Car-free, but middle class, NYC neighborhoods (Yonkers, Ridge: condos, co-ops, transfer)

[skyway31]

Originally Posted by nei

It goes both ways, those who have a car and drive everywhere may assume everything is extremely difficult without one because they have little clue on what do otherwise. Either way, it depends on your personal habits, and amount of inconvenience you are willing to deal with it.

Agreed.

[Henna]

Originally Posted by skyway31

This is a topic where everybody should state whether they have a car or not and what part of NYC they live in. I managed to make it two years of my life without a car after 16 of being dependent on one. There are A LOT of things you take for granted when you have a car that you simply do not understand what not having a car would be like. That store around the corner you drive to every day is really a 15 minute walk each way. That adds up in ways you don't realize when you drive it. And if weather is bad or you're carrying heavy bags, it sucks even more.

Since the OP can not drive no matter what, they should only listen to advice from people who have no car whatsoever. Having zero access to a car whatsoever is entirely different then simply taking a train into work every and driving when you please.

I lived very briefly in NYC with no car access. I'd say outside of Manhattan and the parts of Brooklyn closest to Manhattan, you're going to find it a bit cumbersome living without a car. Although I don't know how that would compare to where you're at in Japan. There are very few places in the USA where living with zero access to a car is particularly easy. You're lifestyle and where you live in relation to work has a lot to do with it.

Then while we're at it, we should require the people who do have cars, and are going on about how convenient it is, to state whether they have off-street parking (garage/driveway) in or next to their building or house. If they do not have off-street parking, then state how difficult it is to find parking on their block.

I do have a car but no parking spot, and in my area, it's not even easy to find a paid spot nearby as there is a waiting list for most garages, and plus, the garages are often not even open to people who are not coop owners in those buildings with garages. So I'm stuck with street parking and I don't have the luxury of just getting in my car at 8pm and popping over to Target, because I will probably not be able to find parking when I get back.

So depending on the situation, it can be cumbersome to have a car in the outer borough neighborhoods where street parking is difficult if you do not have access to your own parking space.

Even my friend who lives on W. 9th St. in an old pre-war with no garage in Manhattan complains that he has to call down to his neighborhood garage where he keeps his car at least an hour in advance in order to make sure the car is ready for him when he needs it. Maybe he's exaggerating or this is an uncommon situation. However, the point is that having a car anywhere in NYC, unless you have easy parking right next to your abode, can be cumbersome.

[patrix542]

Originally Posted by jcoltrane

Are you a Transplant or a Native? If you are a Transplant, WHO are you to say how *naives* live??

Transplant fantasies have NO basis in reality!

Of that so oft quoted 55%, like ALL stats you need to dig deep, and stop regurgitating the fact as if it were a quote from the G_D!

In order to examine that stat in the real, you MUST first discount Manhattan residents. Doing so will lower the statistic greatly!

Second, you MUST apply INCOME limits! For example, what percentage of households earning $50K, $75K, $100K, $150K, own cars, in both Manhattan, and ESPECIALLY the outer boroughs!

In both Manhattan and the outer boroughs, the higher the income, the greater the propensity to own a vehicle!

Third, the stat needs to be broken down by NEIGHBORHOOD! Even the OP get that! For example, if one lives in a *hignly* urban very dense neighborhood, one is less likely to own a vehicle!

It s/also be noted that in the outer boroughs and upper Manhattan, that it is the very urban, very dense areas which are the poorest!!! Many of these areas are where none too properous Transplants dwell!!! Consequently, between Manhattan and thses dense urban poor areas, Transplant have an utterly **warped** sense of NYC reality. Most have never been to middle class native neighborhoods in Brooklyn, Queens, or The Bronx, forget Staten Island altogether!

