fbpx
Wikipedia

New York City

New York, often called New York City[a] or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over 300.46 square miles (778.2 km2), New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the United States, and is more than twice as populous as second-place Los Angeles. New York City lies at the southern tip of New York State, and constitutes the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban landmass.[8] With over 20.1 million people in its metropolitan statistical area and 23.5 million in its combined statistical area as of 2020, New York is one of the world's most populous megacities, and over 58 million people live within 250 mi (400 km) of the city.[9] New York City is a global cultural, financial, entertainment, and media center with a significant influence on commerce, health care and life sciences,[10] research, technology,[11] education, politics, tourism, dining, art, fashion, and sports. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy,[12][13] an established safe haven for global investors, and is sometimes described as the capital of the world.[14][15]

New York
Nicknames: 
Interactive map outlining New York City
Coordinates: 40°42′46″N 74°00′22″W / 40.71278°N 74.00611°W / 40.71278; -74.00611Coordinates: 40°42′46″N 74°00′22″W / 40.71278°N 74.00611°W / 40.71278; -74.00611[1]
CountryUnited States
StateNew York
RegionMid-Atlantic
Constituent counties (boroughs)Bronx (The Bronx)
Kings (Brooklyn)
New York (Manhattan)
Queens (Queens)
Richmond (Staten Island)
Historic coloniesNew Netherland
Province of New York
Settled1624 (approx)
Consolidated1898
Named forJames, Duke of York
Government
 • TypeStrong mayor–council
 • BodyNew York City Council
 • MayorEric Adams (D)
Area
 • Total472.43 sq mi (1,223.59 km2)
 • Land300.46 sq mi (778.18 km2)
 • Water171.97 sq mi (445.41 km2)
Elevation33 ft (10 m)
Population
 (2020)
 • Total8,804,190
 • Estimate 
(July 2021)[4]
8,467,513
 • Rank1st in the United States
1st in New York State
 • Density29,302.66/sq mi (11,313.81/km2)
 • Urban
19,426,449 (1st)
 • Urban density5,980.8/sq mi (2,309.2/km2)
 • Metro20,140,470 (1st)
DemonymNew Yorker
Time zoneUTC−05:00 (EST)
 • Summer (DST)UTC−04:00 (EDT)
ZIP Codes
100xx–104xx, 11004–05, 111xx–114xx, 116xx
Area code(s)212/646/332, 718/347/929, 917
FIPS code36-51000
GNIS feature ID975772
Primary airportsJohn F. Kennedy
LaGuardia
Newark Liberty
Rapid transit systemNew York City Subway
Staten Island Railway
PATH
GDP (City, 2021)$886 billion[6] (1st)
GMP (Metro, 2021)$2.0 trillion[7] (1st)
Largest borough by areaQueens (109 square miles or 280 square kilometres)
Largest borough by populationBrooklyn (2020 Census 2,736,074)
Largest borough by GDP (2021)Manhattan ($651.6 billion)[6]
Websitewww.nyc.gov

Situated on one of the world's largest natural harbors and extending into the Atlantic Ocean, New York City comprises five boroughs, each of which is coextensive with a respective county of the state of New York. The five boroughs—Brooklyn (Kings County), Queens (Queens County), Manhattan (New York County), the Bronx (Bronx County), and Staten Island (Richmond County)—were created when local governments were consolidated into a single municipal entity in 1898.[16] The city and its metropolitan area constitute the premier gateway for legal immigration to the United States. As many as 800 languages are spoken in New York,[17] making it the most linguistically diverse city in the world. New York City is home to more than 3.2 million residents born outside the United States, the largest foreign-born population of any city in the world as of 2016.[18][19] As of 2022, the New York metropolitan area is estimated to produce a gross metropolitan product of over $2.1 trillion, ranking it first worldwide. If the New York metropolitan area were a sovereign state, it would have the eighth-largest economy in the world. As of 2022, New York is home to the highest number of billionaires and millionaires of any city in the world.

New York City traces its origins to a trading post founded on the southern tip of Manhattan Island by Dutch colonists in approximately 1624. The settlement was named New Amsterdam (Dutch: Nieuw Amsterdam) in 1626 and was chartered as a city in 1653. The city came under English control in 1664 and was renamed New York after King Charles II of England granted the lands to his brother, the Duke of York.[20][21] The city was regained by the Dutch in July 1673 and was renamed New Orange for one year and three months; the city has been continuously named New York since November 1674. New York City was the capital of the United States from 1785 until 1790,[22] and has been the largest U.S. city since 1790. The Statue of Liberty greeted millions of immigrants as they came to the U.S. by ship in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and is a symbol of the U.S. and its ideals of liberty and peace.[23] In the 21st century, New York City has emerged as a global node of creativity, entrepreneurship,[24] and environmental sustainability,[25][26] and as a symbol of freedom and cultural diversity.[27] The New York Times has won the most Pulitzer Prizes for journalism and remains the U.S. media's "newspaper of record".[28] In 2019, New York City was voted the greatest city in the world per a survey of over 30,000 people from 48 cities worldwide, citing its cultural diversity.[29]

Many districts and monuments in New York City are major landmarks, including three of the world's ten most visited tourist attractions in 2013.[30] A record 66.6 million tourists visited New York City in 2019. Times Square is the brightly illuminated hub of the Broadway Theater District,[31] one of the world's busiest pedestrian intersections,[30][32] and a major center of the world's entertainment industry.[33] Many of the city's landmarks, skyscrapers, and parks are known around the world, as is the city's fast pace, spawning the term New York minute. The Empire State Building has become the global standard of reference to describe the height and length of other structures.[34]

The Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, part of the Stonewall National Monument, is considered the historic epicenter of LGBTQ+ culture and the birthplace of the modern gay rights movement.[35][36] Manhattan's real estate market is among the most expensive in the world.[37][38] Providing continuous 24/7 service and contributing to the nickname The City That Never Sleeps, the New York City Subway is the largest single-operator rapid transit system worldwide, with 472 passenger rail stations; and Penn Station in Midtown Manhattan is the busiest transportation hub in the Western Hemisphere.[39] The city has over 120 colleges and universities, including Columbia University, New York University, and the City University of New York system, which is the largest urban public university system in the United States. Anchored by Wall Street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan, New York City has been called both the world's leading financial center[40] and the most powerful city in the world,[41] and is home to the world's two largest stock exchanges by total market capitalization, the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq.[42][43] New York City is the headquarters of the global art market, with numerous art galleries and auction houses collectively hosting half of the world’s art auctions.[44]

Etymology

In 1664, New York was named in honor of the Duke of York, who would become King James II of England.[45] James's elder brother, King Charles II, appointed the Duke proprietor of the former territory of New Netherland, including the city of New Amsterdam, when England seized it from Dutch control.[46]

History

Early history

In the pre-Columbian era, the area of present-day New York City was inhabited by Algonquian Native Americans, including the Lenape. Their homeland, known as Lenapehoking, included Staten Island, Manhattan, the Bronx, the western portion of Long Island (including the areas that would later become the boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens), and the Lower Hudson Valley.[47]

The first documented visit into New York Harbor by a European was in 1524 by Italian Giovanni da Verrazzano, an explorer from Florence in the service of the French crown.[48] He claimed the area for France and named it Nouvelle Angoulême (New Angoulême).[49] A Spanish expedition, led by the Portuguese captain Estêvão Gomes sailing for Emperor Charles V, arrived in New York Harbor in January 1525 and charted the mouth of the Hudson River, which he named Río de San Antonio ('Saint Anthony's River'). The Padrón Real of 1527, the first scientific map to show the East Coast of North America continuously, was informed by Gomes' expedition and labeled the northeastern United States as Tierra de Esteban Gómez in his honor.[50]

In 1609, the English explorer Henry Hudson rediscovered New York Harbor while searching for the Northwest Passage to the Orient for the Dutch East India Company.[51] He proceeded to sail up what the Dutch would name the North River (now the Hudson River), named first by Hudson as the Mauritius after Maurice, Prince of Orange. Hudson's first mate described the harbor as "a very good Harbour for all windes" and the river as "a mile broad" and "full of fish".[52] Hudson sailed roughly 150 miles (240 km) north,[53] past the site of the present-day New York State capital city of Albany, in the belief that it might be an oceanic tributary before the river became too shallow to continue.[52] He made a ten-day exploration of the area and claimed the region for the Dutch East India Company. In 1614, the area between Cape Cod and Delaware Bay was claimed by the Netherlands and called Nieuw-Nederland ('New Netherland').

The first non–Native American inhabitant of what would eventually become New York City was Juan Rodriguez (transliterated to Dutch as Jan Rodrigues), a merchant from Santo Domingo. Born in Santo Domingo of Portuguese and African descent, he arrived in Manhattan during the winter of 1613–14, trapping for pelts and trading with the local population as a representative of the Dutch. Broadway, from 159th Street to 218th Street in Upper Manhattan, is named Juan Rodriguez Way in his honor.[54][55]

Dutch rule

 
New Amsterdam, centered in the eventual Lower Manhattan, in 1664, the year England took control and renamed it New York

A permanent European presence near New York Harbor was established in 1624—making New York the 12th oldest continuously occupied European-established settlement in the continental United States[56]—with the founding of a Dutch fur trading settlement on Governors Island. In 1625, construction was started on a citadel and Fort Amsterdam, later called Nieuw Amsterdam (New Amsterdam), on present-day Manhattan Island.[57][58] The colony of New Amsterdam was centered on what would ultimately be known as Lower Manhattan. It extended from the southern tip of Manhattan to modern day Wall Street, where a 12-foot wooden stockade was built in 1653 to protect against Native American and British raids.[59] In 1626, the Dutch colonial Director-General Peter Minuit, acting as charged by the Dutch West India Company, purchased the island of Manhattan from the Canarsie, a small Lenape band,[60] for "the value of 60 guilders"[61] (about $900 in 2018).[62] A disproved legend claims that Manhattan was purchased for $24 worth of glass beads.[63][64]

Following the purchase, New Amsterdam grew slowly.[21] To attract settlers, the Dutch instituted the patroon system in 1628, whereby wealthy Dutchmen (patroons, or patrons) who brought 50 colonists to New Netherland would be awarded swaths of land, along with local political autonomy and rights to participate in the lucrative fur trade. This program had little success.[65]

Since 1621, the Dutch West India Company had operated as a monopoly in New Netherland, on authority granted by the Dutch States General. In 1639–1640, in an effort to bolster economic growth, the Dutch West India Company relinquished its monopoly over the fur trade, leading to growth in the production and trade of food, timber, tobacco, and slaves (particularly with the Dutch West Indies).[21][66]

In 1647, Peter Stuyvesant began his tenure as the last Director-General of New Netherland. During his tenure, the population of New Netherland grew from 2,000 to 8,000.[67][68] Stuyvesant has been credited with improving law and order in the colony; however, he also earned a reputation as a despotic leader. He instituted regulations on liquor sales, attempted to assert control over the Dutch Reformed Church, and blocked other religious groups (including Quakers, Jews, and Lutherans) from establishing houses of worship.[69] The Dutch West India Company would eventually attempt to ease tensions between Stuyvesant and residents of New Amsterdam.[70]

English rule

 
Fort George and the City of New York c. 1731. Royal Navy ships of the line are seen guarding what would become New York Harbor.

In 1664, unable to summon any significant resistance, Stuyvesant surrendered New Amsterdam to English troops, led by Colonel Richard Nicolls, without bloodshed.[69][70] The terms of the surrender permitted Dutch residents to remain in the colony and allowed for religious freedom.[71] In 1667, during negotiations leading to the Treaty of Breda after the Second Anglo-Dutch War, the Dutch decided to keep the nascent plantation colony of what is now Suriname (on the northern South American coast) they had gained from the English; and in return, the English kept New Amsterdam. The fledgling settlement was promptly renamed "New York" after the Duke of York (the future King James II and VII), who would eventually be deposed in the Glorious Revolution.[72] After the founding, the duke gave part of the colony to proprietors George Carteret and John Berkeley. Fort Orange, 150 miles (240 km) north on the Hudson River, was renamed Albany after James's Scottish title.[73] The transfer was confirmed in 1667 by the Treaty of Breda, which concluded the Second Anglo-Dutch War.[74]

On August 24, 1673, during the Third Anglo-Dutch War, Dutch captain Anthony Colve seized the colony of New York from the English at the behest of Cornelis Evertsen the Youngest and rechristened it "New Orange" after William III, the Prince of Orange.[75] The Dutch would soon return the island to England under the Treaty of Westminster of November 1674.[76][77]

Several intertribal wars among the Native Americans and some epidemics brought on by contact with the Europeans caused sizeable population losses for the Lenape between the years 1660 and 1670.[78] By 1700, the Lenape population had diminished to 200.[79] New York experienced several yellow fever epidemics in the 18th century, losing ten percent of its population to the disease in 1702 alone.[80][81]

Province of New York and slavery

 
Columbia University was founded by royal charter in 1754 under the name King's College.

In the early 18th century, New York grew in importance as a trading port while as a part of the colony of New York.[82] It also became a center of slavery, with 42% of households enslaving Africans by 1730, the highest percentage outside Charleston, South Carolina.[83] Most cases were that of domestic slavery, as a New York household then commonly enslaved few or several people. Others were hired out to work at labor. Slavery became integrally tied to New York's economy through the labor of slaves throughout the port, and the banking and shipping industries trading with the American South. During construction in Foley Square in the 1990s, the African Burying Ground was discovered; the cemetery included 10,000 to 20,000 of graves of colonial-era Africans, some enslaved and some free.[84]

The 1735 trial and acquittal in Manhattan of John Peter Zenger, who had been accused of seditious libel after criticizing colonial governor William Cosby, helped to establish the freedom of the press in North America.[85] In 1754, Columbia University was founded under charter by King George II as King's College in Lower Manhattan.[86]

American Revolution

 
The Battle of Long Island, one of the largest battles of the American Revolutionary War, took place in Brooklyn on August 27, 1776.

The Stamp Act Congress met in New York in October 1765, as the Sons of Liberty, organized in the city, skirmished over the next ten years with British troops stationed there.[87] The Battle of Long Island, the largest battle of the American Revolutionary War, was fought in August 1776 within the modern-day borough of Brooklyn.[88] After the battle, in which the Americans were defeated, the British made the city their military and political base of operations in North America. The city was a haven for Loyalist refugees and escaped slaves who joined the British lines for freedom newly promised by the Crown for all fighters. As many as 10,000 escaped slaves crowded into the city during the British occupation. When the British forces evacuated at the close of the war in 1783, they transported 3,000 freedmen for resettlement in Nova Scotia.[89] They resettled other freedmen in England and the Caribbean.

The only attempt at a peaceful solution to the war took place at the Conference House on Staten Island between American delegates, including Benjamin Franklin, and British general Lord Howe on September 11, 1776. Shortly after the British occupation began, the Great Fire of New York occurred, a large conflagration on the West Side of Lower Manhattan, which destroyed about a quarter of the buildings in the city, including Trinity Church.[90]

In 1785, the assembly of the Congress of the Confederation made New York City the national capital shortly after the war. New York was the last capital of the U.S. under the Articles of Confederation and the first capital under the Constitution of the United States. New York City as the U.S. capital hosted several events of national scope in 1789—the first President of the United States, George Washington, was inaugurated; the first United States Congress and the Supreme Court of the United States each assembled for the first time; and the United States Bill of Rights was drafted, all at Federal Hall on Wall Street.[91] In 1790, New York surpassed Philadelphia as the nation's largest city. At the end of that year, pursuant to the Residence Act, the national capital was moved to Philadelphia.[92][93]

Nineteenth century

 
Broadway follows the Native American Wecquaesgeek Trail through Manhattan.[94]

Over the course of the nineteenth century, New York City's population grew from 60,000 to 3.43 million.[95] Under New York State's abolition act of 1799, children of slave mothers were to be eventually liberated but to be held in indentured servitude until their mid-to-late twenties.[96][97] Together with slaves freed by their masters after the Revolutionary War and escaped slaves, a significant free-Black population gradually developed in Manhattan. Under such influential United States founders as Alexander Hamilton and John Jay, the New York Manumission Society worked for abolition and established the African Free School to educate Black children.[98] It was not until 1827 that slavery was completely abolished in the state, and free Blacks struggled afterward with discrimination. New York interracial abolitionist activism continued; among its leaders were graduates of the African Free School. New York city's population jumped from 123,706 in 1820 to 312,710 by 1840, 16,000 of whom were Black.[99][100]

In the 19th century, the city was transformed by both commercial and residential development relating to its status as a national and international trading center, as well as by European immigration, respectively.[101] The city adopted the Commissioners' Plan of 1811, which expanded the city street grid to encompass almost all of Manhattan. The 1825 completion of the Erie Canal through central New York connected the Atlantic port to the agricultural markets and commodities of the North American interior via the Hudson River and the Great Lakes.[102] Local politics became dominated by Tammany Hall, a political machine supported by Irish and German immigrants.[103]

 
The current five boroughs of Greater New York as they appeared in 1814. The Bronx was in Westchester County, Queens County included modern Nassau County, Kings County had six towns, one of which was Brooklyn, and New York City is shown by hatching in southern New York County on the island of Manhattan, and Richmond County on Staten Island.

Several prominent American literary figures lived in New York during the 1830s and 1840s, including William Cullen Bryant, Washington Irving, Herman Melville, Rufus Wilmot Griswold, John Keese, Nathaniel Parker Willis, and Edgar Allan Poe. Public-minded members of the contemporaneous business elite lobbied for the establishment of Central Park, which in 1857 became the first landscaped park in an American city.

The Great Irish Famine brought a large influx of Irish immigrants; more than 200,000 were living in New York by 1860, upwards of a quarter of the city's population.[104] There was also extensive immigration from the German provinces, where revolutions had disrupted societies, and Germans comprised another 25% of New York's population by 1860.[105]

Democratic Party candidates were consistently elected to local office, increasing the city's ties to the South and its dominant party. In 1861, Mayor Fernando Wood called upon the aldermen to declare independence from Albany and the United States after the South seceded, but his proposal was not acted on.[98] Anger at new military conscription laws during the American Civil War (1861–1865), which spared wealthier men who could afford to pay a $300 (equivalent to $6,602 in 2021) commutation fee to hire a substitute,[106] led to the Draft Riots of 1863, whose most visible participants were ethnic Irish working class.[98]

The draft riots deteriorated into attacks on New York's elite, followed by attacks on Black New Yorkers and their property after fierce competition for a decade between Irish immigrants and Black people for work. Rioters burned the Colored Orphan Asylum to the ground, with more than 200 children escaping harm due to efforts of the New York Police Department, which was mainly made up of Irish immigrants.[105] At least 120 people were killed.[107] Eleven Black men were lynched over five days, and the riots forced hundreds of Blacks to flee the city for Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and New Jersey. The Black population in Manhattan fell below 10,000 by 1865, which it had last been in 1820. The White working class had established dominance.[105][107] Violence by longshoremen against Black men was especially fierce in the docks area.[105] It was one of the worst incidents of civil unrest in American history.[108]

Modern history

 
A construction worker atop the Empire State Building as it was being built in 1930. The Chrysler Building can be seen behind him.

In 1898, the modern City of New York was formed with the consolidation of Brooklyn (until then a separate city), the County of New York (which then included parts of the Bronx), the County of Richmond, and the western portion of the County of Queens.[109] The opening of the subway in 1904, first built as separate private systems, helped bind the new city together.[110] Throughout the first half of the 20th century, the city became a world center for industry, commerce, and communication.[111]

In 1904, the steamship General Slocum caught fire in the East River, killing 1,021 people on board.[112] In 1911, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, the city's worst industrial disaster, took the lives of 146 garment workers and spurred the growth of the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union and major improvements in factory safety standards.[113]

New York's non-White population was 36,620 in 1890.[114] New York City was a prime destination in the early twentieth century for African Americans during the Great Migration from the American South, and by 1916, New York City had become home to the largest urban African diaspora in North America.[115] The Harlem Renaissance of literary and cultural life flourished during the era of Prohibition.[116] The larger economic boom generated construction of skyscrapers competing in height and creating an identifiable skyline.

 
Manhattan's Little Italy in the Lower East Side, c. 1900

New York became the most populous urbanized area in the world in the early 1920s, overtaking London. The metropolitan area surpassed the 10 million mark in the early 1930s, becoming the first megacity in human history.[117] The difficult years of the Great Depression saw the election of reformer Fiorello La Guardia as mayor and the fall of Tammany Hall after eighty years of political dominance.[118]

Returning World War II veterans created a post-war economic boom and the development of large housing tracts in eastern Queens and Nassau County as well as similar suburban areas in New Jersey. New York emerged from the war unscathed as the leading city of the world, with Wall Street leading America's place as the world's dominant economic power. The United Nations headquarters was completed in 1952, solidifying New York's global geopolitical influence, and the rise of abstract expressionism in the city precipitated New York's displacement of Paris as the center of the art world.[119]

 
The Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, a designated U.S. National Historic Landmark and National Monument, was the site of the June 1969 Stonewall riots and the cradle of the modern LGBT+ rights movement.[120][121][122]

The Stonewall riots were a series of spontaneous, violent protests by members of the gay community against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, at the Stonewall Inn in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Lower Manhattan.[123] They are widely considered to constitute the single most important event leading to the gay liberation movement[120][124][125][126] and the modern fight for LGBT rights.[127][128] Wayne R. Dynes, author of the Encyclopedia of Homosexuality, wrote that drag queens were the only "transgender folks around" during the June 1969 Stonewall riots. The transgender community in New York City played a significant role in fighting for LGBT equality during the period of the Stonewall riots and thereafter.[129]

In the 1970s, job losses due to industrial restructuring caused New York City to suffer from economic problems and rising crime rates.[130] While a resurgence in the financial industry greatly improved the city's economic health in the 1980s, New York's crime rate continued to increase through that decade and into the beginning of the 1990s.[131] By the mid 1990s, crime rates started to drop dramatically due to revised police strategies, improving economic opportunities, gentrification, and new residents, both American transplants and new immigrants from Asia and Latin America. Important new sectors, such as Silicon Alley, emerged in the city's economy.[132] New York's population reached all-time highs in the 2000 census and then again in the 2010 census.

New York City suffered the bulk of the economic damage and largest loss of human life in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, attacks.[133] Two of the four airliners hijacked that day were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center, destroying the towers and killing 2,192 civilians, 343 firefighters, and 71 law enforcement officers. The North Tower became the tallest building ever to be destroyed anywhere then or subsequently.[134]

The area was rebuilt with a new One World Trade Center, a 9/11 memorial and museum, and other new buildings and infrastructure.[135] The World Trade Center PATH station, which had opened on July 19, 1909, as the Hudson Terminal, was also destroyed in the attacks. A temporary station was built and opened on November 23, 2003. An 800,000-square-foot (74,000 m2) permanent rail station designed by Santiago Calatrava, the World Trade Center Transportation Hub, the city's third-largest hub, was completed in 2016.[136] The new One World Trade Center is the tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere[137] and the seventh-tallest building in the world by pinnacle height, with its spire reaching a symbolic 1,776 feet (541.3 m) in reference to the year of U.S. independence.[138][139][140][141]

The Occupy Wall Street protests in Zuccotti Park in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan began on September 17, 2011, receiving global attention and popularizing the Occupy movement against social and economic inequality worldwide.[142]

In March 2020, the first case of COVID-19 in the city was confirmed in Manhattan.[143] The city rapidly replaced Wuhan, China to become the global epicenter of the pandemic during the early phase, before the infection became widespread across the world and the rest of the nation. As of March 2021, New York City had recorded over 30,000 deaths from COVID-19-related complications. In 2022, the LGBT community in New York City became the epicenter of the monkeypox outbreak in the Western Hemisphere, prompting New York Governor Kathy Hochul and New York City Mayor Eric Adams declared corresponding public health emergencies in the state and city, respectively, in July 2022.[144]

Geography

 
The core of the New York City metropolitan area, with Manhattan Island at its center

During the Wisconsin glaciation, 75,000 to 11,000 years ago, the New York City area was situated at the edge of a large ice sheet over 2,000 feet (610 m) in depth.[145] The erosive forward movement of the ice (and its subsequent retreat) contributed to the separation of what is now Long Island and Staten Island. That action also left bedrock at a relatively shallow depth, providing a solid foundation for most of Manhattan's skyscrapers.[146]

New York City is situated in the northeastern United States, in southeastern New York State, approximately halfway between Washington, D.C. and Boston. The location at the mouth of the Hudson River, which feeds into a naturally sheltered harbor and then into the Atlantic Ocean, has helped the city grow in significance as a trading port. Most of New York City is built on the three islands of Long Island, Manhattan, and Staten Island.

