Rochester neighborhoods with nice views (Buffalo, Syracuse: condo, townhouse, YMCA)
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My wife and I are moving to NY and will very likely pick Buffalo or Rochester but there are a couple other cities also in the running. One neighborhood that has caught our attention is the Waterfront Village area in Buffalo. From this neighborhood it looks like we could have views of both water (Lake Erie) and skyline (downtown Buffalo.) That got us curious about what neighborhoods in Rochester offer the coolest views. Doesn't have to be water or skyline necessarily, could be some other kind of impressive view (although we were trying to figure out if there's any good place to live with views of that waterfall right in the center of the city.) Also interested in large suburbs that have neighborhoods with especially cool views. We're limiting our search to cities and larger suburbs because we want a wide variety of restaurants. Thanks for any ideas you can offer.
I'm surprised that no one has answered, but I'd say that the area of the
SE Quadrant closer to Downtown in the East Ave., Park Ave., Neighborhood of the Arts, Monroe Village and South Wedge would be the best area to look into. Close to Downtown, but they have their own scene as well. https://rocwiki.org/Southeast_Quadrant
Also in Rochester you could live near Cobbs Hill Park and go there for awesome skyline views. Or Corn Hill would give you views of cool historic homes. East Ave neighborhood has grand old mansions.
Outside the city to the southeast it's hilly so you can get cool sloping wooded views in some neighborhoods like in the Perinton area for example. There are townhomes along the canal in Fairport with the Heritage Trail right outside your door, lovely views.
I'm relatively new to Rochester but these are a few areas we've discovered so far that might be what you're looking for. I'm sure there are many others.
I've become interested in the Grove Place neighborhood in Rochester, particularly the section designated as the Grove Place Historic District. It might be another area for you to consider because I think it could provide some very nice views. Here is a listing that recently sold, make sure to check out the street view: https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...il/M3311184872
I looked up the Waterfront area in Buffalo that you referenced. Maybe a somewhat comparable setting in Rochester would be the Erie Harbor community on the Genesee River: https://liveaterieharbor.com/
Or Tower280 downtown should give you amazing views. (I read you can even see the lake from the all-glass top floors.) https://tower280.com/
I looked up the Waterfront area in Buffalo that you referenced. Maybe a somewhat comparable setting in Rochester would be the Erie Harbor community on the Genesee River: https://liveaterieharbor.com/
Or Tower280 downtown should give you amazing views. (I read you can even see the lake from the all-glass top floors.) https://tower280.com/
You are correct. You can see the lake from all of the tallest buildings downtown. I used to work at the former Xerox Square and had access to the roof.
On the other hand, you can also see downtown starting from about a mile out in the lake. A really beautiful boatride, if you ever get the chance is leaving the port in Charlotte heading north at twilight on a clear night. The whole city comes to life the farther out you go. It's like a huge bowl.
You are correct. You can see the lake from all of the tallest buildings downtown. I used to work at the former Xerox Square and had access to the roof.
On the other hand, you can also see downtown starting from about a mile out in the lake. A really beautiful boatride, if you ever get the chance is leaving the port in Charlotte heading north at twilight on a clear night. The whole city comes to life the farther out you go. It's like a huge bowl.
Thanks for these ideas. We drove around Rochester a couple months ago but that was all we did, just drove through a few areas to see what they look like and stopped for a bite to eat. I know we saw Park Avenue (in fact that street view provided by ckhthankgod showing the rainbow crosswalk I definitely remember that because we ate right there at the Jines diner. We love Greek food and breakfast diners so the place was perfect for us!) We saw the Village Gate Center and the area around there so I guess that was in Neighborhood of the Arts. Drove East Avenue from out where the Wegmans is, past the nice big historic homes with all the trees, right into downtown and saw some cool buildings - we must have gone right by that 280 place because I totally remember that one cool building that you can see in the video HeartNY posted - the real tall one with the vertical white lines going up, looks really cool. By the way that is crazy you can see Lake Ontario from some of the buildings in downtown Rochester... it looks far on a map! That would be so so cool to have a view of the city buildings plus a distant lake view. Probably would be way above our price range for that though. We did not see Corn Hill or that Grove Historic District, wish we would have known about them. We also didn't see any Rochester suburbs. But that is the point of my questions here because we drove through a few cities in NY just to get a first impression feel for them, but now we need to identify specific neighborhoods or areas that could likely be what we are looking for.