Also, it, ay not be pleasant for some, but must be pointed out. Poor NYers, *natives*, the majority living in highly dense urban areas, like Harlem, The South Bronx, Washington Heights, as well as several others, are poor. Most of the folk they live around are poor. Unfortunately, they live in a world, generally, w/o personal cars, new cars, and most other middle class accroutrements!

These folks, along with a great number of Transplants, live in a world and mental environment which does NOT honestly reflect the reality of NYC!! Transplants in particular come to NYC with some strange sort of embbeded notion that cars are some sort of endangered species, and that EVERYONE is on some sort of *subway* high! Nothing c/b further from the truth.

Every fool visiting NYC can see that cars are EVERYWHERE! In the outer boroughs, NATIVES have cars!! The more native the neighborhood the more the cars. The more properous the neighborhood, the more the cars! Even the Housing Projects parking lots are FILLED with vehicles!

Now, can you fantasize that NYC is a carless place, and live a carless life? You most certainly can! Though, unless you are a Transplant and/or a odd sort of native, it is lousy to be w/o a vehicle!

Transplants are so lousy with this "walkability" fantasy, that they apply it in the most ludicrous of ways. For example, Transplants *think* "Bodegas" are intended for weekly/biweekly GROCERY shoping! They buy their groceries there, then complain about the high cost of food in NYC!!

They wish to *walk* and buy and do everything in the neighborhoods they live, regardless of whether it is financially prudent. Then they complain about the high costs!

Their whole notion of life in NYC is so warped, that they have created their own reality which has NOTHING to do with what NYC is or was, historically, nor in reality!.

Transplants want to ride bikes in NYC!!! They wish to do so, even thought they do not have the slightest skill, nor knowledge of how to do so without killing themselves or an innocent motorist! They ride bikes so poorly, that the idiot Mayor has to make idiot proof bike lanes!

NYers don't need bike lanes! We've been riding our bikes in this city and traffic ALL OUR LIVES! So, to accommodate their incompetency,




Oh yeah! Visually impaired couple with child moving to a drug infested ghetto, where they will be culturally SHOCKED, and their child will have access to likely the WORST schools in the city!! Right!

I have a Filipino Friend, whose family moved to Washington Heights upon coming to this country/city. They moved their for the obviouss reasons of cost. He spent half his life there, in the Dominican ghetto! He hates that place and his experience with the greatest passion you can imagine. I was schocked at the venom. He has nothing positive to say.

It is not a place for the OP, and to suggest such is non thinking and irresponsible.

*****

So, where does a visually impaired couple w/child and native Japanese wife/mother seeking high affordability AND *community* in a non car centric SAFE environment with at least "fair" schools???

How could a Transplant have the slightest idea?!

The answer, in truth, is nowhere in the five boroughs!

I HIGHLY suggest the OP investigate the possibility of Portland, Oregon and/or Vancover, Canada! I think the northwest will be your best chance at satisfaction and happiness, given the limitations of your circumstances.

BBC NEWS | Programmes | Newsnight Home | Where the car is not king

FOCUS - PORTLAND - SO LONG CARS, HELLO PEOPLE - NYTimes.com

Transportation in Portland, Oregon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Transportation in Vancouver - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

yeah we get it you're a "native", get over yourself nobody gives a ****. and stop acting like transplants dont know anything. I also think you have some serious anger problems because you shout so much (!!!!!)

and yeah you can live in ALMOST all parts of brooklyn without a car and in a lot of areas in Queens

[checkmatechamp13]

Originally Posted by wawaweewa

Does NYC have a dearth of cars parked on its streets?It's full of them and there's a reason.

Just because it's full of cars doesn't mean most of the people own a car. New York City is the densest major city in the nation. Even if only 25% of the people own cars, that's still going to be a lot of cars.

Originally Posted by patrix542

4.6 million New Yorkers dont have a car (manhattan only has 1.6 million people) so i guess poverty in New York must be really bad lol. I agree that in some areas families may need a car like Bayside in Queens for example but family can get by without it too, in many many areas of the city. and cars are really not that expensive to buy if you really wanted too so i bet even newcomers - new immigrants could get one if they wanted too, unless they are of course illegal.