The Hudson River flows through the Hudson Valley into New York Bay. Between New York City and Troy, New York, the river is an estuary.[147] The Hudson River separates the city from the U.S. state of New Jersey. The East River—a tidal strait—flows from Long Island Sound and separates the Bronx and Manhattan from Long Island. The Harlem River, another tidal strait between the East and Hudson rivers, separates most of Manhattan from the Bronx. The Bronx River, which flows through the Bronx and Westchester County, is the only entirely freshwater river in the city.[148]

The city's land has been altered substantially by human intervention, with considerable land reclamation along the waterfronts since Dutch colonial times; reclamation is most prominent in Lower Manhattan, with developments such as Battery Park City in the 1970s and 1980s.[149] Some of the natural relief in topography has been evened out, especially in Manhattan.[150]

The city's total area is 468.484 square miles (1,213.37 km2); 302.643 sq mi (783.84 km2) of the city is land and 165.841 sq mi (429.53 km2) of this is water.[151][152] The highest point in the city is Todt Hill on Staten Island, which, at 409.8 feet (124.9 m) above sea level, is the highest point on the eastern seaboard south of Maine.[153] The summit of the ridge is mostly covered in woodlands as part of the Staten Island Greenbelt.[154]

Boroughs

 
  1. Manhattan
  2. Brooklyn
  3. Queens
  4. The Bronx
  5. Staten Island
Jurisdiction Population Land area Density of population GDP †
Borough County Census
(2020)
square
miles
square
km
people/
sq. mile
people/
sq. km
billions
(2012 US$) 2
Bronx
1,472,654 42.2 109.3 34,920 13,482 $ 38.725
Kings
2,736,074 69.4 179.7 39,438 15,227 $ 92.230
New York
1,694,263 22.7 58.8 74,781 28,872 $ 651.619
Queens
2,405,464 108.7 281.5 22,125 8,542 $ 88.578
Richmond
495,747 57.5 148.9 8,618 3,327 $ 14.806
8,804,190 302.6 783.8 29,095 11,234 $  885.958
20,215,751 47,126.4 122,056.8 429 166 $ 1,514.779
GDP = Gross Domestic Product    Sources:[155][156][157][158] and see individual borough articles.

New York City is sometimes referred to collectively as the Five Boroughs.[159] Each borough is coextensive with a respective county of New York State, making New York City one of the U.S. municipalities in multiple counties. There are hundreds of distinct neighborhoods throughout the boroughs, many with a definable history and character.

If the boroughs were each independent cities, four of the boroughs (Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan, and the Bronx) would be among the ten most populous cities in the United States (Staten Island would be ranked 37th as of 2020); these same boroughs are coterminous with the four most densely populated counties in the United States: New York (Manhattan), Kings (Brooklyn), Bronx, and Queens.

Manhattan

 
Lower and Midtown Manhattan, as seen by a SkySat satellite in 2017

Manhattan (New York County) is the geographically smallest and most densely populated borough. It is home to Central Park and most of the city's skyscrapers, and is sometimes locally known as The City.[160] Manhattan's population density of 72,033 people per square mile (27,812/km2) in 2015 makes it the highest of any county in the United States and higher than the density of any individual American city.[161]

Manhattan is the cultural, administrative, and financial center of New York City and contains the headquarters of many major multinational corporations, the United Nations headquarters, Wall Street, and a number of important universities. The borough of Manhattan is often described as the financial and cultural center of the world.[162][163]

Most of the borough is situated on Manhattan Island, at the mouth of the Hudson River and the East River, and its southern tip, at the confluence of the two rivers, represents the birthplace of New York City itself. Several small islands also compose part of the borough of Manhattan, including Randall's Island, Wards Island, and Roosevelt Island in the East River, and Governors Island and Liberty Island to the south in New York Harbor.

Manhattan Island is loosely divided into the Lower, Midtown, and Uptown regions. Uptown Manhattan is divided by Central Park into the Upper East Side and the Upper West Side, and above the park is Harlem, bordering the Bronx (Bronx County).

Harlem was predominantly occupied by Jewish and Italian Americans in the 19th century until the Great Migration. It was the center of the Harlem Renaissance.

The borough of Manhattan also includes a small neighborhood on the mainland, called Marble Hill, which is contiguous with the Bronx. New York City's remaining four boroughs are collectively referred to as the Outer Boroughs.

 
View of Midtown Manhattan from New Jersey, taken in September 2021

Brooklyn

Brooklyn (Kings County), on the western tip of Long Island, is the city's most populous borough. Brooklyn is known for its cultural, social, and ethnic diversity, an independent art scene, distinct neighborhoods, and a distinctive architectural heritage. Downtown Brooklyn is the largest central core neighborhood in the Outer Boroughs. The borough has a long beachfront shoreline including Coney Island, established in the 1870s as one of the earliest amusement grounds in the U.S.[164] Marine Park and Prospect Park are the two largest parks in Brooklyn.[165] Since 2010, Brooklyn has evolved into a thriving hub of entrepreneurship and high technology startup firms,[166][167] and of postmodern art and design.[167][168]

 
Downtown Brooklyn skyline from Governors Island in September 2016

Queens

Queens (Queens County), on Long Island north and east of Brooklyn, is geographically the largest borough, the most ethnically diverse county in the United States,[169] and the most ethnically diverse urban area in the world.[170][171] Historically a collection of small towns and villages founded by the Dutch, the borough has since developed both commercial and residential prominence. Downtown Flushing has become one of the busiest central core neighborhoods in the outer boroughs. Queens is the site of the Citi Field baseball stadium, home of the New York Mets, and hosts the annual U.S. Open tennis tournament at Flushing Meadows-Corona Park. Additionally, two of the three busiest airports serving the New York metropolitan area, John F. Kennedy International Airport and LaGuardia Airport, are in Queens. The third is Newark Liberty International Airport in Newark, New Jersey.

The Bronx

The Bronx (Bronx County) is both New York City's northernmost borough, and the only one that is mostly on the mainland. It is the location of Yankee Stadium, the baseball park of the New York Yankees, and home to the largest cooperatively-owned housing complex in the United States, Co-op City.[172] It is also home to the Bronx Zoo, the world's largest metropolitan zoo,[173] which spans 265 acres (1.07 km2) and houses more than 6,000 animals.[174] The Bronx is also the birthplace of hip hop music and its associated culture.[175] Pelham Bay Park is the largest park in New York City, at 2,772 acres (1,122 ha).[176]

Staten Island

Staten Island (Richmond County) is the most suburban in character of the five boroughs. Staten Island is connected to Brooklyn by the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, and to Manhattan by way of the free Staten Island Ferry, a daily commuter ferry that provides unobstructed views of the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, and Lower Manhattan. In central Staten Island, the Staten Island Greenbelt spans approximately 2,500 acres (10 km2), including 28 miles (45 km) of walking trails and one of the last undisturbed forests in the city.[177] Designated in 1984 to protect the island's natural lands, the Greenbelt comprises seven city parks.

Architecture

 
The Empire State Building is a solitary icon of New York, defined by its setbacks, Art Deco details, and spire as the world's tallest building from 1931 to 1970.
 
The Chrysler Building, built in 1930, is also a Manhattan icon in the Art Deco style, with ornamental hubcaps and its spire.
 
Landmark 19th-century rowhouses, including brownstones, on tree-lined Kent Street in the Greenpoint Historic District, Brooklyn.

New York has architecturally noteworthy buildings in a wide range of styles and from distinct time periods, from the Dutch Colonial Pieter Claesen Wyckoff House in Brooklyn, the oldest section of which dates to 1656, to the modern One World Trade Center, the skyscraper at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan and the most expensive office tower in the world by construction cost.[179]

Manhattan's skyline, with its many skyscrapers, is universally recognized, and the city has been home to several of the tallest buildings in the world. As of 2019, New York City had 6,455 high-rise buildings, the third most in the world after Hong Kong and Seoul.[180] Of these, as of 2011, 550 completed structures were at least 330 feet (100 m) high, with more than fifty completed skyscrapers taller than 656 feet (200 m). These include the Woolworth Building, an early example of Gothic Revival architecture in skyscraper design, built with massively scaled Gothic detailing; completed in 1913, for 17 years it was the world's tallest building.[181]

The 1916 Zoning Resolution required setbacks in new buildings and restricted towers to a percentage of the lot size, to allow sunlight to reach the streets below.[182] The Art Deco style of the Chrysler Building (1930) and Empire State Building (1931), with their tapered tops and steel spires, reflected the zoning requirements. The buildings have distinctive ornamentation, such as the eagles at the corners of the 61st floor on the Chrysler Building, and are considered some of the finest examples of the Art Deco style.[183] A highly influential example of the international style in the United States is the Seagram Building (1957), distinctive for its façade using visible bronze-toned I-beams to evoke the building's structure. The Condé Nast Building (2000) is a prominent example of green design in American skyscrapers[184] and has received an award from the American Institute of Architects and AIA New York State for its design.

The character of New York's large residential districts is often defined by the elegant brownstone rowhouses and townhouses and shabby tenements that were built during a period of rapid expansion from 1870 to 1930.[185] In contrast, New York City also has neighborhoods that are less densely populated and feature free-standing dwellings. In neighborhoods such as Riverdale (in the Bronx), Ditmas Park (in Brooklyn), and Douglaston (in Queens), large single-family homes are common in various architectural styles such as Tudor Revival and Victorian.[186][187][188]

Stone and brick became the city's building materials of choice after the construction of wood-frame houses was limited in the aftermath of the Great Fire of 1835.[189] A distinctive feature of many of the city's buildings is the roof-mounted wooden water tower. In the 1800s, the city required their installation on buildings higher than six stories to prevent the need for excessively high water pressures at lower elevations, which could break municipal water pipes.[190] Garden apartments became popular during the 1920s in outlying areas, such as Jackson Heights.[191]

According to the United States Geological Survey, an updated analysis of seismic hazard in July 2014 revealed a "slightly lower hazard for tall buildings" in New York City than previously assessed. Scientists estimated this lessened risk based upon a lower likelihood than previously thought of slow shaking near the city, which would be more likely to cause damage to taller structures from an earthquake in the vicinity of the city.[192] Manhattan contained over 500 million square feet of office space as of 2022; the Covid-19 pandemic and hybrid work model have prompted consideration of commercial-to-residential conversion within Midtown Manhattan.[193]

Climate

New York City
Climate chart (explanation)
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
 
 
3.6
 
 
40
28
 
 
3.2
 
 
42
30
 
 
4.3
 
 
50
36
 
 
4.1
 
 
62
46
 
 
4
 
 
71
55
 
 
4.5
 
 
80
64
 
 
4.6
 
 
85
70
 
 
4.6
 
 
83
69
 
 
4.3
 
 
76
62
 
 
4.4
 
 
65
51
 
 
3.6
 
 
54
42
 
 
4.4
 
 
44
34
Average max. and min. temperatures in °F
Precipitation totals in inches
Metric conversion
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
 
 
91
 
 
4
−2
 
 
81
 
 
6
−1
 
 
109
 
 
10
2
 
 
104
 
 
17
8
 
 
102
 
 
22
13
 
 
114
 
 
27
18
 
 
117
 
 
29
21
 
 
117
 
 
28
21
 
 
109
 
 
24
17
 
 
112
 
 
18
11
 
 
91
 
 
12
6
 
 
112
 
 
7
1
Average max. and min. temperatures in °C
Precipitation totals in mm

Under the Köppen climate classification, using the 0 °C (32 °F) isotherm, New York City features a humid subtropical climate (Cfa), and is thus the northernmost major city on the North American continent with this categorization. The suburbs to the immediate north and west lie in the transitional zone between humid subtropical and humid continental climates (Dfa).[194][195] By the Trewartha classification, the city is defined as having an oceanic climate (Do).[196][197] Annually, the city averages 234 days with at least some sunshine.[198] The city lies in the USDA 7b plant hardiness zone.[199]

 
Central Park in Winter by Raymond Speers, in Munsey's Magazine, February 1900

Winters are chilly and damp, and prevailing wind patterns that blow sea breezes offshore temper the moderating effects of the Atlantic Ocean; yet the Atlantic and the partial shielding from colder air by the Appalachian Mountains keep the city warmer in the winter than inland North American cities at similar or lesser latitudes such as Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, and Indianapolis. The daily mean temperature in January, the area's coldest month, is 33.3 °F (0.7 °C).[200] Temperatures usually drop to 10 °F (−12 °C) several times per winter,[201] yet can also reach 60 °F (16 °C) for several days even in the coldest winter month. Spring and autumn are unpredictable and can range from cool to warm, although they are usually mild with low humidity. Summers are typically hot and humid, with a daily mean temperature of 77.5 °F (25.3 °C) in July.[200]

Nighttime temperatures are often enhanced due to the urban heat island effect. Daytime temperatures exceed 90 °F (32 °C) on average of 17 days each summer and in some years exceed 100 °F (38 °C), although this is a rare achievement, last occurring on July 18, 2012.[202] Similarly, readings of 0 °F (−18 °C) are also extremely rare, last occurring on February 14, 2016.[203] Extreme temperatures have ranged from −15 °F (−26 °C), recorded on February 9, 1934, up to 106 °F (41 °C) on July 9, 1936;[200] the coldest recorded wind chill was −37 °F (−38 °C) on the same day as the all-time record low.[204] The record cold daily maximum was 2 °F (−17 °C) on December 30, 1917, while, conversely, the record warm daily minimum was 87 °F (31 °C), on July 2, 1903.[202] The average water temperature of the nearby Atlantic Ocean ranges from 39.7 °F (4.3 °C) in February to 74.1 °F (23.4 °C) in August.[205]

The city receives 49.5 inches (1,260 mm) of precipitation annually, which is relatively evenly spread throughout the year. Average winter snowfall between 1991 and 2020 has been 29.8 inches (76 cm); this varies considerably between years. Hurricanes and tropical storms are rare in the New York area.[206] Hurricane Sandy brought a destructive storm surge to New York City on the evening of October 29, 2012, flooding numerous streets, tunnels, and subway lines in Lower Manhattan and other areas of the city and cutting off electricity in many parts of the city and its suburbs.[207] The storm and its profound impacts have prompted the discussion of constructing seawalls and other coastal barriers around the shorelines of the city and the metropolitan area to minimize the risk of destructive consequences from another such event in the future.[208][209]

The coldest month on record is January 1857, with a mean temperature of 19.6 °F (−6.9 °C) whereas the warmest months on record are July 1825 and July 1999, both with a mean temperature of 81.4 °F (27.4 °C).[210] The warmest years on record are 2012 and 2020, both with mean temperatures of 57.1 °F (13.9 °C). The coldest year is 1836, with a mean temperature of 47.3 °F (8.5 °C).[210][211] The driest month on record is June 1949, with 0.02 inches (0.51 mm) of rainfall. The wettest month was August 2011, with 18.95 inches (481 mm) of rainfall. The driest year on record is 1965, with 26.09 inches (663 mm) of rainfall. The wettest year was 1983, with 80.56 inches (2,046 mm) of rainfall.[212] The snowiest month on record is February 2010, with 36.9 inches (94 cm) of snowfall. The snowiest season (Jul–Jun) on record is 1995–1996, with 75.6 inches (192 cm) of snowfall. The least snowy season was 1972–1973, with 2.3 inches (5.8 cm) of snowfall.[213] The earliest seasonal trace of snowfall occurred on October 10, in both 1979 and 1925. The latest seasonal trace of snowfall occurred on May 9, in both 2020 and 1977.[214]

Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year
Record high °F (°C) 72
(22)
78
(26)
86
(30)
96
(36)
99
(37)
101
(38)
106
(41)
104
(40)
102
(39)
94
(34)
84
(29)
75
(24)
106
(41)
Mean maximum °F (°C) 60.4
(15.8)
60.7
(15.9)
70.3
(21.3)
82.9
(28.3)
88.5
(31.4)
92.1
(33.4)
95.7
(35.4)
93.4
(34.1)
89.0
(31.7)
79.7
(26.5)
70.7
(21.5)
62.9
(17.2)
97.0
(36.1)
Average high °F (°C) 39.5
(4.2)
42.2
(5.7)
49.9
(9.9)
61.8
(16.6)
71.4
(21.9)
79.7
(26.5)
84.9
(29.4)
83.3
(28.5)
76.2
(24.6)
64.5
(18.1)
54.0
(12.2)
44.3
(6.8)
62.6
(17.0)
Daily mean °F (°C) 33.7
(0.9)
35.9
(2.2)
42.8
(6.0)
53.7
(12.1)
63.2
(17.3)
72.0
(22.2)
77.5
(25.3)
76.1
(24.5)
69.2
(20.7)
57.9
(14.4)
48.0
(8.9)
39.1
(3.9)
55.8
(13.2)
Average low °F (°C) 27.9
(−2.3)
29.5
(−1.4)
35.8
(2.1)
45.5
(7.5)
55.0
(12.8)
64.4
(18.0)
70.1
(21.2)
68.9
(20.5)
62.3
(16.8)
51.4
(10.8)
42.0
(5.6)
33.8
(1.0)
48.9
(9.4)
Mean minimum °F (°C) 9.8
(−12.3)
12.7
(−10.7)
19.7
(−6.8)
32.8
(0.4)
43.9
(6.6)
52.7
(11.5)
61.8
(16.6)
60.3
(15.7)
50.2
(10.1)
38.4
(3.6)
27.7
(−2.4)
18.0
(−7.8)
7.7
(−13.5)
Record low °F (°C) −6
(−21)
−15
(−26)
3
(−16)
12
(−11)
32
(0)
44
(7)
52
(11)
50
(10)
39
(4)
28
(−2)
5
(−15)
−13
(−25)
−15
(−26)
Average precipitation inches (mm) 3.64
(92)
3.19
(81)
4.29
(109)
4.09
(104)
3.96
(101)
4.54
(115)
4.60
(117)
4.56
(116)
4.31
(109)
4.38
(111)
3.58
(91)
4.38
(111)
49.52
(1,258)
Average snowfall inches (cm) 8.8
(22)
10.1
(26)
5.0
(13)
0.4
(1.0)
0.0
(0.0)
0.0
(0.0)
0.0
(0.0)
0.0
(0.0)
0.0
(0.0)
0.1
(0.25)
0.5
(1.3)
4.9
(12)
29.8
(76)
Average precipitation days (≥ 0.01 in) 10.8 10.0 11.1 11.4 11.5 11.2 10.5 10.0 8.8 9.5 9.2 11.4 125.4
Average snowy days (≥ 0.1 in) 3.7 3.2 2.0 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.2 2.1 11.4
Average relative humidity (%) 61.5 60.2 58.5 55.3 62.7 65.2 64.2 66.0 67.8 65.6 64.6 64.1 63.0
Average dew point °F (°C) 18.0
(−7.8)
19.0
(−7.2)
25.9
(−3.4)
34.0
(1.1)
47.3
(8.5)
57.4
(14.1)
61.9
(16.6)
62.1
(16.7)
55.6
(13.1)
44.1
(6.7)
34.0
(1.1)
24.6
(−4.1)
40.3
(4.6)
Mean monthly sunshine hours 162.7 163.1 212.5 225.6 256.6 257.3 268.2 268.2 219.3 211.2 151.0 139.0 2,534.7
Percent possible sunshine 54 55 57 57 57 57 59 63 59 61 51 48 57
Average ultraviolet index 2 3 4 6 7 8 8 8 6 4 2 1 5
Source 1: NOAA (relative humidity and sun 1961–1990; dew point 1965–1984)[202][216][198][217]
Source 2: Weather Atlas[218]

See Climate of New York City for additional climate information from the outer boroughs.

Sea temperature data for New York
Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year
Average sea temperature °F (°C) 41.7
(5.4)
39.7
(4.3)
40.2
(4.5)
45.1
(7.3)
52.5
(11.4)
64.5
(18.1)
72.1
(22.3)
74.1
(23.4)
70.1
(21.2)
63.0
(17.2)
54.3
(12.4)
47.2
(8.4)
55.4
(13.0)
Source: Weather Atlas[218]

See or edit raw graph data.

Parks

 
Flushing Meadows–Corona Park was used in both the 1939 and 1964 New York World's Fair, with the Unisphere as the centerpiece of the latter and which remains today.

The city of New York has a complex park system, with various lands operated by the National Park Service, the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, and the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation. In its 2018 ParkScore ranking, The Trust for Public Land reported that the park system in New York City was the ninth-best park system among the fifty most populous U.S. cities.[219] ParkScore ranks urban park systems by a formula that analyzes median park size, park acres as percent of city area, the percent of city residents within a half-mile of a park, spending of park services per resident, and the number of playgrounds per 10,000 residents. In 2021, the New York City Council banned the use of synthetic pesticides by city agencies and instead required organic lawn management. The effort was started by teacher Paula Rogovin's kindergarten class at P.S. 290.[220]

National parks

 
The Statue of Liberty on Liberty Island in New York Harbor is a symbol of the United States and its ideals of freedom, democracy, and opportunity.[23]

Gateway National Recreation Area contains over 26,000 acres (110 km2), most of it in New York City.[221] In Brooklyn and Queens, the park contains over 9,000 acres (36 km2) of salt marsh, wetlands, islands, and water, including most of Jamaica Bay and the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge. Also in Queens, the park includes a significant portion of the western Rockaway Peninsula, most notably Jacob Riis Park and Fort Tilden. In Staten Island, it includes Fort Wadsworth, with historic pre-Civil War era Battery Weed and Fort Tompkins, and Great Kills Park, with beaches, trails, and a marina.

The Statue of Liberty National Monument and Ellis Island Immigration Museum are managed by the National Park Service and are in both New York and New Jersey. They are joined in the harbor by Governors Island National Monument. Historic sites under federal management on Manhattan Island include Stonewall National Monument; Castle Clinton National Monument; Federal Hall National Memorial; Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace National Historic Site; General Grant National Memorial (Grant's Tomb); African Burial Ground National Monument; and Hamilton Grange National Memorial. Hundreds of properties are listed on the National Register of Historic Places or as a National Historic Landmark.

State parks

There are seven state parks within the confines of New York City. Some of them include:

City parks

 
View of The Pond and Midtown Manhattan from the Gapstow Bridge in Central Park, one of the world's most visited tourist attractions, in 2019

New York City has over 28,000 acres (110 km2) of municipal parkland and 14 miles (23 km) of public beaches.[224] The largest municipal park in the city is Pelham Bay Park in the Bronx, with 2,772 acres (1,122 ha).[176][225]

Military installations

Brooklyn is home to Fort Hamilton, the U.S. military's only active duty installation within New York City,[236] aside from Coast Guard operations. The facility was established in 1825 on the site of a small battery used during the American Revolution, and it is one of America's longest serving military forts.[237] Today, Fort Hamilton serves as the headquarters of the North Atlantic Division of the United States Army Corps of Engineers and for the New York City Recruiting Battalion. It also houses the 1179th Transportation Brigade, the 722nd Aeromedical Staging Squadron, and a military entrance processing station. Other formerly active military reservations still used for National Guard and military training or reserve operations in the city include Fort Wadsworth in Staten Island and Fort Totten in Queens.

