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1. Riverdale (including Fieldston, Spuyten Duyvil/aka "South Riverdale", North Riverdale and Central Riverdale - they're all subsections of Riverdale)
2. Country Club
3. Morris Park/Indian Village
4. Woodlawn
5. City Island
6. Throggs Neck (includes all subsections - Schuylerville, Locust Point and Edgewater)
7. Pelham Parkway
8. Pelham Gardens
9. Pelham Bay
10. Kingsbridge (west of Corlear Avenue)
11. Van Cortlandt Village/Kingsbridge Heights (EXCLUDING the areas South of the Reservoir - mainly ghetto areas)
12. Parkchester
13. Norwood (this is ok, but it wouldn't make my list)
14. Co-op City (this is ok, but it wouldn't make my list)
15. Bedford Park (this is ok, but it wouldn't make my list)
16. Baychester (this is ok, but it wouldn't make my list)
17. Westchester Square (this is ok, but it wouldn't make my list)
18. Bronxwood (this is a rather ghetto part of the Bronx)
Am I right in saying that these, including the ones you think are ok, but wouldn't make your list, seem to form two main clumps with an outlier in Woodlawn (though, of course, there's Westchester county just past the Bronx borders) and an outlier in City Island?
There's the northeastern one with Country Clubb, Morris Park, Throggs Neck, Pelham Parkway, Pelham Gardens, and Pelham Bay, Parkchester, Co-op City, Baychester, and Westchester Square..
There's another northwestern one with Riverdale, Kingsbridge, Van Cortland Village/Kingsbridge Heights, Norwood, and Bedford Park. It almost makes a ring around Jerome Reservoir except for Fordham Manor and those parts of Kingsbridge Heights south of the reservoir which you note are mainly ghetto areas.
Are these lists in order of where you'd personally choose to live in the BX?
For me, yes. I thought about safety, housing stock, transportation and overall amenities. Riverdale can be a pain to get to if you have to take the subway since you need to get a bus to reach it afterwards in most cases, but if money is no object, you have two Metro-North stations and three express buses, so you can ride in comfort to and from work and you have a good amount of options. You're also minutes away from Westchester and Manhattan by car. It's a very unique neighborhood in terms of having large co-ops and condos with English tudors on the same block, something you find in most of Riverdale, even in Fieldston outside of the estate area. Riverdale is really an example of what the old Bronx was like because Moses came along and destroyed parts of it. It was a planned area and the residents have fought hard to keep it from becoming tacky looking.
I would say a lot of the nice Bronx areas have this small town feel that's pretty charming... Morris Park, Woodlawn... You walk down the main avenue and that's the feel you get. The same in Riverdale. Country Club is very very suburban, but also charming, particularly by Maria Villa. Lots of parts with no sidewalks. I also like parts of Van Cortlandt Village. It's very hilly but very charming architecture overall. Quiet, lots of green...
Belmont in its cute little strip is nice, but really starts going downhill as you wander away from it especially in the west and south. Fordham Road is also weirdly screwy. You'd think Fordham University would try to pull some weight in making it nicer. I remember biking to Arthur Avenue a few times when I used to live closer and biking around the area; that was several years ago, but the drop off back then, especially to the south, was pretty severe (also, the drivers got a lot more aggressive). I'm guessing it hasn't changed too much.
Am I right in saying that these, including the ones you think are ok, but wouldn't make your list, seem to form two main clumps with an outlier in Woodlawn (though, of course, there's Westchester county just past the Bronx borders) and an outlier in City Island?
There's the northeastern one with Country Clubb, Morris Park, Throggs Neck, Pelham Parkway, Pelham Gardens, and Pelham Bay, Parkchester, Co-op City, Baychester, and Westchester Square..
There's another northwestern one with Riverdale, Kingsbridge, Van Cortland Village/Kingsbridge Heights, Norwood, and Bedford Park. It almost makes a ring around Jerome Reservoir except for Fordham Manor and those parts of Kingsbridge Heights south of the reservoir which you note are mainly ghetto areas.