Now, technically, it's 55% of households, not 55% of the people. It's likely skewed towards single and/or childless people, so the number of people who have access to some sort of vehicle is going to be higher than 45%.

Say you have a single man without a car, a married couple with a car, a married couple without a car, and a family (say, a couple and 3 kids) with a car.

So there's 4 households and 10 people total. 50% of the households have a car, but 70% of the people have access to a car. But at the same time, access for a family is different from access for a single person. If a husband and wife share a car, that means that if both need to get to work, one of them is going to end up taking the subway/bus/taxi/shoe leather express. And if you add in the kids, that's more people who have access to that car, but it's only at times when it's convenient for the parents.

And then you have to consider that many families don't use their car often. They might take the subway to work, and shop at their local store, but use the car to go out to say, Long Island on the weekends.

Originally Posted by patrix542

i guess i see it from a totally different perspecitve, americans seem so lazy when i read something like this. and why cant you use that damn bus? is walking 10-15 mins to train station that bad? lol THATS NOTHING

This.

Originally Posted by nei

Many, maybe most buses in NYC have a higher frequency than 30 minutes. The OP probably realizes how much more a car can go than on foot in 15 minutes, but as they CANNOT drive, they have no choice. It's irrelevant that a car can go more. Fifteen minutes walking is manageable, and with good planning they can find better.

This. Closer to Manhattan, most routes run every 10 minutes or less. Further out, in parts of eastern Queens or SI, it might be every 15-20 minutes. Of course, some routes are unreliable, so they could be scheduled every 10 minutes, but they might often bunch (come 2 or more at a time), or buses could go missing, meaning that effectively, they're running every 20 minutes. But it's one thing where you have to ask around before you move in (how reliable are the buses).

Originally Posted by jcoltrane

Are you a Transplant or a Native? If you are a Transplant, WHO are you to say how *naives* live??

Transplant fantasies have NO basis in reality! blah blah blah blah blah

LMAO at you trying to cover yourself by saying "If you're a transplant....". It's amazing how everybody who disagrees with you is a transplant, the same way everybody who disagrees with hilltopjay is some kind of ghetto supporter or whatever. Great, you're a native. Now go tell somebody who cares.

Yeah, you see a bunch of cars because NYC is the densest major city in the U.S. Even if only 25% of the households have cars, that's still going to be a lot of cars.

Back when I lived in Brooklyn (Brighton Beach), my parents had only one car, because one of them worked in an inconvenient location outside of the city. The car was parked in a garage in Sheepshead Bay because parking was inconvenient in the area (so it was either a long walk, or a short bus ride to reach the car). There are only a handful of times when I recall using the family car. To go to Manhattan, we took the subway, and to go shopping, we walked.

Now I live deep into Staten Island. We use the car here more than Brooklyn because parking is easier, so we don't have to go through the trouble of going to/from the garage. But at the same time, when we don't have access to the car (because it's being used for work), walking and public transportation cover most of our needs. Shopping can be done using public transportation. If it's a few bags, just carry them onto the bus. If it's anything heavy, you can get one of those "granny carts" (nowadays, many supermarkets deliver as well).

Does having a car make things easier out here in SI? Yes, but it isn't a dire necessity. In Brooklyn, it didn't even make things easier, and if it wasn't required for work, we probably wouldn't have a car in the first place.

In any case, for the OP, it all depends on what their "standard" is as far as how compact the neighborhood has to be (in terms of walkability, spacing of transit lines, frequency of transit lines, etc). For the most part, any area along a subway line would work well (but of course, you have to consider how safe the neighborhood is as well). Depending on whether you mind a bus-subway commute (or an express bus or commuter rail commute), a few areas away from the subway might also work.

Originally Posted by jcoltrane

He spent half his life there, in the Dominican ghetto!