Demographics

Historical population
YearPop.±%
16984,937—    
17125,840+18.3%
17237,248+24.1%
173710,664+47.1%
174611,717+9.9%
175613,046+11.3%
177121,863+67.6%
179049,401+126.0%
180079,216+60.4%
1810119,734+51.1%
1820152,056+27.0%
1830242,278+59.3%
1840391,114+61.4%
1850696,115+78.0%
18601,174,779+68.8%
18701,478,103+25.8%
18801,911,698+29.3%
18902,507,414+31.2%
19003,437,202+37.1%
19104,766,883+38.7%
19205,620,048+17.9%
19306,930,446+23.3%
19407,454,995+7.6%
19507,891,957+5.9%
19607,781,984−1.4%
19707,894,862+1.5%
19807,071,639−10.4%
19907,322,564+3.5%
20008,008,278+9.4%
20108,175,133+2.1%
20208,804,190+7.7%
Note: Census figures (1790–2010) cover the present area of all five boroughs, before and after the 1898 consolidation. For New York City itself before annexing part of the Bronx in 1874, see Manhattan#Demographics.[238]
Source: U.S. Decennial Census;[239]
1698–1771[240] 1790–1890[238][241]
1900–1990[242] 2000–2010[243][244][245]
2010–2020[246]

New York City is the most populous city in the United States,[250] with 8,804,190 residents[246] incorporating more immigration into the city than outmigration since the 2010 United States census.[251][252] More than twice as many people live in New York City as compared to Los Angeles, the second-most populous U.S. city;[250] and New York has more than three times the population of Chicago, the third-most populous U.S. city. New York City gained more residents between 2010 and 2020 (629,000) than any other U.S. city, and a greater amount than the total sum of the gains over the same decade of the next four largest U.S. cities, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, and Phoenix, Arizona combined.[253][254] New York City's population is about 44% of New York State's population,[255] and about 39% of the population of the New York metropolitan area.[256] The majority of New York City residents in 2020 (5,141,538, or 58.4%) were living on Long Island, in Brooklyn, or in Queens.[257]

Population density

 
Looking down Broadway in Midtown Manhattan. New York City had an estimated population density of 29,302.37 inhabitants per square mile (11,313.71/km2) in 2020, as the most densely populated major U.S. city. Manhattan (New York County) alone was home to 74,870.7 inhabitants per square mile (28,907.7/km2), rendering it the most densely populated municipality in the United States.

In 2020, the city had an estimated population density of 29,302.37 inhabitants per square mile (11,313.71/km2), rendering it the nation's most densely populated of all larger municipalities (those with more than 100,000 residents), with several small cities (of fewer than 100,000) in adjacent Hudson County, New Jersey having greater density, as per the 2010 census.[258] Geographically co-extensive with New York County, the borough of Manhattan's 2017 population density of 72,918 inhabitants per square mile (28,154/km2) makes it the highest of any county in the United States and higher than the density of any individual American city.[259][260][261][262] The next three densest counties in the United States, placing second through fourth, are also New York boroughs: Brooklyn, the Bronx, and Queens respectively.[263]

Race and ethnicity

 
The Spanish Harlem Orchestra. New York City is home to nearly 3 million Latino Americans, the largest Hispanic population of any city outside Latin America and Spain.

The city's population in 2020 was 30.9% White (non-Hispanic), 28.7% Hispanic or Latino, 20.2% Black or African American (non-Hispanic), 15.6% Asian, and 0.2% Native American (non-Hispanic).[264] A total of 3.4% of the non-Hispanic population identified with more than one race. Throughout its history, New York has been a major port of entry for immigrants into the United States. More than 12 million European immigrants were received at Ellis Island between 1892 and 1924.[265] The term "melting pot" was first coined to describe densely populated immigrant neighborhoods on the Lower East Side. By 1900, Germans constituted the largest immigrant group, followed by the Irish, Jews, and Italians.[266] In 1940, Whites represented 92% of the city's population.[249]

Approximately 37% of the city's population is foreign born, and more than half of all children are born to mothers who are immigrants as of 2013.[267][268] In New York, no single country or region of origin dominates.[267] The ten largest sources of foreign-born individuals in the city as of 2011 were the Dominican Republic, China, Mexico, Guyana, Jamaica, Ecuador, Haiti, India, Russia, and Trinidad and Tobago,[269] while the Bangladeshi-born immigrant population has become one of the fastest growing in the city, counting over 74,000 by 2011.[18][270]

Asian Americans in New York City, according to the 2010 census, number more than one million, greater than the combined totals of San Francisco and Los Angeles.[271] New York contains the highest total Asian population of any U.S. city proper.[272] The New York City borough of Queens is home to the state's largest Asian American population and the largest Andean (Colombian, Ecuadorian, Peruvian, and Bolivian) populations in the United States, and is also the most ethnically and linguistically diverse urban area in the world.[273][171]

The Chinese population constitutes the fastest-growing nationality in New York State; multiple satellites of the original Manhattan's Chinatown—home to the highest concentration of Chinese people in the Western Hemisphere,[274][275] as well as in Brooklyn, and around Flushing, Queens, are thriving as traditionally urban enclaves—while also expanding rapidly eastward into suburban Nassau County[276] on Long Island,[277] as the New York metropolitan region and New York State have become the top destinations for new Chinese immigrants, respectively, and large-scale Chinese immigration continues into New York City and surrounding areas,[278][279][280][281][282][283] with the largest metropolitan Chinese diaspora outside Asia,[18][284] including an estimated 812,410 individuals in 2015.[285]

In 2012, 6.3% of New York City was of Chinese ethnicity, with nearly three-fourths living in either Queens or Brooklyn, geographically on Long Island.[286] A community numbering 20,000 Korean-Chinese (Chaoxianzu or Joseonjok) is centered in Flushing, Queens, while New York City is also home to the largest Tibetan population outside China, India, and Nepal, also centered in Queens.[287] Koreans made up 1.2% of the city's population, and Japanese 0.3%. Filipinos were the largest Southeast Asian ethnic group at 0.8%, followed by Vietnamese, who made up 0.2% of New York City's population in 2010. Indians are the largest South Asian group, comprising 2.4% of the city's population, with Bangladeshis and Pakistanis at 0.7% and 0.5%, respectively.[288] Queens is the preferred borough of settlement for Asian Indians, Koreans, Filipinos and Malaysians,[289][278] and other Southeast Asians;[290] while Brooklyn is receiving large numbers of both West Indian and Asian Indian immigrants.

New York City has the largest European and non-Hispanic White population of any American city. At 2.7 million in 2012, New York's non-Hispanic White population is larger than the non-Hispanic White populations of Los Angeles (1.1 million), Chicago (865,000), and Houston (550,000) combined.[291] The non-Hispanic White population was 6.6 million in 1940.[292] The non-Hispanic White population has begun to increase since 2010.[293]

The European diaspora residing in the city is very diverse. According to 2012 census estimates, there were roughly 560,000 Italian Americans, 385,000 Irish Americans, 253,000 German Americans, 223,000 Russian Americans, 201,000 Polish Americans, and 137,000 English Americans. Additionally, Greek and French Americans numbered 65,000 each, with those of Hungarian descent estimated at 60,000 people. Ukrainian and Scottish Americans numbered 55,000 and 35,000, respectively. People identifying ancestry from Spain numbered 30,838 total in 2010.[294]

 
Uzbekistan's president Shavkat Mirziyoyev with members of the Uzbek diaspora in New York City, home to more than half of all Uzbek Americans, most settling in Queens or Brooklyn

People of Norwegian and Swedish descent both stood at about 20,000 each, while people of Czech, Lithuanian, Portuguese, Scotch-Irish, and Welsh descent all numbered between 12,000 and 14,000.[295] Arab Americans number over 160,000 in New York City,[296] with the highest concentration in Brooklyn. Central Asians, primarily Uzbek Americans, are a rapidly growing segment of the city's non-Hispanic White population, enumerating over 30,000, and including more than half of all Central Asian immigrants to the United States,[297] most settling in Queens or Brooklyn. Albanian Americans are most highly concentrated in the Bronx,[298] while Astoria, Queens is the epicenter of American Greek culture as well as the Cypriot community.

The wider New York City metropolitan statistical area, with more than twenty million people, about fifty percent more than second-place Los Angeles,[299] is also ethnically diverse,[300] with the largest foreign-born population of any metropolitan region in the world. The New York region continues to be by far the leading metropolitan gateway for legal immigrants admitted into the United States, substantially exceeding the combined totals of Los Angeles and Miami.[278] It is home to the largest Jewish and Israeli communities outside Israel, with the Jewish population in the region numbering over 1.5 million in 2012 and including many diverse Jewish sects, predominantly from around the Middle East and Eastern Europe, and including a rapidly growing Orthodox Jewish population, also the largest outside Israel.[287]

The metropolitan area is also home to 20% of the nation's Indian Americans and at least 20 Little India enclaves, and 15% of all Korean Americans and four Koreatowns;[301] the largest Asian Indian population in the Western Hemisphere; the largest Russian American,[279] Italian American, and African American populations; the largest Dominican American, Puerto Rican American, and South American[279] and second-largest overall Hispanic population in the United States, numbering 4.8 million;[294] and includes multiple established Chinatowns within New York City alone.[302]

 
Band rehearsal on 125th Street in Harlem, the historic epicenter of African American culture. New York City is home by a significant margin to the world's largest Black population of any city outside Africa, at over 2.2 million. African immigration to New York City has contributed the majority of the Black population growth since 2000.

Ecuador, Colombia, Guyana, Peru, Brazil, and Venezuela are the top source countries from South America for immigrants to the New York City region; the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Haiti, and Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean; Nigeria, Egypt, Ghana, Tanzania, Kenya, and South Africa from Africa; and El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala in Central America.[303] Amidst a resurgence of Puerto Rican migration to New York City, this population had increased to approximately 1.3 million in the metropolitan area as of 2013. In 2022, New York City began receiving thousands of Latino immigrants bused from the state of Texas, mostly originating from Venezuela, Ecuador, Columbia, and Honduras.[304]

Since 2010, Little Australia has emerged and is growing rapidly, representing the Australasian presence in Nolita, Manhattan.[305][306][307][308] In 2011, there were an estimated 20,000 Australian residents of New York City, nearly quadruple the 5,537 in 2005.[309][310] Qantas Airways of Australia and Air New Zealand have been planning for long-haul flights from New York to Sydney and Auckland, which would both rank among the longest non-stop flights in the world.[311] A Little Sri Lanka has developed in the Tompkinsville neighborhood of Staten Island.[312] Le Petit Sénégal, or Little Senegal, is based in Harlem. Richmond Hill, Queens is often thought of as "Little Guyana" for its large Guyanese community,[313] as well as Punjab Avenue (ਪੰਜਾਬ ਐਵੇਨਿਊ), or Little Punjab, for its high concentration of Punjabi people. Little Poland is expanding rapidly in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.

Sexual orientation and gender identity

 
The NYC Dyke March, the world’s largest celebration of lesbian pride and culture[314]
 
Spectators at a BDSM street fair in Lower Manhattan
 
NYC Pride March in Manhattan, the world's largest[29][315]

New York City has been described as the gay capital of the world, and is home to one of the world’s largest LGBTQ populations and the most prominent.[316] The New York metropolitan area is home to about 570,000 self-identifying gay and bisexual people, the largest in the United States.[317][318] Same-sex sexual activity between consenting adults has been legal in New York since the New York v. Onofre case in 1980 which invalidated the state's sodomy law.[319] Same-sex marriages in New York were legalized on June 24, 2011, and were authorized to take place on July 23, 2011.[320] Brian Silverman, the author of Frommer's New York City from $90 a Day, wrote the city has "one of the world's largest, loudest, and most powerful LGBT communities", and "Gay and lesbian culture is as much a part of New York's basic identity as yellow cabs, high-rise buildings, and Broadway theatre".[321] LGBT travel guide Queer in the World states, "The fabulosity of Gay New York is unrivaled on Earth, and queer culture seeps into every corner of its five boroughs".[322] LGBT advocate and entertainer Madonna stated metaphorically, "Anyways, not only is New York City the best place in the world because of the queer people here. Let me tell you something, if you can make it here, then you must be queer."[323]

The annual New York City Pride March (or gay pride parade) proceeds southward down Fifth Avenue and ends at Greenwich Village in Lower Manhattan; the parade is the largest pride parade in the world, attracting tens of thousands of participants and millions of sidewalk spectators each June.[324][29] The annual Queens Pride Parade is held in Jackson Heights and is accompanied by the ensuing Multicultural Parade.[325]

Stonewall 50 – WorldPride NYC 2019 was the largest international Pride celebration in history, produced by Heritage of Pride and enhanced through a partnership with the I NY program's LGBT division, commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, with 150,000 participants and five million spectators attending in Manhattan alone.[326] New York City is also home to the largest transgender population in the world, estimated at more than 50,000 in 2018, concentrated in Manhattan and Queens; however, until the June 1969 Stonewall riots, this community had felt marginalized and neglected by the gay community.[325][129] Brooklyn Liberation March, the largest transgender-rights demonstration in LGBTQ history, took place on June 14, 2020, stretching from Grand Army Plaza to Fort Greene, Brooklyn, focused on supporting Black transgender lives, drawing an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 participants.[327][328]

Religion

Religious affiliation (2014)[329][330]
Christian
59%
Catholic
33%
Protestant
23%
Other Christian
3%
Unaffiliated
24%
Jewish
8%
Muslim
4%
Hindu
2%
Buddhist
1%
Other faiths
1%

Christianity

 
The landmark Neo-Gothic Roman Catholic St. Patrick's Cathedral, Midtown Manhattan

Largely as a result of Western European missionary work and colonialism, Christianity is the largest religion in New York City,[329] which is home to the highest number of churches of any city in the world.[14] Roman Catholicism is the largest Christian denomination (33%), followed by Protestantism (23%), and other Christians (3%). The Roman Catholic population are primarily served by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York and Diocese of Brooklyn. Eastern Catholics are divided into numerous jurisdictions throughout the city. Evangelical Protestantism is the largest branch of Protestantism in the city (9%), followed by Mainline Protestantism (8%), while the converse is usually true for other cities and metropolitan areas.[330] In Evangelicalism, Baptists are the largest group; in Mainline Protestantism, Reformed Protestants compose the largest subset. The majority of historically African American churches are affiliated with the National Baptist Convention (USA) and Progressive National Baptist Convention. The Church of God in Christ is one of the largest predominantly Black Pentecostal denominations in the area. Approximately 1% of the population is Mormon. The Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America and other Orthodox Christians (mainstream and independent) were the largest Eastern Christian groups. The American Orthodox Catholic Church (initially led by Aftimios Ofiesh) was founded in New York City in 1927.

Judaism

 
Ultra-Orthodox Jewish residents in Brooklyn, nicknamed "the most Jewish spot on Earth",[331] and home to the world’s largest Jewish community, which with over 600,000 adherents living in the borough, greater than both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem[332]

Judaism, the second-largest religion practiced in New York City, with approximately 1.6 million adherents as of 2022, represents the largest Jewish community of any city in the world, greater than the combined totals of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.[333][334] Nearly half of the city’s Jews live in Brooklyn.[332][331] The ethno-religious population makes up 18.4% of the city and its religious demographic makes up 8%.[335] The first recorded Jewish settler was Jacob Barsimson, who arrived in August 1654 on a passport from the Dutch West India Company.[336] Following the assassination of Alexander II of Russia, for which many blamed "the Jews", the 36 years beginning in 1881 experienced the largest wave of Jewish immigration to the United States.[337] In 2012, the largest Jewish denominations were Orthodox, Haredi, and Conservative Judaism.[338] Reform Jewish communities are prevalent through the area. Congregation Emanu-El of New York in Manhattan is the largest Reform synagogue in the world.

Islam

 
The Islamic Cultural Center of New York in Upper Manhattan was the first mosque built in New York City.

Islam ranks as the third largest religion in New York City, following Christianity and Judaism, with estimates ranging between 600,000 and 1,000,000 observers of Islam, including 10% of the city's public school children.[339] Given both the size and scale of the city, as well as its relative proxinity and accessibility by air transportation to the Middle East, North Africa, Central Asia, and South Asia, 22.3% of American Muslims live in New York City, with 1.5 million Muslims in the greater New York metropolitan area, representing the largest metropolitan Muslim population in the Western Hemisphere[340]—and the most ethnically diverse Muslim population of any city in the world.[341] Powers Street Mosque in Brooklyn is one of the oldest continuously operating mosques in the U.S., and represents the first Islamic organization in both the city and the state of New York.[342][343]

Hinduism and other religious affiliations

Following these three largest religious groups in New York City are Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Zoroastrianism, and a variety of other religions, as well as atheism. In 2014, 24% of New Yorkers identified with no organized religious affiliation; a little over 3% of New Yorkers were atheist.[329]

Wealth and income disparity

New York City, like other large cities, has a high degree of income disparity, as indicated by its Gini coefficient of 0.55 as of 2017.[344] In the first quarter of 2014, the average weekly wage in New York County (Manhattan) was $2,749, representing the highest total among large counties in the United States.[345] As of 2017, New York City was home to the highest number of billionaires of any city in the world at 103,[346] including former Mayor Michael Bloomberg.[347] New York also had the highest density of millionaires per capita among major U.S. cities in 2014, at 4.6% of residents.[348] New York City is one of the relatively few American cities levying an income tax (about 3%) on its residents.[349][350][351] As of 2018, there were 78,676 homeless people in New York City.[352]

Economy

Top publicly traded companies in New York City

(ranked by 2015 revenues) with city and US ranks

NYC Corporation US
1 Verizon Communications 13
2 JPMorgan Chase 23
3 Citigroup 29
4 MetLife 40
5 American International Group 49
6 Pfizer (pharmaceuticals) 55
7 New York Life 61
8 Goldman Sachs 74
9 Morgan Stanley 78
10 TIAA (Teachers Ins. & Annuity) 82
11 INTL FCStone 83
12 American Express 85
Every firm's revenue exceeded $30 billion.
Financial services firms in green
Full table at Economy of New York City
Source: Fortune 500[353]

New York City is a global hub of business and commerce and an established safe haven for global investors,[354] and is sometimes described as the capital of the world.[355] The term global city was popularized by sociologist Saskia Sassen in her 1991 work, The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo.[356] New York is a center for worldwide banking and finance, health care and life sciences,[10] medical technology and research, retailing, world trade, transportation, tourism, real estate, new media, traditional media, advertising, legal services, accountancy, insurance, both musical and prose theater, fashion, and the arts in the United States; while Silicon Alley, metonymous for New York's broad-spectrum high technology sphere, continues to expand. The Port of New York and New Jersey is a major economic engine, handling a maritime cargo volume in the ten months through October 2022 of over 8.2 million TEUs, benefitting post-Panamax from the expansion of the Panama Canal, and accelerating ahead of California seaports in monthly cargo volumes.[357][358]

Many Fortune 500 corporations are headquartered in New York City,[359] as are a large number of multinational corporations. New York City has been ranked first among cities across the globe in attracting capital, business, and tourists.[360][361] New York City's role as the top global center for the advertising industry is metonymously reflected as Madison Avenue.[362] The city's fashion industry provides approximately 180,000 employees with $11 billion in annual wages.[363] The non-profit Partnership for New York City, currently headed by Kathryn Wylde, is the city's pre-eminent private business association, comprising approximately 330 corporate leaders in membership. The fashion industry is based in Midtown Manhattan and is represented by the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CDFA), headquartered in Lower Manhattan.

Significant economic sectors also include non-profit institutions, and universities. Manufacturing declined over the 20th century but still accounts for significant employment. particularly in smaller operations. The city's apparel and garment industry, historically centered on the Garment District in Manhattan, peaked in 1950, when more than 323,000 workers were employed in the industry in New York. In 2015, fewer than 23,000 New York City residents were employed in the manufacture of garments, accessories, and finished textiles, although efforts to revive the industry were underway,[364] and the American fashion industry continues to be metonymized as Seventh Avenue.[365]

Chocolate is New York City's leading specialty-food export, with up to $234 million worth of exports each year.[366] Godiva, one of the world's largest chocolatiers, is headquartered in Manhattan,[367] and an unofficial chocolate district in Brooklyn is home to several chocolate makers and retailers.[368] Food processing is a $5 billion industry that employs more than 19,000 residents.

Wall Street

 

New York City's most important economic sector lies in its role as the headquarters for the U.S. financial industry, metonymously known as Wall Street. The city's securities industry continues to form the largest segment of the city's financial sector and is an important economic engine. Many large financial companies are headquartered in New York City, and the city is also home to a burgeoning number of financial startup companies.

Lower Manhattan is home to the New York Stock Exchange, at 11 Wall Street, and the Nasdaq, at 165 Broadway, representing the world's largest and second largest stock exchanges, respectively, when measured both by overall average daily trading volume and by total market capitalization of their listed companies in 2013.[370][371] Investment banking fees on Wall Street totaled approximately $40 billion in 2012,[372] while in 2013, senior New York City bank officers who manage risk and compliance functions earned as much as $324,000 annually.[373] In fiscal year 2013–14, Wall Street's securities industry generated 19% of New York State's tax revenue.[374]

New York City remains the largest global center for trading in public equity and debt capital markets, driven in part by the size and financial development of the U.S. economy.[375]: 31–32 [376] New York also leads in hedge fund management; private equity; and the monetary volume of mergers and acquisitions. Several investment banks and investment managers headquartered in Manhattan are important participants in other global financial centers.[375]: 34–35  New York is also the principal commercial banking center of the United States.[377]

Many of the world's largest media conglomerates are also based in the city. Manhattan contained over 500 million square feet (46.5 million m2) of office space in 2018,[378] making it the largest office market in the United States,[379] while Midtown Manhattan, with 400 million square feet (37.2 million m2) in 2018,[378] is the largest central business district in the world.[380]

Tech and biotech

Silicon Alley, centered in New York, has evolved into a metonym for the sphere encompassing the metropolitan region's high technology industries[381] involving the internet, new media, financial technology (fintech) and cryptocurrency, telecommunications, digital media, software development, biotechnology, game design, and other fields within information technology that are supported by its entrepreneurship ecosystem and venture capital investments.

High technology startup companies and employment are growing in New York City and the region. The technology sector has been claiming a greater share of New York City's economy since 2010.[382] Tech:NYC, founded in 2016, is a non-profit organization which represents New York City's technology industry with government, civic institutions, in business, and in the media, and whose primary goals are to further augment New York's substantial tech talent base and to advocate for policies that will nurture tech companies to grow in the city.[383]

The biotechnology sector is also growing in New York City, based upon the city's strength in academic scientific research and public and commercial financial support. On December 19, 2011, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced his choice of Cornell University and Technion-Israel Institute of Technology to build a $2 billion graduate school of applied sciences called Cornell Tech on Roosevelt Island with the goal of transforming New York City into the world's premier technology capital.[384][385] By mid-2014, Accelerator, a biotech investment firm, had raised more than $30 million from investors, including Eli Lilly and Company, Pfizer, and Johnson & Johnson, for initial funding to create biotechnology startups at the Alexandria Center for Life Science, which encompasses more than 700,000 square feet (65,000 m2) on East 29th Street and promotes collaboration among scientists and entrepreneurs at the center and with nearby academic, medical, and research institutions. The New York City Economic Development Corporation's Early Stage Life Sciences Funding Initiative and venture capital partners, including Celgene, General Electric Ventures, and Eli Lilly, committed a minimum of $100 million to help launch 15 to 20 ventures in life sciences and biotechnology.[386]

Real estate

Real estate is a major force in the city's economy, as the total value of all New York City property was assessed at US$1.072 trillion for the 2017 fiscal year, an increase of 10.6% from the previous year, with 89% of the increase coming from market effects.[387] The Deutsche Bank Center is the property with the highest-listed market value in the city, at $1.1 billion in 2006.[387] New York City is home to some of the nation's—and the world's—most valuable real estate. 450 Park Avenue was sold on July 2, 2007, for $510 million, about $1,589 per square foot ($17,104/m2), breaking the barely month-old record for an American office building of $1,476 per square foot ($15,887/m2) set in the June 2007 sale of 660 Madison Avenue.[388]

In 2014, Manhattan was home to six of the top ten ZIP codes in the United States by median housing price.[389] Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan commands the highest retail rents in the world, at $3,000 per square foot ($32,000/m2) in 2017.[390] In 2019, the most expensive home sale ever in the United States achieved completion in Manhattan, at a selling price of $238 million, for a 24,000 square feet (2,200 m2) penthouse apartment overlooking Central Park.[391] In 2022, one-bedroom apartments in Manhattan rented at a median monthly price of US$3,600.00, one of the world's highest.