If you want to talk about the best area of the Bronx, then the Northwest Bronx wins by a mile. It has basically the safest areas (Riverdale/Spuyten Duyvil/Central Riverdale/Fieldston/North Riverdale, Van Cortlandt Village, parts of Kingsbridge Heights and Woodlawn). Those are all really good to solid areas where you don't have extreme ghettos in between somewhere.
Of course you do have the areas along the water that are all good as well... Country Club, City Island, Pelham Bay, most of Throggs Neck east of the expressway... Those areas basically held on nicely when most of the Bronx was "burning" especially Throggs Neck. The problem is parts of Throggs Neck are in decline with all of the ugly houses, Section 8 and the PJs.
The bad parts of the Bronx are basically either south or in the middle of the borough. With gentrification coming, it'll be like a re-birth for a lot of these areas. University Heights may be another one. It experienced severe white flight back in the day, but it was a solid area.
Belmont in its cute little strip is nice, but really starts going downhill as you wander away from it especially in the west and south. Fordham Road is also weirdly screwy. You'd think Fordham University would try to pull some weight in making it nicer.
They should have expanded like NYU did, I think bluedog was saying this on another thread. The land was cheap at the time, that area really could have been something different from Fordham Road to St. Barnabas....ppl aren't visionaries...
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Belmont in its cute little strip is nice, but really starts going downhill as you wander away from it especially in the west and south. Fordham Road is also weirdly screwy. You'd think Fordham University would try to pull some weight in making it nicer. I remember biking to Arthur Avenue a few times when I used to live closer and biking around the area; that was several years ago, but the drop off back then, especially to the south, was pretty severe (also, the drivers got a lot more aggressive). I'm guessing it hasn't changed too much.
Fordham U has already spoken by basically making the Bronx campus a mini-fortress with gates all around it. The Manhattan campus is the complete opposite. The Fordham U students in the Bronx generally run to and from Metro-North around Fordham Road. If they can clean up Fordham Road (literally and figurately) it can stand a chance. A few new places have come in but you need more gentrification. Most of the old shops and stores remind me of Downtown Brooklyn back in the day before it gentrified, and not in a good way. If you compare the two, Downtown Brooklyn is MUCH nicer... CLEAN... Fordham Road is filthy.
They should have expanded like NYU did, I think bluedog was saying this on another thread. The land was cheap at the time, that area really could have been something different from Fordham Road to St. Barnabas....ppl aren't visionaries...
Yea, that would have made a lot of sense. I think both to the west and to the south.
It's still weird to me that having both Lehman College and Fordham University in the area didn't turn Fordham Manor and Bedford Park into a college town kind of neighborhood. There's even an assist with Bronx Science and the Academy of Mount St. Ursula.
Google Maps says 29 minutes on the B (during AM rush hour) 23 minutes on the D (leaving now). He’s correct is under 30 minutes.
I ride the B regularly, which is why I'm standing by what I said earlier, which is that it's doable if there are no delays, but how often is the B NOT delayed...
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler
Yea, that would have made a lot of sense. I think both to the west and to the south.
It's still weird to me that having both Lehman College and Fordham University in the area didn't turn Fordham Manor and Bedford Park into a college town kind of neighborhood. There's even an assist with Bronx Science and the Academy of Mount St. Ursula.
I think the topography may have something to do with that. Most of the Bronx is very hilly, which sort of cuts off parts of neighborhoods from another.
Riverdale has a campus feel, but only the parts immediately by Manhattan College. The thing with Lehman and Fordham U is a lot of students commute to and from. That's true with Manhattan College too actually, not to mention that the student populations aren't that huge to begin with. Fordham likes being small, so I don't expect them to expand like Columbia U, which has MUCH deeper pockets.
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