West of Broadway isn't a Dominican ghetto. It's mostly white (Orthodox Jewish to be exact).

Originally Posted by jcoltrane

I HIGHLY suggest the OP investigate the possibility of Portland, Oregon and/or Vancover, Canada! I think the northwest will be your best chance at satisfaction and happiness, given the limitations of your circumstances.

Yeah, Portland is going to be more walkable and have better public transportation than NYC. Yeah, OK.

[nykiddo718718]

As was mentioned earlier you DO NOT NEED a car in NYC. However, it is more difficult to get around without a car in certain neighborhoods. Examples that come to mind are Riverdale and Throgs Neck in the Bronx, Bergan Beach and Mill Basin in Brooklyn, East Queens excluding Jamaica and Flushing, and much of Staten Island. You can live without a car in those neighborhoods, however it will often take long time to get to certain areas of the city (Typically outside your borough).

However,

Due to density, NYC neighborhoods are stuffed full of THOUSANDS of amenities, creating WALKABILITY. Small businesses, chains, parks/playgrounds, hospitals, ect. You typically do not need to leave your neighborhood. Definitely not on a daily basis. Most jobs are located in the largest two CBDs, and thankfully most transportation in the city is oriented towards those areas. At the same time people typically live near work. Most New Yorkers live within 5 miles of their jobs.

Because of such density a car can be a PITA, in fact the city attempts to deter driving. Especially in the CBDs. Pedestrian density, pollution, worn roads, expensive infrastructure, traffic, tickets, traffic, limited parking, ever increasing traffic calming, high gas, registration and insurance fees, and coming speed cameras/congestion pricing and more red light cameras making driving rather unpleasant.

Anyway, I recommend:

Bronx:

•Kingsbridge
•Bedford Park
•Norwood
•Pelham Parkway/Bronx Park East
•Castle Hill (North of Bruckner Blvd, closer to subway)
•Parkchester
•Van Nest
•Morris Park (Closer to Pelham Parkway subway)
•Allerton (Closer to White Plains Road/subway)

Manhattan:

•Marble Hill
•Upper East Side
•Upper West Side
•Morningside Heights
•West Harlem
•Washington Heights/Hudson Heights
•Inwood

All these neighborhoods are rich in amenities and have good mass transit.

Someone else can do BK, Qns, and SI.

[NyWriterdude]

Originally Posted by nykiddo718718

Due to density, NYC neighborhoods are stuffed full of THOUSANDS of amenities, creating WALKABILITY. Small businesses, chains, parks/playgrounds, hospitals, ect. You typically do not need to leave your neighborhood. Definitely not on a daily basis. Most jobs are located in the largest two CBDs, and thankfully most transportation in the city is oriented towards those areas. At the same time people typically live near work. Most New Yorkers live within 5 miles of their jobs.

I agree that you typically don't need to leave your neighborhood on a daily basis if you work in the neighborhood and/or at home and you'll find even in the outer boroughs a fair number of people working in their neighborhood. Many neighborhoods are pretty walkable, but some are a lot less than others.

I would not claim though that most New Yorkers live within 5 miles of their jobs. There's enough people crowding all forms of transportation, public and private (cars on the road) to suggest a huge percentage of people significantly commute. The E and F get very crowded and Jamaica and the trains stay crowded till Midtown, and that trip is more than 5 miles. Ditto for the IRT lines from the North Bronx, or the 7 train from Flushing.

[Chava61]

Originally Posted by Schermerhorn

My wife and I are planning to move back to NYC in the next 4-5 years. She's from Kyoto (Japan's former capital; it could be NYC's sister city given the similar layout), and while we like it here just fine, we want to raise our child in America and then give him the choice on where to go from there.

