as I'm concerned - same for North/South Valley Stream. It's really a fuzzy definition and legally can't be defined perfectly, but I think it makes more sense looking at it that way...especially doing what I'm trying to do. The difference is really only that one resembles an incorporated village more than the other.
North Woodmere and Meadowmere Park would only be considered regions or neighborhoods by how I go. Both are actually in Woodmere as per the 2000 census maps, but are geographically different enough to be worth noting separately. This is the loosest definition of them all and isn't based on anything other than my own knowledge (or anyone elses). A easier example of this is Gilgo-Oak Beach-Captree. These are three easily definable areas (four including West Gilgo) but are counted as one under the NYS CDP/Hamlet definitions.
Meadowmere Park is a strange one...it's the neighborhood west of the Five Towns Shopping Center, but it's actually WEST of the Queens neighborhood of Meadowmere. It's very small, and yes it would be considered part of the Five Towns...it has a Lawrence mailing address which must date back to a time before Inwood existed because it would logically be more a part of Inwood.
Walter - I wish you could take a look at the Wikimapia pages because I think if you saw how I have everything laid out you'd understand what I'm getting at. It's just the technical definitions that are mixing the two of us up.
Also, in the mapping program you only have four options for defining any geographic area...
Town, city - I use this for cities (Glen Cove/Long Beach), as well as hamlets...only because proper hamlets tend to have a somewhat uniform postal code. The difference has to be defined in the description box. I haven't mapped any of the towns yet but I'll use it for that too. Wikimapia doesn't allow enough pixels yet to properly do towns.
Village - Used only for incorporated villages.
Region, neighborhood - Used for CDPs that I don't consider hamlets and also for any other smaller, definable area that is within a city/town/hamlet/CDP (this would be North Woodmere/Meadowmere Park). Has to be defined properly in the description box.
Island - I only use this for the semi-inhabited islands in the Great South Bay (Meadow Island for instance) that contain the fishing shacks and bay houses, as well as any notable uninhabited ones. I would consider Oak Island a "Region, neighborhood" however since it is part of Gilgo-Oak Beach-Captree.
I thought Meadowmere Park was a 'hamlet' unto itself since it has its own fire department. Isn't it one of the "Five Towns"?
The Meadowmere FDFD (Fire District Fire Department) serves the northeastern part of the Hamlet of Inwood and the western part of the Hamlet of Woodmere, according to my reading of the Nassau County map of "Fire Protection Services and Special Districts".
The "Five Towns" (none of which are towns) includes the Village of Cedarhurst (incorporated in 1910), the Hamlet of Hewlett, the Hamlet of Inwood, the Village of Lawrence (incorporated in 1897) and the Hamlet of Woodmere, all in the southwest part of the Town of Hempstead in the southwest part of Nassau County.
Walter I'll try to break down my understanding of Hamlet vs. CDP ... I think it's fair to say that ALL NYS hamlets are CDPs, while there are CDPs that are not in fact hamlets ... The difference is really only that one resembles an incorporated village more than the other.
We differ as to what is a hamlet: I accept, with only small disagreements as to exact borders (where two hamlets meet, the current maps use the nearest through street which may be off by 5 or so streets from the true border separating these two hamlets), the official maps of the respective county planning commission/department as to the hamlets in the various towns in each county.
Pardon me now for one of my pet peeves (other pet peeve is calling towns, townships, because hamlets are incorrectly called towns): it is not necessary to refer to a village, a municipal corporation, as an incorporated village as this is over-identification (an incorporated corporation) and, by inference, suggests that there are unincorporated villages, of which there are none.
Many people who live outside a village but have the village name in their mailing address, incorrectly believe that they live in an unincorporated village. For example, many people that live in homes with a Valley Stream mailing address but that are outside of the Village of Valley Stream, believe that they live in the unincorporated Village of Valley Stream, rather than in the Hamlet of North Valley Stream or in the Hamlet of South Valley Stream, as the case may be.
This geographic misunderstanding is so great that many villages are confused themselves and they refer to themselves on their letterheads and at their web sites unnecessarily as an incorporated village.
Walter... here's one. What is the town/hamlet/Village or whatever that includes Jones Beach, TOBAY and Gilgo?
That's three: Jones Beach is in the Hamlet of Wantagh, in the Town of Hempstead, but as it is a NYS park, it is a separate entity; TOBAY is in the Hamlet of Massapequa in the Town of Oyster Bay; and, Gilgo Beach is part of the Hamlet of Gilgo, Oak Beach & Captree on the western end of Fire Island in the Town of Babylon.
Quote:
Originally Posted by watamensch
Also, just interested in your background and how you know all this stuff!
When I received my first property tax bill from the Town of Oyster Bay there were 21 separate taxing districts, most of which had different borders and I wanted to learn more about the political geography behind what appeared to be an incomprehensible hodge-podge. I was fortunate to come across Rufus Langhans, the well respected Town of Huntington historian, while he was still alive, who was kind enough to share information with me. Also, I learned from the people at LILCO who published the annual population survey and also the people at the Nassau County Planning Division and the Suffolk County Planning Department who maintain all the different maps as required by the Secretary of State of New York State.
I need to correct this: the Hamlet of Gilgo, Oak Beach & Captree is not on the western end of Fire Island in the Town of Babylon.
The Hamlet of Gilgo, Oak Beach & Captree is on the eastern end of an unamed barrier island, that is north of and parallel to west end of Fire Island.
Gilgo Beach, West Gilgo Beach and Oak Beach are all on Jones Island (which is everything from Jones Beach's west end to Captree), Captree Island and Oak Island are both separate and just north of Jones Island. Oak Island is only reachable by boat, but amazingly people do live there year round. There's also one or two other very small islands just to the east and west of Captree Island with fishing shacks and old shanty bay houses on them.
I don't think Jones Beach is in Wantagh nor Tobay Beach in Massapequa, they don't show up on official Nassau County maps that way. No clue what it would "officially" be referred to, though.
Gilgo Beach, West Gilgo Beach and Oak Beach are all on Jones Island (which is everything from Jones Beach's west end to Captree), Captree Island and Oak Island are both separate and just north of Jones Island. Oak Island is only reachable by boat, but amazingly people do live there year round. There's also one or two other very small islands just to the east and west of Captree Island with fishing shacks and old shanty bay houses on them.
Thanks, Sean, for providing the name of the island.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sean sean sean sean
I don't think Jones Beach is in Wantagh nor Tobay Beach in Massapequa, they don't show up on official Nassau County maps that way. No clue what it would "officially" be referred to, though.
You're right, Sean, that they do not show up on the official map of Census Designated Places, but (and, here I may be taking a bit of poetic license) if there was map that showed the true borders of hamlets, they would, in my humble opinion, be in the Hamlet of Wantagh in the Town of Hempstead and the Hamlet of Massapequa in the Town of Oyster Bay, respectively.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