I described our situation and our wishlist of what we're looking for in this thread: https://www.city-data.com/forum/new-...staurants.html
I'm going to be visiting 3 different office locations, each one 3 or 4 times a year. They are in Albany, Buffalo, and Pittsburgh so probably living in Buffalo or Rochester will be the best spot for us. Is the main difference between the two that Buffalo just feels like a larger city and Rochester has a small city feel?
Like I mentioned before, we are very interested in the Waterfront neighborhood in Buffalo. Have you ever been to that area? Even my Buffalo work colleagues don't really seem to know much about it.
Also in the Buffalo area we are seriously looking at Snyder which is part of the large suburb Amherst. If anyone is familiar with Snyder, do you think there is a similar neighborhood in any large Rochester suburbs? Has to be somewhere with a good variety of restaurants like sushi/ Japanese, Greek/ Mediterranean, Indian, Mexican, vegan/ vegetarian/ organic. We are also hoping to be near a large gym like YMCA or JCC. I saw that Fairport was suggested but is it kind of a less convenient location for the types of things we want?
^In terms of a similar suburb to Snyder in the Rochester area would be the Twelve Corners area of Brighton just south/SE of Rochester, which it is adjacent to. It would also put close to the SE Quadrant of the city, which is where most of those city neighborhoods you mentioned are located.
That area of the town has a similar housing stock as well. Brighton also is about 12-13% Asian, a relatively big Jewish population, with visible Black and Hispanic populations. So, it is similar to Amherst in that regard(Vestal in the Binghamton area and DeWitt in the Syracuse area are also similar).
As for the Buffalo and Rochester metro areas, they have similar populations(1.1-1.2 million), but Buffalo is only behind Milwaukee and Hartford in terms of the smallest metro areas in land size with over 1 million people(Providence is a very close 4th in that regard). Rochester isn’t huge in terms of land area, but it covers more land. Plus, Buffalo is right across the river from the Golden Horseshoe region of Ontario with about 9 million people or so. So, those are a couple of things to consider.
Last edited by ckhthankgod; 12-16-2022 at 08:15 PM..
Thanks for these ideas. We drove around Rochester a couple months ago but that was all we did, just drove through a few areas to see what they look like and stopped for a bite to eat. I know we saw Park Avenue (in fact that street view provided by ckhthankgod showing the rainbow crosswalk I definitely remember that because we ate right there at the Jines diner. We love Greek food and breakfast diners so the place was perfect for us!) We saw the Village Gate Center and the area around there so I guess that was in Neighborhood of the Arts. Drove East Avenue from out where the Wegmans is, past the nice big historic homes with all the trees, right into downtown and saw some cool buildings - we must have gone right by that 280 place because I totally remember that one cool building that you can see in the video HeartNY posted - the real tall one with the vertical white lines going up, looks really cool. By the way that is crazy you can see Lake Ontario from some of the buildings in downtown Rochester... it looks far on a map! That would be so so cool to have a view of the city buildings plus a distant lake view. Probably would be way above our price range for that though. We did not see Corn Hill or that Grove Historic District, wish we would have known about them. We also didn't see any Rochester suburbs. But that is the point of my questions here because we drove through a few cities in NY just to get a first impression feel for them, but now we need to identify specific neighborhoods or areas that could likely be what we are looking for.
I described our situation and our wishlist of what we're looking for in this thread: https://www.city-data.com/forum/new-...staurants.html
I'm going to be visiting 3 different office locations, each one 3 or 4 times a year. They are in Albany, Buffalo, and Pittsburgh so probably living in Buffalo or Rochester will be the best spot for us. Is the main difference between the two that Buffalo just feels like a larger city and Rochester has a small city feel?
Like I mentioned before, we are very interested in the Waterfront neighborhood in Buffalo. Have you ever been to that area? Even my Buffalo work colleagues don't really seem to know much about it.
Also in the Buffalo area we are seriously looking at Snyder which is part of the large suburb Amherst. If anyone is familiar with Snyder, do you think there is a similar neighborhood in any large Rochester suburbs? Has to be somewhere with a good variety of restaurants like sushi/ Japanese, Greek/ Mediterranean, Indian, Mexican, vegan/ vegetarian/ organic. We are also hoping to be near a large gym like YMCA or JCC. I saw that Fairport was suggested but is it kind of a less convenient location for the types of things we want?
Yes, Buffalo is slightly larger. It used to be twice as large as Rochester, but in recent decades Rochester has caught up. Also Buffalo has a lot of large, vacant buildings, as Rochester has torn down vacant buildings, so it feels larger. Also, their sports teams rely heavily on Rochester to exist.
The YMCA just built a brand new facility in Pittsford, and a fairly new one in Penfield. JCC is in Brighton
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