Tourism

 
Times Square is the hub of the Broadway theater district and a media center. It also has one of the highest annual attendance rates of any tourist attraction in the world, estimated at 50 million.[30]

Tourism is a vital industry for New York City, and NYC & Company represents the city's official bureau of tourism. New York has witnessed a growing combined volume of international and domestic tourists, reflecting over 60 million visitors to the city per year, the world's busiest tourist destination.[14] Approximately 12 million visitors to New York City have been from outside the United States, with the highest numbers from the United Kingdom, Canada, Brazil, and China. Multiple sources have called New York the most photographed city in the world.[392][393][394]

 
The I Love New York logo, designed by Milton Glaser in 1977

I Love New York (stylized I NY) is both a logo and a song that are the basis of an advertising campaign and have been used since 1977 to promote tourism in New York City,[395] and later to promote New York State as well. The trademarked logo, owned by New York State Empire State Development,[396] appears in souvenir shops and brochures throughout the city and state, some licensed, many not. The song is the state song of New York.

The majority of the most high-profile tourist destinations to the city are situated in Manhattan. These include Times Square; Broadway theater productions; the Empire State Building; the Statue of Liberty; Ellis Island; the United Nations headquarters; the World Trade Center (including the National September 11 Museum and One World Trade Center); the art museums along Museum Mile; green spaces such as Central Park, Washington Square Park, the High Line, and the medieval gardens of The Cloisters; the Stonewall Inn; Rockefeller Center; ethnic enclaves including the Manhattan Chinatown, Koreatown, Curry Hill, Harlem, Spanish Harlem, Little Italy, and Little Australia; luxury shopping along Fifth and Madison Avenues; and events such as the Halloween Parade in Greenwich Village; the Brooklyn Bridge (shared with Brooklyn); the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade; the lighting of the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree; the St. Patrick's Day Parade; seasonal activities such as ice skating in Central Park in the wintertime; the Tribeca Film Festival; and free performances in Central Park at SummerStage.[397]

Points of interest have also developed in the city outside Manhattan and have made the outer boroughs tourist destinations in their own right. These include numerous ethnic enclaves; the Unisphere, Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, and Downtown Flushing in Queens; Downtown Brooklyn, Coney Island, Williamsburg, Park Slope, and Prospect Park in Brooklyn; the Bronx Zoo, the New York Botanical Garden, and the Grand Concourse in the Bronx; and the Staten Island Ferry shuttling passengers between Staten Island and the South Ferry Terminal bordering Battery Park in Lower Manhattan, at the historical birthplace of New York City.

Media and entertainment

New York City has been described as the entertainment[14][398][399] and digital media capital of the world.[400][401] The city is a prominent location for the American entertainment industry, with many films, television series, books, and other media being set there.[402] As of 2019, New York City was the second-largest center for filmmaking and television production in the United States, producing about 200 feature films annually, employing 130,000 individuals. The filmed entertainment industry has been growing in New York, contributing nearly $9 billion to the New York City economy alone as of 2015.[403] By volume, New York is the world leader in independent film production—one-third of all American independent films are produced there.[404][405] The Association of Independent Commercial Producers is also based in New York.[406] In the first five months of 2014 alone, location filming for television pilots in New York City exceeded the record production levels for all of 2013,[407] with New York surpassing Los Angeles as the top North American city for the same distinction during the 2013–2014 cycle.[408]

New York City is the center for the advertising, music, newspaper, digital media, and publishing industries and is also the largest media market in North America.[409] Some of the city's media conglomerates and institutions include Warner Bros. Discovery, the Thomson Reuters Corporation, the Associated Press, Bloomberg L.P., the News Corp, The New York Times Company, NBCUniversal, the Hearst Corporation, AOL, Fox Corporation, and Paramount Global. Seven of the world's top eight global advertising agency networks have their headquarters in New York.[410] Two of the top three record labels' headquarters are in New York: Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group. Universal Music Group also has offices in New York. New media enterprises are contributing an increasingly important component to the city's central role in the media sphere.

More than 200 newspapers and 350 consumer magazines have an office in the city,[405] and the publishing industry employs about 25,000 people.[411] Two of the three national daily newspapers with the largest circulations in the United States are published in New York: The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times (NYT). Nicknamed "the Grey Lady", the NYT has won the most Pulitzer Prizes for journalism and is considered the U.S. media's "newspaper of record".[28] Tabloid newspapers in the city include The New York Daily News, which was founded in 1919 by Joseph Medill Patterson,[412] and The New York Post, founded in 1801 by Alexander Hamilton.[413] The city also has a comprehensive ethnic press, with 270 newspapers and magazines published in more than 40 languages.[414] El Diario La Prensa is New York's largest Spanish-language daily and the oldest in the nation.[415] The New York Amsterdam News, published in Harlem, is a prominent African American newspaper. The Village Voice, historically the largest alternative newspaper in the United States, announced in 2017 that it would cease publication of its print edition and convert to a fully digital venture.[416] The television and radio industry developed in New York and is a significant employer in the city's economy. The three major American broadcast networks are all headquartered in New York: ABC, CBS, and NBC. Many cable networks are based in the city as well, including CNN, MSNBC, MTV, Fox News, HBO, Showtime, Bravo, Food Network, AMC, and Comedy Central. News 12 Networks operated News 12 The Bronx and News 12 Brooklyn. WBAI, with news and information programming, is one of the few socialist radio stations operating in the United States.

New York is also a major center for non-commercial educational media. NYC Media is the official public radio, television, and online media network and broadcasting service of New York City,[417] and this network has produced several original Emmy Award-winning shows covering music and culture in city neighborhoods and city government. The oldest public-access television channel in the United States is the Manhattan Neighborhood Network, founded in 1971.[418] WNET is the city's major public television station and a primary source of national Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) television programming. WNYC, a public radio station owned by the city until 1997, has the largest public radio audience in the United States.[419]

Education

New York City has the largest educational system of any city in the world.[14] The city’s educational infrastructure spans primary education, secondary education, higher education, and research.

Primary and secondary education

The New York City Public Schools system, managed by the New York City Department of Education, is the largest public school system in the United States, serving about 1.1 million students in more than 1,700 separate primary and secondary schools.[420] The city's public school system includes nine specialized high schools to serve academically and artistically gifted students. The city government pays the Pelham Public Schools to educate a very small, detached section of the Bronx.[421]

The New York City Charter School Center assists the setup of new charter schools.[422] There are approximately 900 additional privately run secular and religious schools in the city.[423]

Higher education and research

 
Butler Library at Columbia University, described as one of the most beautiful college libraries in the United States[424]
 
The Washington Square Arch, an unofficial icon of both New York University (NYU) and its Greenwich Village neighborhood

More than a million students, the highest number of any city in the United States,[425] are enrolled in New York City's more than 120 higher education institutions, with more than half a million in the City University of New York (CUNY) system alone as of 2020, including both degree and professional programs.[426] According to Academic Ranking of World Universities, New York City has, on average, the best higher education institutions of any global city.[427]

The public CUNY system is one of the largest universities in the nation, comprising 25 institutions across all five boroughs: senior colleges, community colleges, and other graduate/professional schools. The public State University of New York (SUNY) system includes campuses in New York City, including Downstate Health Sciences University, Fashion Institute of Technology, Maritime College, and the College of Optometry.

New York City is home to such notable private universities as Barnard College, Columbia University, Cooper Union, Fordham University, New York University, New York Institute of Technology, Rockefeller University, and Yeshiva University; several of these universities are ranked among the top universities in the world,[428][429] while some of the world's most prestigious institutions like Princeton University and Yale University remain in the New York metropolitan area.

The city also hosts other smaller private colleges and universities, including many religious and special-purpose institutions, such as Pace University, St. John's University, The Juilliard School, Manhattan College, Adelphi University - Manhattan, Mercy College (New York), The College of Mount Saint Vincent, Parsons School of Design, The New School, Pratt Institute, New York Film Academy, The School of Visual Arts, The King's College, Marymount Manhattan College, and Wagner College.

Much of the scientific research in the city is done in medicine and the life sciences. In 2019, the New York metropolitan area ranked first on the list of cities and metropolitan areas by share of published articles in life sciences.[430] New York City has the most postgraduate life sciences degrees awarded annually in the United States, and in 2012, 43,523 licensed physicians were practicing in New York City.[431] There are 127 Nobel laureates with roots in local institutions as of 2004.[432]

Major biomedical research institutions include Memorial Sloan–Kettering Cancer Center, Rockefeller University, SUNY Downstate Medical Center, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, and Weill Cornell Medical College, being joined by the Cornell University/Technion-Israel Institute of Technology venture on Roosevelt Island. The graduates of SUNY Maritime College in the Bronx earned the highest average annual salary of any university graduates in the United States, $144,000 as of 2017.[433]

Human resources

Public health

 
New York-Presbyterian Hospital, affiliated with Columbia University and Cornell University, the largest hospital and largest private employer in New York City and one of the world's busiest[434]

The New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation (HHC) operates the public hospitals and outpatient clinics in New York City. A public benefit corporation with As of 2021, HHC is the largest municipal healthcare system in the United States with $10.9 billion in annual revenues,[435] HHC is the largest municipal healthcare system in the United States serving 1.4 million patients, including more than 475,000 uninsured city residents.[436] HHC was created in 1969 by the New York State Legislature as a public benefit corporation (Chapter 1016 of the Laws 1969).[437] HHC operates 11 acute care hospitals, five nursing homes, six diagnostic and treatment centers, and more than 70 community-based primary care sites, serving primarily the poor and working class. HHC's MetroPlus Health Plan is one of the New York area's largest providers of government-sponsored health insurance and is the plan of choice for nearly half a million New Yorkers.[438]

HHC's facilities annually provide millions of New Yorkers services interpreted in more than 190 languages.[439] The most well-known hospital in the HHC system is Bellevue Hospital, the oldest public hospital in the United States. Bellevue is the designated hospital for treatment of the President of the United States and other world leaders if they become sick or injured while in New York City.[440] The president of HHC is Ramanathan Raju, MD, a surgeon and former CEO of the Cook County health system in Illinois.[441] In August 2017, Mayor Bill de Blasio signed legislation outlawing pharmacies from selling cigarettes once their existing licenses to do so expired, beginning in 2018.[442]

Public safety

Police and law enforcement

 
The New York Police Department (NYPD) is the largest police force in the United States.

The New York Police Department (NYPD) has been the largest police force in the United States by a significant margin, with more than 35,000 sworn officers.[443] Members of the NYPD are frequently referred to by politicians, the media, and their own police cars by the nickname, New York's Finest.

Crime overall has trended downward in New York City since the 1990s.[444] In 2012, the NYPD came under scrutiny for its use of a stop-and-frisk program,[445][446][447] which has undergone several policy revisions since then. In 2014, New York City had the third-lowest murder rate among the largest U.S. cities,[448] having become significantly safer after a spike in crime in the 1970s through 1990s.[449] Violent crime in New York City decreased more than 75% from 1993 to 2005, and continued decreasing during periods when the nation as a whole saw increases.[450] By 2002, New York City was ranked 197th in crime among the 216 U.S. cities with populations greater than 100,000.[450] In 1992, the city recorded 2,245 murders.[451] In 2005, the homicide rate was at its lowest level since 1966,[452] and in 2009, the city recorded fewer than 461 homicides for the first time ever since crime statistics were first published in 1963.[451] In 2017, 60.1% of violent crime suspects were Black, 29.6% Hispanic, 6.5% White, 3.6% Asian and 0.2% American Indian.[453] New York City experienced 292 homicides in 2017.[454]

 
Police officers of New York Police Department (NYPD)

Sociologists and criminologists have not reached consensus on the explanation for the dramatic long-term decrease in the city's crime rate. Some attribute the phenomenon to new tactics used by the NYPD,[455] including its use of CompStat and the broken windows theory.[456] Others cite the end of the crack epidemic and demographic changes,[457] including from immigration.[458] Another theory is that widespread exposure to lead pollution from automobile exhaust, which can lower intelligence and increase aggression levels, incited the initial crime wave in the mid-20th century, most acutely affecting heavily trafficked cities like New York. A strong correlation was found demonstrating that violent crime rates in New York and other big cities began to fall after lead was removed from American gasoline in the 1970s.[459] Another theory cited to explain New York City's falling homicide rate is the inverse correlation between the number of murders and the increasingly wet climate in the city.[460]

Organized crime has long been associated with New York City, beginning with the Forty Thieves and the Roach Guards in the Five Points neighborhood in the 1820s, followed by the Tongs in the same neighborhood, which ultimately evolved into Chinatown, Manhattan. The 20th century saw a rise in the Mafia, dominated by the Five Families, as well as in gangs, including the Black Spades.[461] The Mafia and gang presence has declined in the city in the 21st century.[462][463]

Firefighting

 
The Fire Department of New York (FDNY) is the largest municipal fire department in the United States.

The Fire Department of New York (FDNY) provides fire protection, technical rescue, primary response to biological, chemical, and radioactive hazards, and emergency medical services for the five boroughs of New York City. The FDNY is the largest municipal fire department in the United States and the second largest in the world after the Tokyo Fire Department. The FDNY employs approximately 11,080 uniformed firefighters and more than 3,300 uniformed EMTs and paramedics. The FDNY's motto is New York's Bravest.

The fire department faces multifaceted firefighting challenges in many ways unique to New York. In addition to responding to building types that range from wood-frame single family homes to high-rise structures, the FDNY also responds to fires that occur in the New York City Subway.[464] Secluded bridges and tunnels, as well as large parks and wooded areas that can give rise to brush fires, also present challenges.

The FDNY is headquartered at 9 MetroTech Center in Downtown Brooklyn,[465] and the FDNY Fire Academy is on the Randalls Island.[466] There are three Bureau of Fire Communications alarm offices which receive and dispatch alarms to appropriate units. One office, at 11 Metrotech Center in Brooklyn, houses Manhattan/Citywide, Brooklyn, and Staten Island Fire Communications; the Bronx and Queens offices are in separate buildings.

Public library system

 
The Stephen A. Schwarzman Headquarters Building of the New York Public Library, at 5th Avenue and 42nd Street

The New York Public Library (NYPL), which has the largest collection of any public library system in the United States, serves Manhattan, the Bronx, and Staten Island.[467] Queens is served by the Queens Borough Public Library (QPL), the nation's second-largest public library system, while the Brooklyn Public Library (BPL) serves Brooklyn.[467]

In 2013, the New York Public Library and the Brooklyn Public Library announced that they would merge their technical services departments into a new department called BookOps. This proposed merger anticipated a savings of $2 million for the Brooklyn Public Library and $1.5 million for the New York Public Library. Although not currently part of the merger, it is expected that the Queens Public Library will eventually share some resources with the other city libraries.[468][469]

Culture and contemporary life

New York City has been described as the cultural capital of the world by Manhattan's Baruch College.[470] A book containing a series of essays titled New York, Culture Capital of the World, 1940–1965 has also been published as showcased by the National Library of Australia.[471] In describing New York, author Tom Wolfe said, "Culture just seems to be in the air, like part of the weather."[472]

Numerous major American cultural movements began in the city, such as the Harlem Renaissance, which established the African-American literary canon in the United States.[473][474] The city became the center of stand-up comedy in the early 20th century, jazz[475] in the 1940s, abstract expressionism in the 1950s, and the birthplace of hip-hop in the 1970s.[476] The city's punk[477] and hardcore[478] scenes were influential in the 1970s and 1980s. New York has long had a flourishing scene for Jewish American literature.

The city is the birthplace of many cultural movements, including the Harlem Renaissance in literature and visual art; abstract expressionism (also known as the New York School) in painting; and hip-hop,[175] punk, salsa, freestyle, Tin Pan Alley, certain forms of jazz, and (along with Philadelphia) disco in music. New York City has been considered the dance capital of the world.[479][480] The city is also frequently the setting for novels, movies (see List of films set in New York City), and television programs. New York Fashion Week is one of the world's preeminent fashion events and is afforded extensive coverage by the media.[481][482] New York has also frequently been ranked the top fashion capital of the world on the annual list compiled by the Global Language Monitor.[483]

Pace

 
The fast-paced streets of New York City, January 2020

One of the most common traits attributed to New York City is its fast pace,[484][485][486] which spawned the term New York minute.[487] Journalist Walt Whitman characterized New York's streets as being traversed by "hurrying, feverish, electric crowds".[486]

Arts

New York City has more than 2,000 arts and cultural organizations and more than 500 art galleries.[488] The city government funds the arts with a larger annual budget than the National Endowment for the Arts.[488] Wealthy business magnates in the 19th century built a network of major cultural institutions, such as Carnegie Hall and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which have become internationally renowned. The advent of electric lighting led to elaborate theater productions, and in the 1880s, New York City theaters on Broadway and along 42nd Street began featuring a new stage form that became known as the Broadway musical. Strongly influenced by the city's immigrants, productions such as those of Harrigan and Hart, George M. Cohan, and others used song in narratives that often reflected themes of hope and ambition. New York City itself is the subject or background of many plays and musicals.

Performing arts

Broadway theatre is one of the premier forms of English-language theatre in the world, named after Broadway, the major thoroughfare that crosses Times Square,[489] also sometimes referred to as "The Great White Way".[490][491][492] Forty-one venues in Midtown Manhattan's Theatre District, each with at least 500 seats, are classified as Broadway theatres. According to The Broadway League, Broadway shows sold approximately $1.27 billion worth of tickets in the 2013–2014 season, an 11.4% increase from $1.139 billion in the 2012–2013 season. Attendance in 2013–2014 stood at 12.21 million, representing a 5.5% increase from the 2012–2013 season's 11.57 million.[493] Performance artists displaying diverse skills are ubiquitous on the streets of Manhattan.

Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, anchoring Lincoln Square on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, is home to numerous influential arts organizations, including the Metropolitan Opera, New York City Opera, New York Philharmonic, and New York City Ballet, as well as the Vivian Beaumont Theater, the Juilliard School, Jazz at Lincoln Center, and Alice Tully Hall. The Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute is in Union Square, and Tisch School of the Arts is based at New York University, while Central Park SummerStage presents free music concerts in Central Park.[494]

 
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, part of Museum Mile, is one of the largest museums in the world.[495]

Visual arts

New York City is home to hundreds of cultural institutions and historic sites. Museum Mile is the name for a section of Fifth Avenue running from 82nd to 105th streets on the Upper East Side of Manhattan,[496] in an area sometimes called Upper Carnegie Hill.[497] Nine museums occupy the length of this section of Fifth Avenue, making it one of the densest displays of culture in the world.[498] Its art museums include the Guggenheim, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Neue Galerie New York, and The Africa Center, which opened in late 2012. In addition to other programming, the museums collaborate for the annual Museum Mile Festival, held each year in June, to promote the museums and increase visitation.[499] Many of the world's most lucrative art auctions are held in New York City.[500][501]

Cuisine

 
Smorgasburg opened in 2011 as an open-air food market and is part of the Brooklyn Flea.[502]

New York City's food culture includes an array of international cuisines influenced by the city's immigrant history. Central and Eastern European immigrants, especially Jewish immigrants from those regions, brought bagels, cheesecake, hot dogs, knishes, and delicatessens (or delis) to the city. Italian immigrants brought New York-style pizza and Italian cuisine into the city, while Jewish immigrants and Irish immigrants brought pastrami[503] and corned beef,[504] respectively. Chinese and other Asian restaurants, sandwich joints, trattorias, diners, and coffeehouses are ubiquitous throughout the city. Some 4,000 mobile food vendors licensed by the city, many immigrant-owned, have made Middle Eastern foods such as falafel and kebabs[505] examples of modern New York street food. The city is home to "nearly one thousand of the finest and most diverse haute cuisine restaurants in the world", according to Michelin.[506] The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene assigns letter grades to the city's restaurants based upon their inspection results.[507] As of 2019, there were 27,043 restaurants in the city, up from 24,865 in 2017.[508] The Queens Night Market in Flushing Meadows–Corona Park attracts more than ten thousand people nightly to sample food from more than 85 countries.[509]

Parades

 
The annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, the world's largest parade[510]
 
The annual Halloween Parade in Greenwich Village, the world's largest Halloween parade, with its roots in New York’s queer community[511]

New York City is well known for its street parades, which celebrate a broad array of themes, including holidays, nationalities, human rights, and major league sports team championship victories. The majority of parades are held in Manhattan. The primary orientation of the annual street parades is typically from north to south, marching along major avenues. The annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade is the world's largest parade,[510] beginning alongside Central Park and processing southward to the flagship Macy's Herald Square store;[512] the parade is viewed on telecasts worldwide and draws millions of spectators in person.[510] Other notable parades including the annual New York City St. Patrick's Day Parade in March, the LGBT Pride March in June, the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade in October, and numerous parades commemorating the independence days of many nations. Ticker-tape parades celebrating championships won by sports teams as well as other heroic accomplishments march northward along the Canyon of Heroes on Broadway from Bowling Green to City Hall Park in Lower Manhattan.

Accent and dialect

The New York area is home to a distinctive regional accent and speech pattern called the New York dialect, alternatively known as Brooklynese or New Yorkese. It has generally been considered one of the most recognizable accents within American English.[513]

The traditional New York area speech pattern is known for its rapid delivery, and its accent is characterized as non-rhotic so that the sound [ɹ] does not appear at the end of a syllable or immediately before a consonant; therefore the pronunciation of the city name as "New Yawk."[514] There is no [ɹ] in words like park [pɑək] or [pɒək] (with vowel backed and diphthongized due to the low-back chain shift), butter [bʌɾə], or here [hiə]. In another feature called the low back chain shift, the [ɔ] vowel sound of words like talk, law, cross, chocolate, and coffee and the often homophonous [ɔr] in core and more are tensed and usually raised more than in General American English. In the most old-fashioned and extreme versions of the New York dialect, the vowel sounds of words like "girl" and of words like "oil" became a diphthong [ɜɪ]. This is often misperceived by speakers of other accents as a reversal of the er and oy sounds, so that girl is pronounced "goil" and oil is pronounced "erl"; this leads to the caricature of New Yorkers saying things like "Joizey" (Jersey), "Toidy-Toid Street" (33rd St.) and "terlet" (toilet).[514] The character Archie Bunker from the 1970s television sitcom All in the Family was an example of this pattern of speech.

The classic version of the New York City dialect is generally centered on middle and working-class New Yorkers. The influx of non-European immigrants in recent decades has led to changes in this distinctive dialect,[514] and the traditional form of this speech pattern is no longer as prevalent among general New Yorkers as it has been in the past.[514]

Sports

 
The New York Marathon is the largest marathon in the world.[515]
 
The U.S. Open Tennis Championships are held every August and September in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, Queens.
 
Citi Field, also in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, has been home to the New York Mets since 2009.

New York City is home to the headquarters of the National Football League,[516] Major League Baseball,[517] the National Basketball Association,[518] the National Hockey League,[519] and Major League Soccer.[520] The New York metropolitan area hosts the most sports teams in the first four major North American professional sports leagues with nine, one more than Los Angeles, and has 11 top-level professional sports teams if Major League Soccer is included, also one more than Los Angeles. Participation in professional sports in the city predates all professional leagues.

The city has played host to more than forty major professional teams in the five sports and their respective competing leagues. Four of the ten most expensive stadiums ever built worldwide (MetLife Stadium, the new Yankee Stadium, Madison Square Garden, and Citi Field) are in the New York metropolitan area.[521] Madison Square Garden, its predecessor, the original Yankee Stadium and Ebbets Field, are sporting venues in New York City, the latter two having been commemorated on U.S. postage stamps. New York was the first of eight American cities to have won titles in all four major leagues (MLB, NHL, NFL and NBA), having done so following the Knicks' 1970 title. In 1972, it became the first city to win titles in five sports when the Cosmos won the NASL final.

New York has been described as the "Capital of Baseball".[522] There have been 35 Major League Baseball World Series and 73 pennants won by New York teams. It is one of only five metro areas (Los Angeles, Chicago, Baltimore–Washington, and the San Francisco Bay Area being the others) to have two baseball teams. Additionally, there have been 14 World Series in which two New York City teams played each other, known as a Subway Series and occurring most recently in 2000. No other metropolitan area has had this happen more than once (Chicago in 1906, St. Louis in 1944, and the San Francisco Bay Area in 1989).