(A lot of people are jumping ship, or planning to -- the Japanese government is devoting all its resources to the elderly and the rich and really sticking it to younger working folks. Sounds a bit like the US? )

Now here's one thing that makes most of America unlivable for us: we both have impaired vision (that's how we met each other) and neither of us will ever be able to drive a car. There are plenty of places where you can still get by without a car, but because most people have cars, everything is built around automobiles. The last thing we want is to be socially ostracized when our child's friends' parents casually ask us to go pick someone up at school, or whatever. We want to replicate what we've got now, which is a neighborhood where everything is within walking distance, almost no one uses a car on a daily basis, and

That means living somewhere really central. I make a good income by Japanese standards, but NYC is another world. Above 110th Street or in the outer boroughs are where we're looking. But the further out you get, the more cars you see. Anyone have any data (it's city-data.com, after all) on lowest rates of car ownership? And I mean non-poverty-related non-car-ownership, if that make sense.

We don't need a lot of space -- we have 380 square feet now, and plenty of people in our building are raising multiple kids in that space! -- so a one-bedroom apartment with partitions is just fine. What are Washington Heights and Inwood like? We had been looking at Brooklyn, but the built-up areas are just too expensive. Any other car-free folks out there with neighborhoods that they'd like to share?

I suggest looking at neighborhoods in Central Queens such as Forest Hills or Rego Park in parts of these neighborhoods that are close to Queens Blvd (as the subway lines run under it in these neighborhoods). One doesn't need a car in these areas and in fact having a car is a hassle due to the street cleaning twice a week and lack of available parking spaces. Also I think Sunnyside, Astoria, Elmhurst and Jackson Heights are areas where one can manage without a car if one lives close to the subway lines.

[patrix542]

a lot of people in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn live without car

[yodel]

Originally Posted by Henna

Then while we're at it, we should require the people who do have cars, and are going on about how convenient it is, to state whether they have off-street parking (garage/driveway) in or next to their building or house. If they do not have off-street parking, then state how difficult it is to find parking on their block.

I do have a car but no parking spot, and in my area, it's not even easy to find a paid spot nearby as there is a waiting list for most garages, and plus, the garages are often not even open to people who are not coop owners in those buildings with garages. So I'm stuck with street parking and I don't have the luxury of just getting in my car at 8pm and popping over to Target, because I will probably not be able to find parking when I get back.

So depending on the situation, it can be cumbersome to have a car in the outer borough neighborhoods where street parking is difficult if you do not have access to your own parking space.

That's the truth. I had a car for years both when I lived in Inwood and Bedford Park, BX because I worked in Westchester. On-street parking in Inwood was particularly difficult - sometimes I'd be circling for crazy amounts of time. If I really could't find anything I'd park under the elevated train in a pretty desolate location, but break ins were a problem there. Bedford Park was easier for parking, but you are still subjected to the tyranny of alternate side parking. Imagine you have a sleeping baby and toddler and have to get everyone out to move the car in the winter. Not at all fun. I did have a garage space for a while, but it was also not convenient, particularly since I was using the car regularly. I had to wait in the morning for them to get the car - they had it up on lifts and had to move other cars to get mine.

Really I think it's way easier not to have a car in most neighborhoods with decent public transportation access, unless you have a driveway. Where I live (Bedford Park), everything you need is within walking distance. I miss having a car when I want to go to Home Depot or something, but I could really just take a cab at those times.

I loved Inwood, but I agree with BMW guy that it wasn't the most convenient neighborhood. We lived in Seaman Ave, and getting to a grocery store was a hike - really stunk if you forgot that one thing. Even bodegas weren't very close by.

[Schermerhorn]

Originally Posted by Chava61

One doesn't need a car in these areas {Central Queens} and in fact having a car is a hassle.

Originally Posted by nykiddo718718

Because of such density a car can be a PITA, in fact the city attempts to deter driving.

This is basically the tipping point for me. If a car is more hassle than it's worth, it's probably a livable neighborhood. If a car confers advantages on people who have one, and even people who don't have one wish they did, then it's probably not livable.