The city's two Major League Baseball teams are the New York Mets, who play at Citi Field in Queens,[523] and the New York Yankees, who play at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. These teams compete in six games of interleague play every regular season that has also come to be called the Subway Series. The Yankees have won a record 27 championships,[524] while the Mets have won the World Series twice.[525] The city also was once home to the Brooklyn Dodgers (now the Los Angeles Dodgers), who won the World Series once,[526] and the New York Giants (now the San Francisco Giants), who won the World Series five times. Both teams moved to California in 1958.[527] There is also one Minor League Baseball team in the city, the Mets-affiliated Brooklyn Cyclones,[528] and the city will gain a club in the independent Atlantic League when the Staten Island FerryHawks begin play in 2022.[529]

The city is represented in the National Football League by the New York Giants and the New York Jets, although both teams play their home games at MetLife Stadium in nearby East Rutherford, New Jersey,[530] which hosted Super Bowl XLVIII in 2014.[531]

The metropolitan area is home to three National Hockey League teams. The New York Rangers, the traditional representative of the city itself and one of the league's Original Six, play at Madison Square Garden in Manhattan. The New York Islanders, traditionally representing Nassau and Suffolk Counties of Long Island, play in UBS Arena in Elmont, New York, and played in Brooklyn's Barclays Center from 2015 to 2020. The New Jersey Devils play at Prudential Center in nearby Newark, New Jersey and traditionally represent the counties of neighboring New Jersey which are coextensive with the boundaries of the New York metropolitan area and media market.

The city's National Basketball Association teams are the Brooklyn Nets (previously known as the New York Nets and New Jersey Nets as they moved around the metropolitan area) and the New York Knicks, while the New York Liberty is the city's Women's National Basketball Association team. The first national college-level basketball championship, the National Invitation Tournament, was held in New York in 1938 and remains in the city.[532] The city is well known for its links to basketball, which is played in nearly every park in the city by local youth, many of whom have gone on to play for major college programs and in the NBA.

In soccer, New York City is represented by New York City FC of Major League Soccer, who play their home games at Yankee Stadium[533] and the New York Red Bulls, who play their home games at Red Bull Arena in nearby Harrison, New Jersey.[534] NJ/NY Gotham FC also plays their home games in Red Bull Arena, representing the metropolitan area in the National Women's Soccer League. Historically, the city is known for the New York Cosmos, the highly successful former professional soccer team which was the American home of Pelé. A new version of the New York Cosmos was formed in 2010, and most recently played in the third-division National Independent Soccer Association before going on hiatus in January 2021. New York will be one of eleven US host cities for the 2026 FIFA World Cup. [535]

The annual United States Open Tennis Championships is one of the world's four Grand Slam tennis tournaments and is held at the National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, Queens.[536] The New York City Marathon, which courses through all five boroughs, is the world's largest running marathon,[515] with 51,394 finishers in 2016[537] and 98,247 applicants for the 2017 race.[515] The Millrose Games is an annual track and field meet whose featured event is the Wanamaker Mile. Boxing is also a prominent part of the city's sporting scene, with events like the Amateur Boxing Golden Gloves being held at Madison Square Garden each year.[538] The city is also considered the host of the Belmont Stakes, the last, longest and oldest of horse racing's Triple Crown races, held just over the city's border at Belmont Park on the first or second Sunday of June. The city also hosted the 1932 U.S. Open golf tournament and the 1930 and 1939 PGA Championships, and has been host city for both events several times, most notably for nearby Winged Foot Golf Club. The Gaelic games are played in Riverdale, Bronx at Gaelic Park, home to the New York GAA, the only North American team to compete at the senior inter-county level.

Environment

 
As of 2012, the city had about 6,000 hybrid taxis (shown) in service, the largest number of any city in North America.[539]

Environmental issues in New York City are affected by the city's size, density, abundant public transportation infrastructure, and location at the mouth of the Hudson River. For example, it is both one of the country's biggest sources of pollution, and has the lowest per-capita greenhouse gas emissions rate and electricity usage. Governors Island is planned to host a US$1 billion research and education center with the intention of making New York City the global leader in addressing the climate crisis.[540]

Environmental impact reduction

New York City has focused on reducing its environmental impact and carbon footprint.[541] Mass transit use in New York City is the highest in the United States. Also, by 2010, the city had 3,715 hybrid taxis and other clean diesel vehicles, representing around 28% of New York's taxi fleet in service, the most of any city in North America.[542] New York City is the host of Climate Week NYC, the largest Climate Week to take place globally and regarded as major annual climate summit.

New York's high rate of public transit use, more than 200,000 daily cyclists as of 2014,[543] and many pedestrian commuters make it the most energy-efficient major city in the United States.[544] Walk and bicycle modes of travel account for 21% of all modes for trips in the city; nationally the rate for metro regions is about 8%.[545] In both its 2011 and 2015 rankings, Walk Score named New York City the most walkable large city in the United States,[546][547][548] and in 2018, Stacker ranked New York the most walkable U.S. city.[549] Citibank sponsored the introduction of 10,000 public bicycles for the city's bike-share project in the summer of 2013.[550] New York City's numerical "in-season cycling indicator" of bicycling in the city had hit an all-time high of 437 when measured in 2014.[551]

The city government was a petitioner in the landmark Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency Supreme Court case forcing the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases as pollutants. The city is a leader in the construction of energy-efficient green office buildings, including the Hearst Tower among others.[184] Mayor Bill de Blasio has committed to an 80% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions between 2014 and 2050 to reduce the city's contributions to climate change, beginning with a comprehensive "Green Buildings" plan.[541]

Water purity and availability

The New York City drinking water supply is extracted from the protected Catskill Mountains watershed.[552] As a result of the watershed's integrity and undisturbed natural water filtration system, New York is one of only four major cities in the United States the majority of whose drinking water is pure enough not to require purification through water treatment plants.[553] The city's municipal water system is the largest in the United States, moving over one billion gallons of water per day;[554] a leak in the Delaware aqueduct results in some 20 million gallons a day being lost under the Hudson River.[555] The Croton Watershed north of the city is undergoing construction of a $3.2 billion water purification plant to augment New York City's water supply by an estimated 290 million gallons daily, representing a greater than 20% addition to the city's current availability of water.[556] The ongoing expansion of New York City Water Tunnel No. 3, an integral part of the New York City water supply system, is the largest capital construction project in the city's history,[557] with segments serving Manhattan and the Bronx completed, and with segments serving Brooklyn and Queens planned for construction in 2020.[558] In 2018, New York City announced a $1 billion investment to protect the integrity of its water system and to maintain the purity of its unfiltered water supply.[554]

Air quality

According to the 2016 World Health Organization Global Urban Ambient Air Pollution Database,[559] the annual average concentration in New York City's air of particulate matter measuring 2.5 micrometers or less (PM2.5) was 7.0 micrograms per cubic meter, or 3.0 micrograms within the recommended limit of the WHO Air Quality Guidelines for the annual mean PM2.5.[560] The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, in partnership with Queens College, conducts the New York Community Air Survey to measure pollutants at about 150 locations.[561]

Environmental revitalization

Newtown Creek, a 3.5-mile (6-kilometer) a long estuary that forms part of the border between the boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens, has been designated a Superfund site for environmental clean-up and remediation of the waterway's recreational and economic resources for many communities.[562] One of the most heavily used bodies of water in the Port of New York and New Jersey, it had been one of the most contaminated industrial sites in the country,[563] containing years of discarded toxins, an estimated 30 million US gallons (110,000 m3) of spilled oil, including the Greenpoint oil spill, raw sewage from New York City's sewer system,[563] and other accumulation.

Government and politics

Government

 
New York City Hall is the oldest City Hall in the United States that still houses its original governmental functions.

New York City has been a metropolitan municipality with a Strong mayor–council form of government[564] since its consolidation in 1898. In New York City, the city government is responsible for public education, correctional institutions, public safety, recreational facilities, sanitation, water supply, and welfare services.

The mayor and council members are elected to four-year terms. The City Council is a unicameral body consisting of 51 council members whose districts are defined by geographic population boundaries.[565] Each term for the mayor and council members lasts four years and has a two consecutive-term limit,[566] which is reset after a four-year break. The New York City Administrative Code, the New York City Rules, and the City Record are the code of local laws, compilation of regulations, and official journal, respectively.[567][568]

 
The New York County Courthouse houses the New York Supreme Court and other offices.

Each borough is coextensive with a judicial district of the state Unified Court System, of which the Criminal Court and the Civil Court are the local courts, while the New York Supreme Court conducts major trials and appeals. Manhattan hosts the First Department of the Supreme Court, Appellate Division while Brooklyn hosts the Second Department. There are also several extrajudicial administrative courts, which are executive agencies and not part of the state Unified Court System.

Uniquely among major American cities, New York is divided between, and is host to the main branches of, two different U.S. district courts: the District Court for the Southern District of New York, whose main courthouse is on Foley Square near City Hall in Manhattan and whose jurisdiction includes Manhattan and the Bronx; and the District Court for the Eastern District of New York, whose main courthouse is in Brooklyn and whose jurisdiction includes Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and U.S. Court of International Trade are also based in New York, also on Foley Square in Manhattan.

Politics

The present mayor is Eric Adams. He was elected in 2021 with 67% of the vote, and assumed office on January 1, 2022.

The Democratic Party holds the majority of public offices. As of April 2016, 69% of registered voters in the city are Democrats and 10% are Republicans.[569] New York City has not been carried by a Republican presidential election since President Calvin Coolidge won the five boroughs in 1924. A Republican candidate for statewide office has not won all five boroughs of the city since it was incorporated in 1898. In 2012, Democrat Barack Obama became the first presidential candidate of any party to receive more than 80% of the overall vote in New York City, sweeping all five boroughs. Party platforms center on affordable housing, education, and economic development, and labor politics are of importance in the city. Thirteen out of 27 U.S. congressional districts in the state of New York include portions of New York City.[570]

New York is one of the most important sources of political fundraising in the United States. At least four of the top five ZIP Codes in the nation for political contributions were in Manhattan for the 2004, 2006, and 2008 elections. The top ZIP Code, 10021 on the Upper East Side, generated the most money for the 2004 presidential campaigns of George W. Bush and John Kerry.[571] The city has a strong imbalance of payments with the national and state governments. It receives 83 cents in services for every $1 it sends to the federal government in taxes (or annually sends $11.4 billion more than it receives back). City residents and businesses also sent an additional $4.1 billion in the 2009–2010 fiscal year to the state of New York than the city received in return.[572]

Transportation

 
New York City is home to the two busiest train stations in the U.S., including Grand Central Terminal.

New York City's comprehensive transportation system is both complex and extensive.

Rapid transit

Mass transit in New York City, most of which runs 24 hours a day, accounts for one in every three users of mass transit in the United States, and two-thirds of the nation's rail riders live in the New York City metropolitan area.[573][574]

Rail

The iconic New York City Subway system is the largest rapid transit system in the world when measured by stations in operation, with 472, and by length of routes. Nearly all of New York's subway system is open 24 hours a day, in contrast to the overnight shutdown common to systems in most cities, including Hong Kong,[575][576] London, Paris, Seoul,[577][578] and Tokyo. The New York City Subway is also the busiest metropolitan rail transit system in the Western Hemisphere, with 1.76 billion passenger rides in 2015,[579] while Grand Central Terminal, also referred to as "Grand Central Station", is the world's largest railway station by number of train platforms.

 
The New York City Subway is the world's largest rapid transit system by number of stations.

Public transport is essential in New York City. 54.6% of New Yorkers commuted to work in 2005 using mass transit.[580] This is in contrast to the rest of the United States, where 91% of commuters travel in automobiles to their workplace.[581] According to the New York City Comptroller, workers in the New York City area spend an average of 6 hours and 18 minutes getting to work each week, the longest commute time in the nation among large cities.[582] New York is the only U.S. city in which a majority (52%) of households do not have a car; only 22% of Manhattanites own a car.[583] Due to their high usage of mass transit, New Yorkers spend less of their household income on transportation than the national average, saving $19 billion annually on transportation compared to other urban Americans.[584]

New York City's commuter rail network is the largest in North America.[573] The rail network, connecting New York City to its suburbs, consists of the Long Island Rail Road, Metro-North Railroad, and New Jersey Transit. The combined systems converge at Grand Central Terminal and Pennsylvania Station and contain more than 250 stations and 20 rail lines.[573] In Queens, the elevated AirTrain people mover system connects 24 hours a day JFK International Airport to the New York City Subway and the Long Island Rail Road; a separate AirTrain system is planned alongside the Grand Central Parkway to connect LaGuardia Airport to these transit systems.[585][586] For intercity rail, New York City is served by Amtrak, whose busiest station by a significant margin is Pennsylvania Station on the West Side of Manhattan, from which Amtrak provides connections to Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C. along the Northeast Corridor, and long-distance train service to other North American cities.[587]

The Staten Island Railway rapid transit system solely serves Staten Island, operating 24 hours a day. The Port Authority Trans-Hudson (PATH train) links Midtown and Lower Manhattan to northeastern New Jersey, primarily Hoboken, Jersey City, and Newark. Like the New York City Subway, the PATH operates 24 hours a day; meaning three of the six rapid transit systems in the world which operate on 24-hour schedules are wholly or partly in New York (the others are a portion of the Chicago 'L', the PATCO Speedline serving Philadelphia, and the Copenhagen Metro).

Multibillion-dollar heavy rail transit projects under construction in New York City include the Second Avenue Subway, and the East Side Access project.[588]

Buses

 
The Port Authority Bus Terminal, the world's busiest bus station, at 8th Avenue and 42nd Street[589]

New York City's public bus fleet runs 24/7 and is the largest in North America.[590] The Port Authority Bus Terminal, the main intercity bus terminal of the city, serves 7,000 buses and 200,000 commuters daily, making it the busiest bus station in the world.[589]

Air

New York's airspace is the busiest in the United States and one of the world's busiest air transportation corridors. The three busiest airports in the New York metropolitan area include John F. Kennedy International Airport, Newark Liberty International Airport, and LaGuardia Airport; 130.5 million travelers used these three airports in 2016.[591] JFK and Newark Liberty were the busiest and fourth busiest U.S. gateways for international air passengers, respectively, in 2012; as of 2011, JFK was the busiest airport for international passengers in North America.[592]

Plans have advanced to expand passenger volume at a fourth airport, Stewart International Airport near Newburgh, New York, by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.[593] Plans were announced in July 2015 to entirely rebuild LaGuardia Airport in a multibillion-dollar project to replace its aging facilities.[594] Other commercial airports in or serving the New York metropolitan area include Long Island MacArthur Airport, Trenton–Mercer Airport and Westchester County Airport. The primary general aviation airport serving the area is Teterboro Airport.

Ferries

 
The Staten Island Ferry shuttles commuters between Manhattan and Staten Island.

The Staten Island Ferry is the world's busiest ferry route, carrying more than 23 million passengers from July 2015 through June 2016 on the 5.2-mile (8.4 km) route between Staten Island and Lower Manhattan and running 24 hours a day.[595] Other ferry systems shuttle commuters between Manhattan and other locales within the city and the metropolitan area.

NYC Ferry, a NYCEDC initiative with routes planned to travel to all five boroughs, was launched in 2017, with second graders choosing the names of the ferries.[596] Meanwhile, Seastreak ferry announced construction of a 600-passenger high-speed luxury ferry in September 2016, to shuttle riders between the Jersey Shore and Manhattan, anticipated to start service in 2017; this would be the largest vessel in its class.[597]

Taxis, vehicles for hire, and trams

 
Yellow medallion taxicabs are widely recognized icons of the city.

Other features of the city's transportation infrastructure encompass 13,587 yellow taxicabs;[598] other vehicle for hire companies;[599][600] and the Roosevelt Island Tramway, an aerial tramway that transports commuters between Roosevelt Island and Manhattan Island.

Streets and highways

 
8th Avenue, looking northward ("uptown"). Most streets and avenues in Manhattan's grid plan incorporate a one-way traffic configuration.

Despite New York's heavy reliance on its vast public transit system, streets are a defining feature of the city. The Commissioners' Plan of 1811 greatly influenced the city's physical development. Several of the city's streets and avenues, including Broadway,[601] Wall Street,[602] Madison Avenue,[362] and Seventh Avenue are also used as metonyms for national industries there: the theater, finance, advertising, and fashion organizations, respectively.

New York City also has an extensive web of freeways and parkways, which link the city's boroughs to each other and to North Jersey, Westchester County, Long Island, and southwestern Connecticut through various bridges and tunnels. Because these highways serve millions of outer borough and suburban residents who commute into Manhattan, it is quite common for motorists to be stranded for hours in traffic congestion that are a daily occurrence, particularly during rush hour.[603][604] Congestion pricing in New York City will go into effect in 2022 at the earliest.[605][606][607]

New York City is also known for its rules regarding turning at red lights. Unlike the rest of the United States, New York State prohibits right or left turns on red in cities with a population greater than one million, to reduce traffic collisions and increase pedestrian safety. In New York City, therefore, all turns at red lights are illegal unless a sign permitting such maneuvers is present.[608]

River crossings

 
The George Washington Bridge, connecting Upper Manhattan (background) from Fort Lee, New Jersey across the Hudson River, is the world's busiest motor vehicle bridge.[609][610]

New York City is located on one of the world's largest natural harbors,[611] and the boroughs of Manhattan and Staten Island are primarily coterminous with islands of the same names, while Queens and Brooklyn are at the west end of the larger Long Island, and the Bronx is on New York State's mainland. This situation of boroughs separated by water led to the development of an extensive infrastructure of bridges and tunnels.

The George Washington Bridge is the world's busiest motor vehicle bridge,[609][610] connecting Manhattan to Bergen County, New Jersey. The Verrazano-Narrows Bridge is the longest suspension bridge in the Americas and one of the world's longest.[612][613] The Brooklyn Bridge is an icon of the city itself. The towers of the Brooklyn Bridge are built of limestone, granite, and Rosendale cement, and their architectural style is neo-Gothic, with characteristic pointed arches above the passageways through the stone towers. This bridge was also the longest suspension bridge in the world from its opening until 1903, and is the first steel-wire suspension bridge. The Queensboro Bridge is an important piece of cantilever architecture. The Manhattan Bridge, opened in 1909, is considered to be the forerunner of modern suspension bridges, and its design served as the model for many of the long-span suspension bridges around the world; the Manhattan Bridge, Throgs Neck Bridge, Triborough Bridge, and Verrazano-Narrows Bridge are all examples of structural expressionism.[614][615]

Manhattan Island is linked to New York City's outer boroughs and New Jersey by several tunnels as well. The Lincoln Tunnel, which carries 120,000 vehicles a day under the Hudson River between New Jersey and Midtown Manhattan, is the busiest vehicular tunnel in the world.[616] The tunnel was built instead of a bridge to allow unfettered passage of large passenger and cargo ships that sailed through New York Harbor and up the Hudson River to Manhattan's piers. The Holland Tunnel, connecting Lower Manhattan to Jersey City, New Jersey, was the world's first mechanically ventilated vehicular tunnel when it opened in 1927.[617][618] The Queens-Midtown Tunnel, built to relieve congestion on the bridges connecting Manhattan with Queens and Brooklyn, was the largest non-federal project in its time when it was completed in 1940.[619] President Franklin D. Roosevelt was the first person to drive through it.[620] The Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel (officially known as the Hugh L. Carey Tunnel) runs underneath Battery Park and connects the Financial District at the southern tip of Manhattan to Red Hook in Brooklyn.

Cycling network

Cycling in New York City is associated with mixed cycling conditions that include urban density, relatively flat terrain, congested roadways with stop-and-go traffic, and many pedestrians. The city's large cycling population includes utility cyclists, such as delivery and messenger services; cycling clubs for recreational cyclists; and an increasing number of commuters.[621] Cycling is increasingly popular in New York City; in 2017 there were approximately 450,000 daily bike trips, compared with 170,000 daily bike trips in 2005.[622] As of 2017, New York City had 1,333 miles (2,145 km) of bike lanes, compared to 513 miles (826 km) of bike lanes in 2006.[622] As of 2019, there are 126 miles (203 km) of segregated or "protected" bike lanes citywide.[623]

People

Global outreach

In 2006, the Sister City Program of the City of New York, Inc.[624] was restructured and renamed New York City Global Partners. Through this program, New York City has expanded its international outreach to a network of cities worldwide, promoting the exchange of ideas and innovation between their citizenry and policymakers. New York's historic sister cities are denoted below by the year they joined New York City's partnership network.[625]

See also

york, city, york, york, redirect, here, other, uses, disambiguation, disambiguation, york, york, disambiguation, york, often, called, most, populous, city, united, states, with, 2020, population, distributed, over, square, miles, also, most, densely, populated. NYC and New York New York redirect here For other uses see New York City disambiguation NYC disambiguation and New York New York disambiguation New York often called New York City a or NYC is the most populous city in the United States With a 2020 population of 8 804 190 distributed over 300 46 square miles 778 2 km2 New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the United States and is more than twice as populous as second place Los Angeles New York City lies at the southern tip of New York State and constitutes the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban landmass 8 With over 20 1 million people in its metropolitan statistical area and 23 5 million in its combined statistical area as of 2020 New York is one of the world s most populous megacities and over 58 million people live within 250 mi 400 km of the city 9 New York City is a global cultural financial entertainment and media center with a significant influence on commerce health care and life sciences 10 research technology 11 education politics tourism dining art fashion and sports Home to the headquarters of the United Nations New York is an important center for international diplomacy 12 13 an established safe haven for global investors and is sometimes described as the capital of the world 14 15 New YorkCityManhattan looking southward from Top of the RockCentral ParkUnisphereBrooklyn BridgeGrand Central TerminalStatue of LibertyUnited Nations headquartersTimes SquareBronx ZooStaten Island FerryFlagSealWordmarkNicknames The Big Apple The City That Never Sleeps Gotham and othersInteractive map outlining New York CityCoordinates 40 42 46 N 74 00 22 W 40 71278 N 74 00611 W 40 71278 74 00611 Coordinates 40 42 46 N 74 00 22 W 40 71278 N 74 00611 W 40 71278 74 00611 1 CountryUnited StatesStateNew YorkRegionMid AtlanticConstituent counties boroughs Bronx The Bronx Kings Brooklyn New York Manhattan Queens Queens Richmond Staten Island Historic coloniesNew NetherlandProvince of New YorkSettled1624 approx Consolidated1898Named forJames Duke of YorkGovernment TypeStrong mayor council BodyNew York City Council MayorEric Adams D Area 2 Total472 43 sq mi 1 223 59 km2 Land300 46 sq mi 778 18 km2 Water171 97 sq mi 445 41 km2 Elevation 3 33 ft 10 m Population 2020 Total8 804 190 Estimate July 2021 4 8 467 513 Rank1st in the United States1st in New York State Density29 302 66 sq mi 11 313 81 km2 Urban19 426 449 1st Urban density5 980 8 sq mi 2 309 2 km2 Metro 5 20 140 470 1st DemonymNew YorkerTime zoneUTC 05 00 EST Summer DST UTC 04 00 EDT ZIP Codes100xx 104xx 11004 05 111xx 114xx 116xxArea code s 212 646 332 718 347 929 917FIPS code36 51000GNIS feature ID975772Primary airportsJohn F Kennedy LaGuardia Newark LibertyRapid transit systemNew York City SubwayStaten Island RailwayPATHGDP City 2021 886 billion 6 1st GMP Metro 2021 2 0 trillion 7 1st Largest borough by areaQueens 109 square miles or 280 square kilometres Largest borough by populationBrooklyn 2020 Census 2 736 074 Largest borough by GDP 2021 Manhattan 651 6 billion 6 Websitewww wbr nyc wbr govSituated on one of the world s largest natural harbors and extending into the Atlantic Ocean New York City comprises five boroughs each of which is coextensive with a respective county of the state of New York The five boroughs Brooklyn Kings County Queens Queens County Manhattan New York County the Bronx Bronx County and Staten Island Richmond County were created when local governments were consolidated into a single municipal entity in 1898 16 The city and its metropolitan area constitute the premier gateway for legal immigration to the United States As many as 800 languages are spoken in New York 17 making it the most linguistically diverse city in the world New York City is home to more than 3 2 million residents born outside the United States the largest foreign born population of any city in the world as of 2016 18 19 As of 2022 update the New York metropolitan area is estimated to produce a gross metropolitan product of over 2 1 trillion ranking it first worldwide If the New York metropolitan area were a sovereign state it would have the eighth largest economy in the world As of 2022 update New York is home to the highest number of billionaires and millionaires of any city in the world New York City traces its origins to a trading post founded on the southern tip of Manhattan Island by Dutch colonists in approximately 1624 The settlement was named New Amsterdam Dutch Nieuw Amsterdam in 1626 and was chartered as a city in 1653 The city came under English control in 1664 and was renamed New York after King Charles II of England granted the lands to his brother the Duke of York 20 21 The city was regained by the Dutch in July 1673 and was renamed New Orange for one year and three months the city has been continuously named New York since November 1674 New York City was the capital of the United States from 1785 until 1790 22 and has been the largest U S city since 1790 The Statue of Liberty greeted millions of immigrants as they came to the U S by ship in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and is a symbol of the U S and its ideals of liberty and peace 23 In the 21st century New York City has emerged as a global node of creativity entrepreneurship 24 and environmental sustainability 25 26 and as a symbol of freedom and cultural diversity 27 The New York Times has won the most Pulitzer Prizes for journalism and remains the U S media s newspaper of record 28 In 2019 New York City was voted the greatest city in the world per a survey of over 30 000 people from 48 cities worldwide citing its cultural diversity 29 Many districts and monuments in New York City are major landmarks including three of the world s ten most visited tourist attractions in 2013 30 A record 66 6 million tourists visited New York City in 2019 Times Square is the brightly illuminated hub of the Broadway Theater District 31 one of the world s busiest pedestrian intersections 30 32 and a major center of the world s entertainment industry 33 Many of the city s landmarks skyscrapers and parks are known around the world as is the city s fast pace spawning the term New York minute The Empire State Building has become the global standard of reference to describe the height and length of other structures 34 The Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village part of the Stonewall National Monument is considered the historic epicenter of LGBTQ culture and the birthplace of the modern gay rights movement 35 36 Manhattan s real estate market is among the most expensive in the world 37 38 Providing continuous 24 7 service and contributing to the nickname The City That Never Sleeps the New York City Subway is the largest single operator rapid transit system worldwide with 472 passenger rail stations and Penn Station in Midtown Manhattan is the busiest transportation hub in the Western Hemisphere 39 The city has over 120 colleges and universities including Columbia University New York University and the City University of New York system which is the largest urban public university system in the United States Anchored by Wall Street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan New York City has been called both the world s leading financial center 40 and the most powerful city in the world 41 and is home to the world s two largest stock exchanges by total market capitalization the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq 42 43 New York City is the headquarters of the global art market with numerous art galleries and auction houses collectively hosting half of the world s art auctions 44 Contents 1 Etymology 2 History 2 1 Early history 2 2 Dutch rule 2 3 English rule 2 4 Province of New York and slavery 2 5 American Revolution 2 6 Nineteenth century 2 7 Modern history 3 Geography 3 1 Boroughs 3 1 1 Manhattan 3 1 2 Brooklyn 3 1 3 Queens 3 1 4 The Bronx 3 1 5 Staten Island 3 2 Architecture 3 3 Climate 3 4 Parks 3 4 1 National parks 3 4 2 State parks 3 4 3 City parks 3 5 Military installations 4 Demographics 4 1 Population density 4 2 Race and ethnicity 4 3 Sexual orientation and gender identity 4 4 Religion 4 4 1 Christianity 4 4 2 Judaism 4 4 3 Islam 4 4 4 Hinduism and other religious affiliations 4 5 Wealth and income disparity 5 Economy 5 1 Wall Street 5 2 Tech and biotech 5 3 Real estate 5 4 Tourism 5 5 Media and entertainment 6 Education 6 1 Primary and secondary education 6 2 Higher education and research 7 Human resources 7 1 Public health 7 2 Public safety 7 2 1 Police and law enforcement 7 2 2 Firefighting 7 3 Public library system 8 Culture and contemporary life 8 1 Pace 8 2 Arts 8 2 1 Performing arts 8 2 2 Visual arts 8 3 Cuisine 8 4 Parades 8 5 Accent and dialect 8 6 Sports 9 Environment 9 1 Environmental impact reduction 9 2 Water purity and availability 9 3 Air quality 9 4 Environmental revitalization 10 Government and politics 10 1 Government 10 2 Politics 11 Transportation 11 1 Rapid transit 11 1 1 Rail 11 1 2 Buses 11 2 Air 11 3 Ferries 11 4 Taxis vehicles for hire and trams 11 5 Streets and highways 11 5 1 River crossings 11 6 Cycling network 12 People 13 Global outreach 14 See also 15 Notes 16 References 17 Further reading 18 External linksEtymologySee also Nicknames of New York City In 1664 New York was named in honor of the Duke of York who would become King James II of England 45 James s elder brother King Charles II appointed the Duke proprietor of the former territory of New Netherland including the city of New Amsterdam when England seized it from Dutch control 46 HistoryMain article History of New York City For a chronological guide see Timeline of New York City Early history In the pre Columbian era the area of present day New York City was inhabited by Algonquian Native Americans including the Lenape Their homeland known as Lenapehoking included Staten Island Manhattan the Bronx the western portion of Long Island including the areas that would later become the boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens and the Lower Hudson Valley 47 The first documented visit into New York Harbor by a European was in 1524 by Italian Giovanni da Verrazzano an explorer from Florence in the service of the French crown 48 He claimed the area for France and named it Nouvelle Angouleme New Angouleme 49 A Spanish expedition led by the Portuguese captain Estevao Gomes sailing for Emperor Charles V arrived in New York Harbor in January 1525 and charted the mouth of the Hudson River which he named Rio de San Antonio Saint Anthony s River The Padron Real of 1527 the first scientific map to show the East Coast of North America continuously was informed by Gomes expedition and labeled the northeastern United States as Tierra de Esteban Gomez in his honor 50 In 1609 the English explorer Henry Hudson rediscovered New York Harbor while searching for the Northwest Passage to the Orient for the Dutch East India Company 51 He proceeded to sail up what the Dutch would name the North River now the Hudson River named first by Hudson as the Mauritius after Maurice Prince of Orange Hudson s first mate described the harbor as a very good Harbour for all windes and the river as a mile broad and full of fish 52 Hudson sailed roughly 150 miles 240 km north 53 past the site of the present day New York State capital city of Albany in the belief that it might be an oceanic tributary before the river became too shallow to continue 52 He made a ten day exploration of the area and claimed the region for the Dutch East India Company In 1614 the area between Cape Cod and Delaware Bay was claimed by the Netherlands and called Nieuw Nederland New Netherland The first non Native American inhabitant of what would eventually become New York City was Juan Rodriguez transliterated to Dutch as Jan Rodrigues a merchant from Santo Domingo Born in Santo Domingo of Portuguese and African descent he arrived in Manhattan during the winter of 1613 14 trapping for pelts and trading with the local population as a representative of the Dutch Broadway from 159th Street to 218th Street in Upper Manhattan is named Juan Rodriguez Way in his honor 54 55 Dutch rule New Amsterdam centered in the eventual Lower Manhattan in 1664 the year England took control and renamed it New York A permanent European presence near New York Harbor was established in 1624 making New York the 12th oldest continuously occupied European established settlement in the continental United States 56 with the founding of a Dutch fur trading settlement on Governors Island In 1625 construction was started on a citadel and Fort Amsterdam later called Nieuw Amsterdam New Amsterdam on present day Manhattan Island 57 58 The colony of New Amsterdam was centered on what would ultimately be known as Lower Manhattan It extended from the southern tip of Manhattan to modern day Wall Street where a 12 foot wooden stockade was built in 1653 to protect against Native American and British raids 59 In 1626 the Dutch colonial Director General Peter Minuit acting as charged by the Dutch West India Company purchased the island of Manhattan from the Canarsie a small Lenape band 60 for the value of 60 guilders 61 about 900 in 2018 62 A disproved legend claims that Manhattan was purchased for 24 worth of glass beads 63 64 Following the purchase New Amsterdam grew slowly 21 To attract settlers the Dutch instituted the patroon system in 1628 whereby wealthy Dutchmen patroons or patrons who brought 50 colonists to New Netherland would be awarded swaths of land along with local political autonomy and rights to participate in the lucrative fur trade This program had little success 65 Since 1621 the Dutch West India Company had operated as a monopoly in New Netherland on authority granted by the Dutch States General In 1639 1640 in an effort to bolster economic growth the Dutch West India Company relinquished its monopoly over the fur trade leading to growth in the production and trade of food timber tobacco and slaves particularly with the Dutch West Indies 21 66 In 1647 Peter Stuyvesant began his tenure as the last Director General of New Netherland During his tenure the population of New Netherland grew from 2 000 to 8 000 67 68 Stuyvesant has been credited with improving law and order in the colony however he also earned a reputation as a despotic leader He instituted regulations on liquor sales attempted to assert control over the Dutch Reformed Church and blocked other religious groups including Quakers Jews and Lutherans from establishing houses of worship 69 The Dutch West India Company would eventually attempt to ease tensions between Stuyvesant and residents of New Amsterdam 70 English rule Fort George and the City of New York c 1731 Royal Navy ships of the line are seen guarding what would become New York Harbor In 1664 unable to summon any significant resistance Stuyvesant surrendered New Amsterdam to English troops led by Colonel Richard Nicolls without bloodshed 69 70 The terms of the surrender permitted Dutch residents to remain in the colony and allowed for religious freedom 71 In 1667 during negotiations leading to the Treaty of Breda after the Second Anglo Dutch War the Dutch decided to keep the nascent plantation colony of what is now Suriname on the northern South American coast they had gained from the English and in return the English kept New Amsterdam The fledgling settlement was promptly renamed New York after the Duke of York the future King James II and VII who would eventually be deposed in the Glorious Revolution 72 After the founding the duke gave part of the colony to proprietors George Carteret and John Berkeley Fort Orange 150 miles 240 km north on the Hudson River was renamed Albany after James s Scottish title 73 The transfer was confirmed in 1667 by the Treaty of Breda which concluded the Second Anglo Dutch War 74 On August 24 1673 during the Third Anglo Dutch War Dutch captain Anthony Colve seized the colony of New York from the English at the behest of Cornelis Evertsen the Youngest and rechristened it New Orange after William III the Prince of Orange 75 The Dutch would soon return the island to England under the Treaty of Westminster of November 1674 76 77 Several intertribal wars among the Native Americans and some epidemics brought on by contact with the Europeans caused sizeable population losses for the Lenape between the years 1660 and 1670 78 By 1700 the Lenape population had diminished to 200 79 New York experienced several yellow fever epidemics in the 18th century losing ten percent of its population to the disease in 1702 alone 80 81 Province of New York and slavery Columbia University was founded by royal charter in 1754 under the name King s College In the early 18th century New York grew in importance as a trading port while as a part of the colony of New York 82 It also became a center of slavery with 42 of households enslaving Africans by 1730 the highest percentage outside Charleston South Carolina 83 Most cases were that of domestic slavery as a New York household then commonly enslaved few or several people Others were hired out to work at labor Slavery became integrally tied to New York s economy through the labor of slaves throughout the port and the banking and shipping industries trading with the American South During construction in Foley Square in the 1990s the African Burying Ground was discovered the cemetery included 10 000 to 20 000 of graves of colonial era Africans some enslaved and some free 84 The 1735 trial and acquittal in Manhattan of John Peter Zenger who had been accused of seditious libel after criticizing colonial governor William Cosby helped to establish the freedom of the press in North America 85 In 1754 Columbia University was founded under charter by King George II as King s College in Lower Manhattan 86 American Revolution The Battle of Long Island one of the largest battles of the American Revolutionary War took place in Brooklyn on August 27 1776 The Stamp Act Congress met in New York in October 1765 as the Sons of Liberty organized in the city skirmished over the next ten years with British troops stationed there 87 The Battle of Long Island the largest battle of the American Revolutionary War was fought in August 1776 within the modern day borough of Brooklyn 88 After the battle in which the Americans were defeated the British made the city their military and political base of operations in North America The city was a haven for Loyalist refugees and escaped slaves who joined the British lines for freedom newly promised by the Crown for all fighters As many as 10 000 escaped slaves crowded into the city during the British occupation When the British forces evacuated at the close of the war in 1783 they transported 3 000 freedmen for resettlement in Nova Scotia 89 They resettled other freedmen in England and the Caribbean The only attempt at a peaceful solution to the war took place at the Conference House on Staten Island between American delegates including Benjamin Franklin and British general Lord Howe on September 11 1776 Shortly after the British occupation began the Great Fire of New York occurred a large conflagration on the West Side of Lower Manhattan which destroyed about a quarter of the buildings in the city including Trinity Church 90 In 1785 the assembly of the Congress of the Confederation made New York City the national capital shortly after the war New York was the last capital of the U S under the Articles of Confederation and the first capital under the Constitution of the United States New York City as the U S capital hosted several events of national scope in 1789 the first President of the United States George Washington was inaugurated the first United States Congress and the Supreme Court of the United States each assembled for the first time and the United States Bill of Rights was drafted all at Federal Hall on Wall Street 91 In 1790 New York surpassed Philadelphia as the nation s largest city At the end of that year pursuant to the Residence Act the national capital was moved to Philadelphia 92 93 Nineteenth century Broadway follows the Native American Wecquaesgeek Trail through Manhattan 94 Over the course of the nineteenth century New York City s population grew from 60 000 to 3 43 million 95 Under New York State s abolition act of 1799 children of slave mothers were to be eventually liberated but to be held in indentured servitude until their mid to late twenties 96 97 Together with slaves freed by their masters after the Revolutionary War and escaped slaves a significant free Black population gradually developed in Manhattan Under such influential United States founders as Alexander Hamilton and John Jay the New York Manumission Society worked for abolition and established the African Free School to educate Black children 98 It was not until 1827 that slavery was completely abolished in the state and free Blacks struggled afterward with discrimination New York interracial abolitionist activism continued among its leaders were graduates of the African Free School New York city s population jumped from 123 706 in 1820 to 312 710 by 1840 16 000 of whom were Black 99 100 In the 19th century the city was transformed by both commercial and residential development relating to its status as a national and international trading center as well as by European immigration respectively 101 The city adopted the Commissioners Plan of 1811 which expanded the city street grid to encompass almost all of Manhattan The 1825 completion of the Erie Canal through central New York connected the Atlantic port to the agricultural markets and commodities of the North American interior via the Hudson River and the Great Lakes 102 Local politics became dominated by Tammany Hall a political machine supported by Irish and German immigrants 103 The current five boroughs of Greater New York as they appeared in 1814 The Bronx was in Westchester County Queens County included modern Nassau County Kings County had six towns one of which was Brooklyn and New York City is shown by hatching in southern New York County on the island of Manhattan and Richmond County on Staten Island Several prominent American literary figures lived in New York during the 1830s and 1840s including William Cullen Bryant Washington Irving Herman Melville Rufus Wilmot Griswold John Keese Nathaniel Parker Willis and Edgar Allan Poe Public minded members of the contemporaneous business elite lobbied for the establishment of Central Park which in 1857 became the first landscaped park in an American city The Great Irish Famine brought a large influx of Irish immigrants more than 200 000 were living in New York by 1860 upwards of a quarter of the city s population 104 There was also extensive immigration from the German provinces where revolutions had disrupted societies and Germans comprised another 25 of New York s population by 1860 105 Democratic Party candidates were consistently elected to local office increasing the city s ties to the South and its dominant party In 1861 Mayor Fernando Wood called upon the aldermen to declare independence from Albany and the United States after the South seceded but his proposal was not acted on 98 Anger at new military conscription laws during the American Civil War 1861 1865 which spared wealthier men who could afford to pay a 300 equivalent to 6 602 in 2021 commutation fee to hire a substitute 106 led to the Draft Riots of 1863 whose most visible participants were ethnic Irish working class 98 The draft riots deteriorated into attacks on New York s elite followed by attacks on Black New Yorkers and their property after fierce competition for a decade between Irish immigrants and Black people for work Rioters burned the Colored Orphan Asylum to the ground with more than 200 children escaping harm due to efforts of the New York Police Department which was mainly made up of Irish immigrants 105 At least 120 people were killed 107 Eleven Black men were lynched over five days and the riots forced hundreds of Blacks to flee the city for Williamsburg Brooklyn and New Jersey The Black population in Manhattan fell below 10 000 by 1865 which it had last been in 1820 The White working class had established dominance 105 107 Violence by longshoremen against Black men was especially fierce in the docks area 105 It was one of the worst incidents of civil unrest in American history 108 Modern history A construction worker atop the Empire State Building as it was being built in 1930 The Chrysler Building can be seen behind him In 1898 the modern City of New York was formed with the consolidation of Brooklyn until then a separate city the County of New York which then included parts of the Bronx the County of Richmond and the western portion of the County of Queens 109 The opening of the subway in 1904 first built as separate private systems helped bind the new city together 110 Throughout the first half of the 20th century the city became a world center for industry commerce and communication 111 In 1904 the steamship General Slocum caught fire in the East River killing 1 021 people on board 112 In 1911 the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire the city s worst industrial disaster took the lives of 146 garment workers and spurred the growth of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union and major improvements in factory safety standards 113 New York s non White population was 36 620 in 1890 114 New York City was a prime destination in the early twentieth century for African Americans during the Great Migration from the American South and by 1916 New York City had become home to the largest urban African diaspora in North America 115 The Harlem Renaissance of literary and cultural life flourished during the era of Prohibition 116 The larger economic boom generated construction of skyscrapers competing in height and creating an identifiable skyline Manhattan s Little Italy in the Lower East Side c 1900 New York became the most populous urbanized area in the world in the early 1920s overtaking London The metropolitan area surpassed the 10 million mark in the early 1930s becoming the first megacity in human history 117 The difficult years of the Great Depression saw the election of reformer Fiorello La Guardia as mayor and the fall of Tammany Hall after eighty years of political dominance 118 Returning World War II veterans created a post war economic boom and the development of large housing tracts in eastern Queens and Nassau County as well as similar suburban areas in New Jersey New York emerged from the war unscathed as the leading city of the world with Wall Street leading America s place as the world s dominant economic power The United Nations headquarters was completed in 1952 solidifying New York s global geopolitical influence and the rise of abstract expressionism in the city precipitated New York s displacement of Paris as the center of the art world 119 The Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village a designated U S National Historic Landmark and National Monument was the site of the June 1969 Stonewall riots and the cradle of the modern LGBT rights movement 120 121 122 The Stonewall riots were a series of spontaneous violent protests by members of the gay community against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 28 1969 at the Stonewall Inn in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Lower Manhattan 123 They are widely considered to constitute the single most important event leading to the gay liberation movement 120 124 125 126 and the modern fight for LGBT rights 127 128 Wayne R Dynes author of the Encyclopedia of Homosexuality wrote that drag queens were the only transgender folks around during the June 1969 Stonewall riots The transgender community in New York City played a significant role in fighting for LGBT equality during the period of the Stonewall riots and thereafter 129 In the 1970s job losses due to industrial restructuring caused New York City to suffer from economic problems and rising crime rates 130 While a resurgence in the financial industry greatly improved the city s economic health in the 1980s New York s crime rate continued to increase through that decade and into the beginning of the 1990s 131 By the mid 1990s crime rates started to drop dramatically due to revised police strategies improving economic opportunities gentrification and new residents both American transplants and new immigrants from Asia and Latin America Important new sectors such as Silicon Alley emerged in the city s economy 132 New York s population reached all time highs in the 2000 census and then again in the 2010 census United Airlines Flight 175 hits the South Tower of the World Trade Center on September 11 2001 New York City suffered the bulk of the economic damage and largest loss of human life in the aftermath of the September 11 2001 attacks 133 Two of the four airliners hijacked that day were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center destroying the towers and killing 2 192 civilians 343 firefighters and 71 law enforcement officers The North Tower became the tallest building ever to be destroyed anywhere then or subsequently 134 The area was rebuilt with a new One World Trade Center a 9 11 memorial and museum and other new buildings and infrastructure 135 The World Trade Center PATH station which had opened on July 19 1909 as the Hudson Terminal was also destroyed in the attacks A temporary station was built and opened on November 23 2003 An 800 000 square foot 74 000 m2 permanent rail station designed by Santiago Calatrava the World Trade Center Transportation Hub the city s third largest hub was completed in 2016 136 The new One World Trade Center is the tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere 137 and the seventh tallest building in the world by pinnacle height with its spire reaching a symbolic 1 776 feet 541 3 m in reference to the year of U S independence 138 139 140 141 The Occupy Wall Street protests in Zuccotti Park in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan began on September 17 2011 receiving global attention and popularizing the Occupy movement against social and economic inequality worldwide 142 In March 2020 the first case of COVID 19 in the city was confirmed in Manhattan 143 The city rapidly replaced Wuhan China to become the global epicenter of the pandemic during the early phase before the infection became widespread across the world and the rest of the nation As of March 2021 New York City had recorded over 30 000 deaths from COVID 19 related complications In 2022 the LGBT community in New York City became the epicenter of the monkeypox outbreak in the Western Hemisphere prompting New York Governor Kathy Hochul and New York City Mayor Eric Adams declared corresponding public health emergencies in the state and city respectively in July 2022 144 GeographyMain articles Geography of New York City and Geography of New York New Jersey Harbor Estuary The core of the New York City metropolitan area with Manhattan Island at its center During the Wisconsin glaciation 75 000 to 11 000 years ago the New York City area was situated at the edge of a large ice sheet over 2 000 feet 610 m in depth 145 The erosive forward movement of the ice and its subsequent retreat contributed to the separation of what is now Long Island and Staten Island That action also left bedrock at a relatively shallow depth providing a solid foundation for most of Manhattan s skyscrapers 146 New York City is situated in the northeastern United States in southeastern New York State approximately halfway between Washington D C and Boston The location at the mouth of the Hudson River which feeds into a naturally sheltered harbor and then into the Atlantic Ocean has helped the city grow in significance as a trading port Most of New York City is built on the three islands of Long Island Manhattan and Staten Island The Hudson River flows through the Hudson Valley into New York Bay Between New York City and Troy New York the river is an estuary 147 The Hudson River separates the city from the U S state of New Jersey The East River a tidal strait flows from Long Island Sound and separates the Bronx and Manhattan from Long Island The Harlem River another tidal strait between the East and Hudson rivers separates most of Manhattan from the Bronx The Bronx River which flows through the Bronx and Westchester County is the only entirely freshwater river in the city 148 The city s land has been altered substantially by human intervention with considerable land reclamation along the waterfronts since Dutch colonial times reclamation is most prominent in Lower Manhattan with developments such as Battery Park City in the 1970s and 1980s 149 Some of the natural relief in topography has been evened out especially in Manhattan 150 The city s total area is 468 484 square miles 1 213 37 km2 302 643 sq mi 783 84 km2 of the city is land and 165 841 sq mi 429 53 km2 of this is water 151 152 The highest point in the city is Todt Hill on Staten Island which at 409 8 feet 124 9 m above sea level is the highest point on the eastern seaboard south of Maine 153 The summit of the ridge is mostly covered in woodlands as part of the Staten Island Greenbelt 154 Boroughs Main articles Boroughs of New York City and Neighborhoods in New York City 1 Manhattan 2 Brooklyn 3 Queens 4 The Bronx 5 Staten Island New York City s five boroughsvteJurisdiction Population Land area Density of population GDP Borough County Census 2020 square miles squarekm people sq mile people sq km billions 2012 US 2The Bronx Bronx 1 472 654 42 2 109 3 34 920 13 482 38 725Brooklyn Kings 2 736 074 69 4 179 7 39 438 15 227 92 230Manhattan New York 1 694 263 22 7 58 8 74 781 28 872 651 619Queens Queens 2 405 464 108 7 281 5 22 125 8 542 88 578Staten Island Richmond 495 747 57 5 148 9 8 618 3 327 14 806City of New York 8 804 190 302 6 783 8 29 095 11 234 885 958State of New York 20 215 751 47 126 4 122 056 8 429 166 1 514 779 GDP Gross Domestic Product Sources 155 156 157 158 and see individual borough articles New York City is sometimes referred to collectively as the Five Boroughs 159 Each borough is coextensive with a respective county of New York State making New York City one of the U S municipalities in multiple counties There are hundreds of distinct neighborhoods throughout the boroughs many with a definable history and character If the boroughs were each independent cities four of the boroughs Brooklyn Queens Manhattan and the Bronx would be among the ten most populous cities in the United States Staten Island would be ranked 37th as of 2020 these same boroughs are coterminous with the four most densely populated counties in the United States New York Manhattan Kings Brooklyn Bronx and Queens Manhattan Lower and Midtown Manhattan as seen by a SkySat satellite in 2017 Manhattan New York County is the geographically smallest and most densely populated borough It is home to Central Park and most of the city s skyscrapers and is sometimes locally known as The City 160 Manhattan s population density of 72 033 people per square mile 27 812 km2 in 2015 makes it the highest of any county in the United States and higher than the density of any individual American city 161 Manhattan is the cultural administrative and financial center of New York City and contains the headquarters of many major multinational corporations the United Nations headquarters Wall Street and a number of important universities The borough of Manhattan is often described as the financial and cultural center of the world 162 163 Most of the borough is situated on Manhattan Island at the mouth of the Hudson River and the East River and its southern tip at the confluence of the two rivers represents the birthplace of New York City itself Several small islands also compose part of the borough of Manhattan including Randall s Island Wards Island and Roosevelt Island in the East River and Governors Island and Liberty Island to the south in New York Harbor Manhattan Island is loosely divided into the Lower Midtown and Uptown regions Uptown Manhattan is divided by Central Park into the Upper East Side and the Upper West Side and above the park is Harlem bordering the Bronx Bronx County Harlem was predominantly occupied by Jewish and Italian Americans in the 19th century until the Great Migration It was the center of the Harlem Renaissance The borough of Manhattan also includes a small neighborhood on the mainland called Marble Hill which is contiguous with the Bronx New York City s remaining four boroughs are collectively referred to as the Outer Boroughs Ten mile 16km Manhattan skyline panorama from 120th Street to the Battery taken in February 2018 from across the Hudson River in Weehawken New Jersey Riverside Church Deutsche Bank Center 220 Central Park South Central Park Tower One57 432 Park Avenue 53W53 Chrysler Building Bank of America Tower 4 Times Square The New York Times Building Empire State Building Manhattan West a 55 Hudson Yards 14b 35 Hudson Yards 14c 10 Hudson Yards 14d 15 Hudson Yards 56 Leonard Street 8 Spruce Street Woolworth Building 70 Pine Street Four Seasons Downtown 40 Wall Street 3 World Trade Center 4 World Trade Center One World Trade Center View of Midtown Manhattan from New Jersey taken in September 2021 Brooklyn Brooklyn Kings County on the western tip of Long Island is the city s most populous borough Brooklyn is known for its cultural social and ethnic diversity an independent art scene distinct neighborhoods and a distinctive architectural heritage Downtown Brooklyn is the largest central core neighborhood in the Outer Boroughs The borough has a long beachfront shoreline including Coney Island established in the 1870s as one of the earliest amusement grounds in the U S 164 Marine Park and Prospect Park are the two largest parks in Brooklyn 165 Since 2010 Brooklyn has evolved into a thriving hub of entrepreneurship and high technology startup firms 166 167 and of postmodern art and design 167 168 Downtown Brooklyn skyline from Governors Island in September 2016 Queens Queens Queens County on Long Island north and east of Brooklyn is geographically the largest borough the most ethnically diverse county in the United States 169 and the most ethnically diverse urban area in the world 170 171 Historically a collection of small towns and villages founded by the Dutch the borough has since developed both commercial and residential prominence Downtown Flushing has become one of the busiest central core neighborhoods in the outer boroughs Queens is the site of the Citi Field baseball stadium home of the New York Mets and hosts the annual U S Open tennis tournament at Flushing Meadows Corona Park Additionally two of the three busiest airports serving the New York metropolitan area John F Kennedy International Airport and LaGuardia Airport are in Queens The third is Newark Liberty International Airport in Newark New Jersey The Bronx The Bronx Bronx County is both New York City s northernmost borough and the only one that is mostly on the mainland It is the location of Yankee Stadium the baseball park of the New York Yankees and home to the largest cooperatively owned housing complex in the United States Co op City 172 It is also home to the Bronx Zoo the world s largest metropolitan zoo 173 which spans 265 acres 1 07 km2 and houses more than 6 000 animals 174 The Bronx is also the birthplace of hip hop music and its associated culture 175 Pelham Bay Park is the largest park in New York City at 2 772 acres 1 122 ha 176 Staten Island Staten Island Richmond County is the most suburban in character of the five boroughs Staten Island is connected to Brooklyn by the Verrazano Narrows Bridge and to Manhattan by way of the free Staten Island Ferry a daily commuter ferry that provides unobstructed views of the Statue of Liberty Ellis Island and Lower Manhattan In central Staten Island the Staten Island Greenbelt spans approximately 2 500 acres 10 km2 including 28 miles 45 km of walking trails and one of the last undisturbed forests in the city 177 Designated in 1984 to protect the island s natural lands the Greenbelt comprises seven city parks The growing skyline of Long Island City Queens background 178 facing the East River and Manhattan in May 2017 The Grand Concourse in the Bronx foreground with Manhattan in the background in February 2018 St George Staten Island as seen from the Staten Island Ferry the world s busiest passenger only ferry system shuttling passengers between Manhattan and Staten IslandArchitecture Further information Architecture of New York City List of buildings sites and monuments in New York City List of tallest buildings in New York City and List of hotels in New York City The Empire State Building is a solitary icon of New York defined by its setbacks Art Deco details and spire as the world s tallest building from 1931 to 1970 The Chrysler Building built in 1930 is also a Manhattan icon in the Art Deco style with ornamental hubcaps and its spire Landmark 19th century rowhouses including brownstones on tree lined Kent Street in the Greenpoint Historic District Brooklyn modernist architecture juxtaposed with Gothic Revival architecture in Midtown Manhattan New York has architecturally noteworthy buildings in a wide range of styles and from distinct time periods from the Dutch Colonial Pieter Claesen Wyckoff House in Brooklyn the oldest section of which dates to 1656 to the modern One World Trade Center the skyscraper at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan and the most expensive office tower in the world by construction cost 179 Manhattan s skyline with its many skyscrapers is universally recognized and the city has been home to several of the tallest buildings in the world As of 2019 update New York City had 6 455 high rise buildings the third most in the world after Hong Kong and Seoul 180 Of these as of 2011 update 550 completed structures were at least 330 feet 100 m high with more than fifty completed skyscrapers taller than 656 feet 200 m These include the Woolworth Building an early example of Gothic Revival architecture in skyscraper design built with massively scaled Gothic detailing completed in 1913 for 17 years it was the world s tallest building 181 The 1916 Zoning Resolution required setbacks in new buildings and restricted towers to a percentage of the lot size to allow sunlight to reach the streets below 182 The Art Deco style of the Chrysler Building 1930 and Empire State Building 1931 with their tapered tops and steel spires reflected the zoning requirements The buildings have distinctive ornamentation such as the eagles at the corners of the 61st floor on the Chrysler Building and are considered some of the finest examples of the Art Deco style 183 A highly influential example of the international style in the United States is the Seagram Building 1957 distinctive for its facade using visible bronze toned I beams to evoke the building s structure The Conde Nast Building 2000 is a prominent example of green design in American skyscrapers 184 and has received an award from the American Institute of Architects and AIA New York State for its design The character of New York s large residential districts is often defined by the elegant brownstone rowhouses and townhouses and shabby tenements that were built during a period of rapid expansion from 1870 to 1930 185 In contrast New York City also has neighborhoods that are less densely populated and feature free standing dwellings In neighborhoods such as Riverdale in the Bronx Ditmas Park in Brooklyn and Douglaston in Queens large single family homes are common in various architectural styles such as Tudor Revival and Victorian 186 187 188 Stone and brick became the city s building materials of choice after the construction of wood frame houses was limited in the aftermath of the Great Fire of 1835 189 A distinctive feature of many of the city s buildings is the roof mounted wooden water tower In the 1800s the city required their installation on buildings higher than six stories to prevent the need for excessively high water pressures at lower elevations which could break municipal water pipes 190 Garden apartments became popular during the 1920s in outlying areas such as Jackson Heights 191 According to the United States Geological Survey an updated analysis of seismic hazard in July 2014 revealed a slightly lower hazard for tall buildings in New York City than previously assessed Scientists estimated this lessened risk based upon a lower likelihood than previously thought of slow shaking near the city which would be more likely to cause damage to taller structures from an earthquake in the vicinity of the city 192 Manhattan contained over 500 million square feet of office space as of 2022 the Covid 19 pandemic and hybrid work model have prompted consideration of commercial to residential conversion within Midtown Manhattan 193 Climate Main article Climate of New York City New York CityClimate chart explanation J F M A M J J A S O N D 3 6 40 28 3 2 42 30 4 3 50 36 4 1 62 46 4 71 55 4 5 80 64 4 6 85 70 4 6 83 69 4 3 76 62 4 4 65 51 3 6 54 42 4 4 44 34Average max and min temperatures in FPrecipitation totals in inchesMetric conversionJ F M A M J J A S O N D 91 4 2 81 6 1 109 10 2 104 17 8 102 22 13 114 27 18 117 29 21 117 28 21 109 24 17 112 18 11 91 12 6 112 7 1Average max and min temperatures in CPrecipitation totals in mmUnder the Koppen climate classification using the 0 C 32 F isotherm New York City features a humid subtropical climate Cfa and is thus the northernmost major city on the North American continent with this categorization The suburbs to the immediate north and west lie in the transitional zone between humid subtropical and humid continental climates Dfa 194 195 By the Trewartha classification the city is defined as having an oceanic climate Do 196 197 Annually the city averages 234 days with at least some sunshine 198 The city lies in the USDA 7b plant hardiness zone 199 Central Park in Winter by Raymond Speers in Munsey s Magazine February 1900 Winters are chilly and damp and prevailing wind patterns that blow sea breezes offshore temper the moderating effects of the Atlantic Ocean yet the Atlantic and the partial shielding from colder air by the Appalachian Mountains keep the city warmer in the winter than inland North American cities at similar or lesser latitudes such as Pittsburgh Cincinnati and Indianapolis The daily mean temperature in January the area s coldest month is 33 3 F 0 7 C 200 Temperatures usually drop to 10 F 12 C several times per winter 201 yet can also reach 60 F 16 C for several days even in the coldest winter month Spring and autumn are unpredictable and can range from cool to warm although they are usually mild with low humidity Summers are typically hot and humid with a daily mean temperature of 77 5 F 25 3 C in July 200 Nighttime temperatures are often enhanced due to the urban heat island effect Daytime temperatures exceed 90 F 32 C on average of 17 days each summer and in some years exceed 100 F 38 C although this is a rare achievement last occurring on July 18 2012 202 Similarly readings of 0 F 18 C are also extremely rare last occurring on February 14 2016 203 Extreme temperatures have ranged from 15 F 26 C recorded on February 9 1934 up to 106 F 41 C on July 9 1936 200 the coldest recorded wind chill was 37 F 38 C on the same day as the all time record low 204 The record cold daily maximum was 2 F 17 C on December 30 1917 while conversely the record warm daily minimum was 87 F 31 C on July 2 1903 202 The average water temperature of the nearby Atlantic Ocean ranges from 39 7 F 4 3 C in February to 74 1 F 23 4 C in August 205 The city receives 49 5 inches 1 260 mm of precipitation annually which is relatively evenly spread throughout the year Average winter snowfall between 1991 and 2020 has been 29 8 inches 76 cm this varies considerably between years Hurricanes and tropical storms are rare in the New York area 206 Hurricane Sandy brought a destructive storm surge to New York City on the evening of October 29 2012 flooding numerous streets tunnels and subway lines in Lower Manhattan and other areas of the city and cutting off electricity in many parts of the city and its suburbs 207 The storm and its profound impacts have prompted the discussion of constructing seawalls and other coastal barriers around the shorelines of the city and the metropolitan area to minimize the risk of destructive consequences from another such event in the future 208 209 The coldest month on record is January 1857 with a mean temperature of 19 6 F 6 9 C whereas the warmest months on record are July 1825 and July 1999 both with a mean temperature of 81 4 F 27 4 C 210 The warmest years on record are 2012 and 2020 both with mean temperatures of 57 1 F 13 9 C The coldest year is 1836 with a mean temperature of 47 3 F 8 5 C 210 211 The driest month on record is June 1949 with 0 02 inches 0 51 mm of rainfall The wettest month was August 2011 with 18 95 inches 481 mm of rainfall The driest year on record is 1965 with 26 09 inches 663 mm of rainfall The wettest year was 1983 with 80 56 inches 2 046 mm of rainfall 212 The snowiest month on record is February 2010 with 36 9 inches 94 cm of snowfall The snowiest season Jul Jun on record is 1995 1996 with 75 6 inches 192 cm of snowfall The least snowy season was 1972 1973 with 2 3 inches 5 8 cm of snowfall 213 The earliest seasonal trace of snowfall occurred on October 10 in both 1979 and 1925 The latest seasonal trace of snowfall occurred on May 9 in both 2020 and 1977 214 vteClimate data for New York Belvedere Castle Central Park 1991 2020 normals b extremes 1869 present c Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec YearRecord high F C 72 22 78 26 86 30 96 36 99 37 101 38 106 41 104 40 102 39 94 34 84 29 75 24 106 41 Mean maximum F C 60 4 15 8 60 7 15 9 70 3 21 3 82 9 28 3 88 5 31 4 92 1 33 4 95 7 35 4 93 4 34 1 89 0 31 7 79 7 26 5 70 7 21 5 62 9 17 2 97 0 36 1 Average high F C 39 5 4 2 42 2 5 7 49 9 9 9 61 8 16 6 71 4 21 9 79 7 26 5 84 9 29 4 83 3 28 5 76 2 24 6 64 5 18 1 54 0 12 2 44 3 6 8 62 6 17 0 Daily mean F C 33 7 0 9 35 9 2 2 42 8 6 0 53 7 12 1 63 2 17 3 72 0 22 2 77 5 25 3 76 1 24 5 69 2 20 7 57 9 14 4 48 0 8 9 39 1 3 9 55 8 13 2 Average low F C 27 9 2 3 29 5 1 4 35 8 2 1 45 5 7 5 55 0 12 8 64 4 18 0 70 1 21 2 68 9 20 5 62 3 16 8 51 4 10 8 42 0 5 6 33 8 1 0 48 9 9 4 Mean minimum F C 9 8 12 3 12 7 10 7 19 7 6 8 32 8 0 4 43 9 6 6 52 7 11 5 61 8 16 6 60 3 15 7 50 2 10 1 38 4 3 6 27 7 2 4 18 0 7 8 7 7 13 5 Record low F C 6 21 15 26 3 16 12 11 32 0 44 7 52 11 50 10 39 4 28 2 5 15 13 25 15 26 Average precipitation inches mm 3 64 92 3 19 81 4 29 109 4 09 104 3 96 101 4 54 115 4 60 117 4 56 116 4 31 109 4 38 111 3 58 91 4 38 111 49 52 1 258 Average snowfall inches cm 8 8 22 10 1 26 5 0 13 0 4 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 25 0 5 1 3 4 9 12 29 8 76 Average precipitation days 0 01 in 10 8 10 0 11 1 11 4 11 5 11 2 10 5 10 0 8 8 9 5 9 2 11 4 125 4Average snowy days 0 1 in 3 7 3 2 2 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 2 1 11 4Average relative humidity 61 5 60 2 58 5 55 3 62 7 65 2 64 2 66 0 67 8 65 6 64 6 64 1 63 0Average dew point F C 18 0 7 8 19 0 7 2 25 9 3 4 34 0 1 1 47 3 8 5 57 4 14 1 61 9 16 6 62 1 16 7 55 6 13 1 44 1 6 7 34 0 1 1 24 6 4 1 40 3 4 6 Mean monthly sunshine hours 162 7 163 1 212 5 225 6 256 6 257 3 268 2 268 2 219 3 211 2 151 0 139 0 2 534 7Percent possible sunshine 54 55 57 57 57 57 59 63 59 61 51 48 57Average ultraviolet index 2 3 4 6 7 8 8 8 6 4 2 1 5Source 1 NOAA relative humidity and sun 1961 1990 dew point 1965 1984 202 216 198 217 Source 2 Weather Atlas 218 See Climate of New York City for additional climate information from the outer boroughs Sea temperature data for New YorkMonth Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec YearAverage sea temperature F C 41 7 5 4 39 7 4 3 40 2 4 5 45 1 7 3 52 5 11 4 64 5 18 1 72 1 22 3 74 1 23 4 70 1 21 2 63 0 17 2 54 3 12 4 47 2 8 4 55 4 13 0 Source Weather Atlas 218 See or edit raw graph data Parks Main article List of New York City parks Flushing Meadows Corona Park was used in both the 1939 and 1964 New York World s Fair with the Unisphere as the centerpiece of the latter and which remains today The city of New York has a complex park system with various lands operated by the National Park Service the New York State Office of Parks Recreation and Historic Preservation and the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation In its 2018 ParkScore ranking The Trust for Public Land reported that the park system in New York City was the ninth best park system among the fifty most populous U S cities 219 ParkScore ranks urban park systems by a formula that analyzes median park size park acres as percent of city area the percent of city residents within a half mile of a park spending of park services per resident and the number of playgrounds per 10 000 residents In 2021 the New York City Council banned the use of synthetic pesticides by city agencies and instead required organic lawn management The effort was started by teacher Paula Rogovin s kindergarten class at P S 290 220 National parks Main article National Park Service The Statue of Liberty on Liberty Island in New York Harbor is a symbol of the United States and its ideals of freedom democracy and opportunity 23 Gateway National Recreation Area contains over 26 000 acres 110 km2 most of it in New York City 221 In Brooklyn and Queens the park contains over 9 000 acres 36 km2 of salt marsh wetlands islands and water including most of Jamaica Bay and the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge Also in Queens the park includes a significant portion of the western Rockaway Peninsula most notably Jacob Riis Park and Fort Tilden In Staten Island it includes Fort Wadsworth with historic pre Civil War era Battery Weed and Fort Tompkins and Great Kills Park with beaches trails and a marina The Statue of Liberty National Monument and Ellis Island Immigration Museum are managed by the National Park Service and are in both New York and New Jersey They are joined in the harbor by Governors Island National Monument Historic sites under federal management on Manhattan Island include Stonewall National Monument Castle Clinton National Monument Federal Hall National Memorial Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace National Historic Site General Grant National Memorial Grant s Tomb African Burial Ground National Monument and Hamilton Grange National Memorial Hundreds of properties are listed on the National Register of Historic Places or as a National Historic Landmark State parks Main article New York State Parks There are seven state parks within the confines of New York City Some of them include The Clay Pit Ponds State Park Preserve is a natural area that includes extensive riding trails Riverbank State Park is a 28 acre 11 ha facility that rises 69 feet 21 m over the Hudson River 222 Marsha P Johnson State Park is a state park in Brooklyn and Manhattan that borders the East River that was renamed in honor of Marsha P Johnson 223 City parks See also New York City Department of Parks and Recreation View of The Pond and Midtown Manhattan from the Gapstow Bridge in Central Park one of the world s most visited tourist attractions in 2019 New York City has over 28 000 acres 110 km2 of municipal parkland and 14 miles 23 km of public beaches 224 The largest municipal park in the city is Pelham Bay Park in the Bronx with 2 772 acres 1 122 ha 176 225 Central Park an 843 acre 3 41 km2 176 park in middle upper Manhattan is the most visited urban park in the United States and one of the most filmed locations in the world with 40 million visitors in 2013 226 The park has a wide range of attractions there are several lakes and ponds two ice skating rinks the Central Park Zoo the Central Park Conservatory Garden and the 106 acre 0 43 km2 Jackie Onassis Reservoir 227 Indoor attractions include Belvedere Castle with its nature center the Swedish Cottage Marionette Theater and the historic Carousel On October 23 2012 hedge fund manager John A Paulson announced a 100 million gift to the Central Park Conservancy the largest ever monetary donation to New York City s park system 228 Washington Square Park is a prominent landmark in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Lower Manhattan The Washington Square Arch at the northern gateway to the park is an iconic symbol of both New York University and Greenwich Village Prospect Park in Brooklyn has a 90 acre 36 ha meadow a lake and extensive woodlands Within the park is the historic Battle Pass prominent in the Battle of Long Island 229 Flushing Meadows Corona Park in Queens with its 897 acres 363 ha making it the city s fourth largest park 230 was the setting for the 1939 World s Fair and the 1964 World s Fair 231 and is host to the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center and the annual U S Open Tennis Championships tournament 232 Over a fifth of the Bronx s area 7 000 acres 28 km2 is dedicated to open space and parks including Pelham Bay Park Van Cortlandt Park the Bronx Zoo and the New York Botanical Gardens 233 In Staten Island the Conference House Park contains the historic Conference House site of the only attempt of a peaceful resolution to the American Revolution which was conducted in September 1775 attended by Benjamin Franklin representing the Americans and Lord Howe representing the British Crown 234 The historic Burial Ridge the largest Native American burial ground within New York City is within the park 235 Military installations Brooklyn is home to Fort Hamilton the U S military s only active duty installation within New York City 236 aside from Coast Guard operations The facility was established in 1825 on the site of a small battery used during the American Revolution and it is one of America s longest serving military forts 237 Today Fort Hamilton serves as the headquarters of the North Atlantic Division of the United States Army Corps of Engineers and for the New York City Recruiting Battalion It also houses the 1179th Transportation Brigade the 722nd Aeromedical Staging Squadron and a military entrance processing station Other formerly active military reservations still used for National Guard and military training or reserve operations in the city include Fort Wadsworth in Staten Island and Fort Totten in Queens DemographicsHistorical populationYearPop 16984 937 17125 840 18 3 17237 248 24 1 173710 664 47 1 174611 717 9 9 175613 046 11 3 177121 863 67 6 179049 401 126 0 180079 216 60 4 1810119 734 51 1 1820152 056 27 0 1830242 278 59 3 1840391 114 61 4 1850696 115 78 0 18601 174 779 68 8 18701 478 103 25 8 18801 911 698 29 3 18902 507 414 31 2 19003 437 202 37 1 19104 766 883 38 7 19205 620 048 17 9 19306 930 446 23 3 19407 454 995 7 6 19507 891 957 5 9 19607 781 984 1 4 19707 894 862 1 5 19807 071 639 10 4 19907 322 564 3 5 20008 008 278 9 4 20108 175 133 2 1 20208 804 190 7 7 Note Census figures 1790 2010 cover the present area of all five boroughs before and after the 1898 consolidation For New York City itself before annexing part of the Bronx in 1874 see Manhattan Demographics 238 Source U S Decennial Census 239 1698 1771 240 1790 1890 238 241 1900 1990 242 2000 2010 243 244 245 2010 2020 246 Main articles Demographics of New York City New York City ethnic enclaves and Demographic history of New York City Historical demographics 2020 247 2010 248 1990 249 1970 249 1940 249 White non Hispanic 30 9 33 3 43 4 64 0 92 1 Hispanic or Latino 28 3 28 6 23 7 15 2 1 6 Black or African American non Hispanic 20 2 22 8 28 8 21 1 6 1 Asian and Pacific Islander non Hispanic 15 6 12 6 7 0 1 2 0 2 Native American non Hispanic 0 2 0 2 0 4 0 1 N ATwo or more races non Hispanic 3 4 1 8 N A N A N ANew York City is the most populous city in the United States 250 with 8 804 190 residents 246 incorporating more immigration into the city than outmigration since the 2010 United States census 251 252 More than twice as many people live in New York City as compared to Los Angeles the second most populous U S city 250 and New York has more than three times the population of Chicago the third most populous U S city New York City gained more residents between 2010 and 2020 629 000 than any other U S city and a greater amount than the total sum of the gains over the same decade of the next four largest U S cities Los Angeles Chicago Houston and Phoenix Arizona combined 253 254 New York City s population is about 44 of New York State s population 255 and about 39 of the population of the New York metropolitan area 256 The majority of New York City residents in 2020 5 141 538 or 58 4 were living on Long Island in Brooklyn or in Queens 257 Population density Looking down Broadway in Midtown Manhattan New York City had an estimated population density of 29 302 37 inhabitants per square mile 11 313 71 km2 in 2020 as the most densely populated major U S city Manhattan New York County alone was home to 74 870 7 inhabitants per square mile 28 907 7 km2 rendering it the most densely populated municipality in the United States In 2020 the city had an estimated population density of 29 302 37 inhabitants per square mile 11 313 71 km2 rendering it the nation s most densely populated of all larger municipalities those with more than 100 000 residents with several small cities of fewer than 100 000 in adjacent Hudson County New Jersey having greater density as per the 2010 census 258 Geographically co extensive with New York County the borough of Manhattan s 2017 population density of 72 918 inhabitants per square mile 28 154 km2 makes it the highest of any county in the United States and higher than the density of any individual American city 259 260 261 262 The next three densest counties in the United States placing second through fourth are also New York boroughs Brooklyn the Bronx and Queens respectively 263 Race and ethnicity Further information Category Ethnic groups in New York City African Americans in New York City Bangladeshis in New York City Caribbeans in New York City Chinese in New York City Dominican Americans in New York City Filipinos in New York City Fuzhounese in New York City Indians in New York City Irish in New York City Italians in New York City Japanese in New York City Koreans in New York City Puerto Ricans in New York City Russians in New York City and Ukrainians in New York City The Spanish Harlem Orchestra New York City is home to nearly 3 million Latino Americans the largest Hispanic population of any city outside Latin America and Spain The city s population in 2020 was 30 9 White non Hispanic 28 7 Hispanic or Latino 20 2 Black or African American non Hispanic 15 6 Asian and 0 2 Native American non Hispanic 264 A total of 3 4 of the non Hispanic population identified with more than one race Throughout its history New York has been a major port of entry for immigrants into the United States More than 12 million European immigrants were received at Ellis Island between 1892 and 1924 265 The term melting pot was first coined to describe densely populated immigrant neighborhoods on the Lower East Side By 1900 Germans constituted the largest immigrant group followed by the Irish Jews and Italians 266 In 1940 Whites represented 92 of the city s population 249 Approximately 37 of the city s population is foreign born and more than half of all children are born to mothers who are immigrants as of 2013 267 268 In New York no single country or region of origin dominates 267 The ten largest sources of foreign born individuals in the city as of 2011 update were the Dominican Republic China Mexico Guyana Jamaica Ecuador Haiti India Russia and Trinidad and Tobago 269 while the Bangladeshi born immigrant population has become one of the fastest growing in the city counting over 74 000 by 2011 18 270 Asian Americans in New York City according to the 2010 census number more than one million greater than the combined totals of San Francisco and Los Angeles 271 New York contains the highest total Asian population of any U S city proper 272 The New York City borough of Queens is home to the state s largest Asian American population and the largest Andean Colombian Ecuadorian Peruvian and Bolivian populations in the United States and is also the most ethnically and linguistically diverse urban area in the world 273 171 Chinatown Manhattan Lower Manhattan s Little Italy Koreatown Midtown Manhattan Upper Manhattan s Spanish Harlem Little Russia Brooklyn Little India Queens The Chinese population constitutes the fastest growing nationality in New York State multiple satellites of the original Manhattan s Chinatown home to the highest concentration of Chinese people in the Western Hemisphere 274 275 as well as in Brooklyn and around Flushing Queens are thriving as traditionally urban enclaves while also expanding rapidly eastward into suburban Nassau County 276 on Long Island 277 as the New York metropolitan region and New York State have become the top destinations for new Chinese immigrants respectively and large scale Chinese immigration continues into New York City and surrounding areas 278 279 280 281 282 283 with the largest metropolitan Chinese diaspora outside Asia 18 284 including an estimated 812 410 individuals in 2015 285 In 2012 6 3 of New York City was of Chinese ethnicity with nearly three fourths living in either Queens or Brooklyn geographically on Long Island 286 A community numbering 20 000 Korean Chinese Chaoxianzu or Joseonjok is centered in Flushing Queens while New York City is also home to the largest Tibetan population outside China India and Nepal also centered in Queens 287 Koreans made up 1 2 of the city s population and Japanese 0 3 Filipinos were the largest Southeast Asian ethnic group at 0 8 followed by Vietnamese who made up 0 2 of New York City s population in 2010 Indians are the largest South Asian group comprising 2 4 of the city s population with Bangladeshis and Pakistanis at 0 7 and 0 5 respectively 288 Queens is the preferred borough of settlement for Asian Indians Koreans Filipinos and Malaysians 289 278 and other Southeast Asians 290 while Brooklyn is receiving large numbers of both West Indian and Asian Indian immigrants New York City has the largest European and non Hispanic White population of any American city At 2 7 million in 2012 New York s non Hispanic White population is larger than the non Hispanic White populations of Los Angeles 1 1 million Chicago 865 000 and Houston 550 000 combined 291 The non Hispanic White population was 6 6 million in 1940 292 The non Hispanic White population has begun to increase since 2010 293 The European diaspora residing in the city is very diverse According to 2012 census estimates there were roughly 560 000 Italian Americans 385 000 Irish Americans 253 000 German Americans 223 000 Russian Americans 201 000 Polish Americans and 137 000 English Americans Additionally Greek and French Americans numbered 65 000 each with those of Hungarian descent estimated at 60 000 people Ukrainian and Scottish Americans numbered 55 000 and 35 000 respectively People identifying ancestry from Spain numbered 30 838 total in 2010 294 Uzbekistan s president Shavkat Mirziyoyev with members of the Uzbek diaspora in New York City home to more than half of all Uzbek Americans most settling in Queens or Brooklyn People of Norwegian and Swedish descent both stood at about 20 000 each while people of Czech Lithuanian Portuguese Scotch Irish and Welsh descent all numbered between 12 000 and 14 000 295 Arab Americans number over 160 000 in New York City 296 with the highest concentration in Brooklyn Central Asians primarily Uzbek Americans are a rapidly growing segment of the city s non Hispanic White population enumerating over 30 000 and including more than half of all Central Asian immigrants to the United States 297 most settling in Queens or Brooklyn Albanian Americans are most highly concentrated in the Bronx 298 while Astoria Queens is the epicenter of American Greek culture as well as the Cypriot community The wider New York City metropolitan statistical area with more than twenty million people about fifty percent more than second place Los Angeles 299 is also ethnically diverse 300 with the largest foreign born population of any metropolitan region in the world The New York region continues to be by far the leading metropolitan gateway for legal immigrants admitted into the United States substantially exceeding the combined totals of Los Angeles and Miami 278 It is home to the largest Jewish and Israeli communities outside Israel with the Jewish population in the region numbering over 1 5 million in 2012 and including many diverse Jewish sects predominantly from around the Middle East and Eastern Europe and including a rapidly growing Orthodox Jewish population also the largest outside Israel 287 The metropolitan area is also home to 20 of the nation s Indian Americans and at least 20 Little India enclaves and 15 of all Korean Americans and four Koreatowns 301 the largest Asian Indian population in the Western Hemisphere the largest Russian American 279 Italian American and African American populations the largest Dominican American Puerto Rican American and South American 279 and second largest overall Hispanic population in the United States numbering 4 8 million 294 and includes multiple established Chinatowns within New York City alone 302 Band rehearsal on 125th Street in Harlem the historic epicenter of African American culture New York City is home by a significant margin to the world s largest Black population of any city outside Africa at over 2 2 million African immigration to New York City has contributed the majority of the Black population growth since 2000 Ecuador Colombia Guyana Peru Brazil and Venezuela are the top source countries from South America for immigrants to the New York City region the Dominican Republic Jamaica Haiti and Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean Nigeria Egypt Ghana Tanzania Kenya and South Africa from Africa and El Salvador Honduras and Guatemala in Central America 303 Amidst a resurgence of Puerto Rican migration to New York City this population had increased to approximately 1 3 million in the metropolitan area as of 2013 update In 2022 New York City began receiving thousands of Latino immigrants bused from the state of Texas mostly originating from Venezuela Ecuador Columbia and Honduras 304 Since 2010 Little Australia has emerged and is growing rapidly representing the Australasian presence in Nolita Manhattan 305 306 307 308 In 2011 there were an estimated 20 000 Australian residents of New York City nearly quadruple the 5 537 in 2005 309 310 Qantas Airways of Australia and Air New Zealand have been planning for long haul flights from New York to Sydney and Auckland which would both rank among the longest non stop flights in the world 311 A Little Sri Lanka has developed in the Tompkinsville neighborhood of Staten Island 312 Le Petit Senegal or Little Senegal is based in Harlem Richmond Hill Queens is often thought of as Little Guyana for its large Guyanese community 313 as well as Punjab Avenue ਪ ਜ ਬ ਐਵ ਨ ਊ or Little Punjab for its high concentration of Punjabi people Little Poland is expanding rapidly in Greenpoint Brooklyn Sexual orientation and gender identity Main articles LGBT culture in New York City Stonewall riots NYC Pride March and List of LGBT people from New York City Further information New York City Drag March Queens Liberation Front Queens Pride Parade and Same sex marriage in New York Philippine born Geena Rocero introducing International Transgender Day of Visibility Caribbean NYC LGBTQ Equality Project The NYC Dyke March the world s largest celebration of lesbian pride and culture 314 Spectators at a BDSM street fair in Lower Manhattan NYC Pride March in Manhattan the world s largest 29 315 The Multicultural Festival at the 2018 Queens Pride Parade New York City has been described as the gay capital of the world and is home to one of the world s largest LGBTQ populations and the most prominent 316 The New York metropolitan area is home to about 570 000 self identifying gay and bisexual people the largest in the United States 317 318 Same sex sexual activity between consenting adults has been legal in New York since the New York v Onofre case in 1980 which invalidated the state s sodomy law 319 Same sex marriages in New York were legalized on June 24 2011 and were authorized to take place on July 23 2011 320 Brian Silverman the author of Frommer s New York City from 90 a Day wrote the city has one of the world s largest loudest and most powerful LGBT communities and Gay and lesbian culture is as much a part of New York s basic identity as yellow cabs high rise buildings and Broadway theatre 321 LGBT travel guide Queer in the World states The fabulosity of Gay New York is unrivaled on Earth and queer culture seeps into every corner of its five boroughs 322 LGBT advocate and entertainer Madonna stated metaphorically Anyways not only is New York City the best place in the world because of the queer people here Let me tell you something if you can make it here then you must be queer 323 The annual New York City Pride March or gay pride parade proceeds southward down Fifth Avenue and ends at Greenwich Village in Lower Manhattan the parade is the largest pride parade in the world attracting tens of thousands of participants and millions of sidewalk spectators each June 324 29 The annual Queens Pride Parade is held in Jackson Heights and is accompanied by the ensuing Multicultural Parade 325 Stonewall 50 WorldPride NYC 2019 was the largest international Pride celebration in history produced by Heritage of Pride and enhanced through a partnership with the I NY program s LGBT division commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising with 150 000 participants and five million spectators attending in Manhattan alone 326 New York City is also home to the largest transgender population in the world estimated at more than 50 000 in 2018 concentrated in Manhattan and Queens however until the June 1969 Stonewall riots this community had felt marginalized and neglected by the gay community 325 129 Brooklyn Liberation March the largest transgender rights demonstration in LGBTQ history took place on June 14 2020 stretching from Grand Army Plaza to Fort Greene Brooklyn focused on supporting Black transgender lives drawing an estimated 15 000 to 20 000 participants 327 328 Religion Religious affiliation 2014 329 330 Christian 59 Catholic 33 Protestant 23 Other Christian 3 Unaffiliated 24 Jewish 8 Muslim 4 Hindu 2 Buddhist 1 Other faiths 1 Christianity Further information St Patrick s Cathedral Midtown Manhattan Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree and Christmas in New York The landmark Neo Gothic Roman Catholic St Patrick s Cathedral Midtown Manhattan Largely as a result of Western European missionary work and colonialism Christianity is the largest religion in New York City 329 which is home to the highest number of churches of any city in the world 14 Roman Catholicism is the largest Christian denomination 33 followed by Protestantism 23 and other Christians 3 The Roman Catholic population are primarily served by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York and Diocese of Brooklyn Eastern Catholics are divided into numerous jurisdictions throughout the city Evangelical Protestantism is the largest branch of Protestantism in the city 9 followed by Mainline Protestantism 8 while the converse is usually true for other cities and metropolitan areas 330 In Evangelicalism Baptists are the largest group in Mainline Protestantism Reformed Protestants compose the largest subset The majority of historically African American churches are affiliated with the National Baptist Convention USA and Progressive National Baptist Convention The Church of God in Christ is one of the largest predominantly Black Pentecostal denominations in the area Approximately 1 of the population is Mormon The Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America and other Orthodox Christians mainstream and independent were the largest Eastern Christian groups The American Orthodox Catholic Church initially led by Aftimios Ofiesh was founded in New York City in 1927 Judaism Main articles Judaism in New York City History of the Jews in New York and Jewish arrival in New Amsterdam Ultra Orthodox Jewish residents in Brooklyn nicknamed the most Jewish spot on Earth 331 and home to the world s largest Jewish community which with over 600 000 adherents living in the borough greater than both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem 332 Judaism the second largest religion practiced in New York City with approximately 1 6 million adherents as of 2022 represents the largest Jewish community of any city in the world greater than the combined totals of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem 333 334 Nearly half of the city s Jews live in Brooklyn 332 331 The ethno religious population makes up 18 4 of the city and its religious demographic makes up 8 335 The first recorded Jewish settler was Jacob Barsimson who arrived in August 1654 on a passport from the Dutch West India Company 336 Following the assassination of Alexander II of Russia for which many blamed the Jews the 36 years beginning in 1881 experienced the largest wave of Jewish immigration to the United States 337 In 2012 the largest Jewish denominations were Orthodox Haredi and Conservative Judaism 338 Reform Jewish communities are prevalent through the area Congregation Emanu El of New York in Manhattan is the largest Reform synagogue in the world Islam Main article Islam in New York City The Islamic Cultural Center of New York in Upper Manhattan was the first mosque built in New York City Islam ranks as the third largest religion in New York City following Christianity and Judaism with estimates ranging between 600 000 and 1 000 000 observers of Islam including 10 of the city s public school children 339 Given both the size and scale of the city as well as its relative proxinity and accessibility by air transportation to the Middle East North Africa Central Asia and South Asia 22 3 of American Muslims live in New York City with 1 5 million Muslims in the greater New York metropolitan area representing the largest metropolitan Muslim population in the Western Hemisphere 340 and the most ethnically diverse Muslim population of any city in the world 341 Powers Street Mosque in Brooklyn is one of the oldest continuously operating mosques in the U S and represents the first Islamic organization in both the city and the state of New York 342 343 Hinduism and other religious affiliations Further information Hindu Temple Society of North America Ganesha Temple in Flushing Queens is the oldest Hindu temple in the Western Hemisphere Following these three largest religious groups in New York City are Hinduism Buddhism Sikhism Zoroastrianism and a variety of other religions as well as atheism In 2014 24 of New Yorkers identified with no organized religious affiliation a little over 3 of New Yorkers were atheist 329 Wealth and income disparity New York City like other large cities has a high degree of income disparity as indicated by its Gini coefficient of 0 55 as of 2017 344 In the first quarter of 2014 the average weekly wage in New York County Manhattan was 2 749 representing the highest total among large counties in the United States 345 As of 2017 New York City was home to the highest number of billionaires of any city in the world at 103 346 including former Mayor Michael Bloomberg 347 New York also had the highest density of millionaires per capita among major U S cities in 2014 at 4 6 of residents 348 New York City is one of the relatively few American cities levying an income tax about 3 on its residents 349 350 351 As of 2018 there were 78 676 homeless people in New York City 352 EconomyMain article Economy of New York City Further information Economy of Long Island and Economy of New York State Top publicly traded companies in New York City ranked by 2015 revenues with city and US ranksNYC Corporation US1 Verizon Communications 132 JPMorgan Chase 233 Citigroup 294 MetLife 405 American International Group 496 Pfizer pharmaceuticals 557 New York Life 618 Goldman Sachs 749 Morgan Stanley 7810 TIAA Teachers Ins amp Annuity 8211 INTL FCStone 8312 American Express 85Every firm s revenue exceeded 30 billion Financial services firms in greenFull table at Economy of New York CitySource Fortune 500 353 New York City is a global hub of business and commerce and an established safe haven for global investors 354 and is sometimes described as the capital of the world 355 The term global city was popularized by sociologist Saskia Sassen in her 1991 work The Global City New York London Tokyo 356 New York is a center for worldwide banking and finance health care and life sciences 10 medical technology and research retailing world trade transportation tourism real estate new media traditional media advertising legal services accountancy insurance both musical and prose theater fashion and the arts in the United States while Silicon Alley metonymous for New York s broad spectrum high technology sphere continues to expand The Port of New York and New Jersey is a major economic engine handling a maritime cargo volume in the ten months through October 2022 of over 8 2 million TEUs benefitting post Panamax from the expansion of the Panama Canal and accelerating ahead of California seaports in monthly cargo volumes 357 358 Many Fortune 500 corporations are headquartered in New York City 359 as are a large number of multinational corporations New York City has been ranked first among cities across the globe in attracting capital business and tourists 360 361 New York City s role as the top global center for the advertising industry is metonymously reflected as Madison Avenue 362 The city s fashion industry provides approximately 180 000 employees with 11 billion in annual wages 363 The non profit Partnership for New York City currently headed by Kathryn Wylde is the city s pre eminent private business association comprising approximately 330 corporate leaders in membership The fashion industry is based in Midtown Manhattan and is represented by the Council of Fashion Designers of America CDFA headquartered in Lower Manhattan Significant economic sectors also include non profit institutions and universities Manufacturing declined over the 20th century but still accounts for significant employment particularly in smaller operations The city s apparel and garment industry historically centered on the Garment District in Manhattan peaked in 1950 when more than 323 000 workers were employed in the industry in New York In 2015 fewer than 23 000 New York City residents were employed in the manufacture of garments accessories and finished textiles although efforts to revive the industry were underway 364 and the American fashion industry continues to be metonymized as Seventh Avenue 365 Chocolate is New York City s leading specialty food export with up to 234 million worth of exports each year 366 Godiva one of the world s largest chocolatiers is headquartered in Manhattan 367 and an unofficial chocolate district in Brooklyn is home to several chocolate makers and retailers 368 Food processing is a 5 billion industry that employs more than 19 000 residents Wall Street Main article Wall Street The Financial District of Lower Manhattan including Wall Street the world s principal financial center 40 369 New York City s most important economic sector lies in its role as the headquarters for the U S financial industry metonymously known as Wall Street The city s securities industry continues to form the largest segment of the city s financial sector and is an important economic engine Many large financial companies are headquartered in New York City and the city is also home to a burgeoning number of financial startup companies Lower Manhattan is home to the New York Stock Exchange at 11 Wall Street and the Nasdaq at 165 Broadway representing the world s largest and second largest stock exchanges respectively when measured both by overall average daily trading volume and by total market capitalization of their listed companies in 2013 370 371 Investment banking fees on Wall Street totaled approximately 40 billion in 2012 372 while in 2013 senior New York City bank officers who manage risk and compliance functions earned as much as 324 000 annually 373 In fiscal year 2013 14 Wall Street s securities industry generated 19 of New York State s tax revenue 374 New York City remains the largest global center for trading in public equity and debt capital markets driven in part by the size and financial development of the U S economy 375 31 32 376 New York also leads in hedge fund management private equity and the monetary volume of mergers and acquisitions Several investment banks and investment managers headquartered in Manhattan are important participants in other global financial centers 375 34 35 New York is also the principal commercial banking center of the United States 377 Many of the world s largest media conglomerates are also based in the city Manhattan contained over 500 million square feet 46 5 million m2 of office space in 2018 378 making it the largest office market in the United States 379 while Midtown Manhattan with 400 million square feet 37 2 million m2 in 2018 378 is the largest central business district in the world 380 Tech and biotech Further information Tech NYC Tech companies in New York City Biotech companies in New York City and Silicon Alley Silicon Alley centered in New York has evolved into a metonym for the sphere encompassing the metropolitan region s high technology industries 381 involving the internet new media financial technology fintech and cryptocurrency telecommunications digital media software development biotechnology game design and other fields within information technology that are supported by its entrepreneurship ecosystem and venture capital investments High technology startup companies and employment are growing in New York City and the region The technology sector has been claiming a greater share of New York City s economy since 2010 382 Tech NYC founded in 2016 is a non profit organization which represents New York City s technology industry with government civic institutions in business and in the media and whose primary goals are to further augment New York s substantial tech talent base and to advocate for policies that will nurture tech companies to grow in the city 383 The biotechnology sector is also growing in New York City based upon the city s strength in academic scientific research and public and commercial financial support On December 19 2011 Mayor Michael R Bloomberg announced his choice of Cornell University and Technion Israel Institute of Technology to build a 2 billion graduate school of applied sciences called Cornell Tech on Roosevelt Island with the goal of transforming New York City into the world s premier technology capital 384 385 By mid 2014 Accelerator a biotech investment firm had raised more than 30 million from investors including Eli Lilly and Company Pfizer and Johnson amp Johnson for initial funding to create biotechnology startups at the Alexandria Center for Life Science which encompasses more than 700 000 square feet 65 000 m2 on East 29th Street and promotes collaboration among scientists and entrepreneurs at the center and with nearby academic medical and research institutions The New York City Economic Development Corporation s Early Stage Life Sciences Funding Initiative and venture capital partners including Celgene General Electric Ventures and Eli Lilly committed a minimum of 100 million to help launch 15 to 20 ventures in life sciences and biotechnology 386 Real estate The Deutsche Bank Center as viewed from Central Park West Real estate is a major force in the city s economy as the total value of all New York City property was assessed at US 1 072 trillion for the 2017 fiscal year an increase of 10 6 from the previous year with 89 of the increase coming from market effects 387 The Deutsche Bank Center is the property with the highest listed market value in the city at 1 1 billion in 2006 387 New York City is home to some of the nation s and the world s most valuable real estate 450 Park Avenue was sold on July 2 2007 for 510 million about 1 589 per square foot 17 104 m2 breaking the barely month old record for an American office building of 1 476 per square foot 15 887 m2 set in the June 2007 sale of 660 Madison Avenue 388 In 2014 Manhattan was home to six of the top ten ZIP codes in the United States by median housing price 389 Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan commands the highest retail rents in the world at 3 000 per square foot 32 000 m2 in 2017 390 In 2019 the most expensive home sale ever in the United States achieved completion in Manhattan at a selling price of 238 million for a 24 000 square feet 2 200 m2 penthouse apartment overlooking Central Park 391 In 2022 one bedroom apartments in Manhattan rented at a median monthly price of US 3 600 00 one of the world s highest Tourism Main article Tourism in New York City Times Square is the hub of the Broadway theater district and a media center It also has one of the highest annual attendance rates of any tourist attraction in the world estimated at 50 million 30 Tourism is a vital industry for New York City and NYC amp Company represents the city s official bureau of tourism New York has witnessed a growing combined volume of international and domestic tourists reflecting over 60 million visitors to the city per year the world s busiest tourist destination 14 Approximately 12 million visitors to New York City have been from outside the United States with the highest numbers from the United Kingdom Canada Brazil and China Multiple sources have called New York the most photographed city in the world 392 393 394 The I Love New York logo designed by Milton Glaser in 1977I Love New York stylized I NY is both a logo and a song that are the basis of an advertising campaign and have been used since 1977 to promote tourism in New York City 395 and later to promote New York State as well The trademarked logo owned by New York State Empire State Development 396 appears in souvenir shops and brochures throughout the city and state some licensed many not The song is the state song of New York The majority of the most high profile tourist destinations to the city are situated in Manhattan These include Times Square Broadway theater productions the Empire State Building the Statue of Liberty Ellis Island the United Nations headquarters the World Trade Center including the National September 11 Museum and One World Trade Center the art museums along Museum Mile green spaces such as Central Park Washington Square Park the High Line and the medieval gardens of The Cloisters the Stonewall Inn Rockefeller Center ethnic enclaves including the Manhattan Chinatown Koreatown Curry Hill Harlem Spanish Harlem Little Italy and Little Australia luxury shopping along Fifth and Madison Avenues and events such as the Halloween Parade in Greenwich Village the Brooklyn Bridge shared with Brooklyn the Macy s Thanksgiving Day Parade the lighting of the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree the St Patrick s Day Parade seasonal activities such as ice skating in Central Park in the wintertime the Tribeca Film Festival and free performances in Central Park at SummerStage 397 Points of interest have also developed in the city outside Manhattan and have made the outer boroughs tourist destinations in their own right These include numerous ethnic enclaves the Unisphere Flushing Meadows Corona Park and Downtown Flushing in Queens Downtown Brooklyn Coney Island Williamsburg Park Slope and Prospect Park in Brooklyn the Bronx Zoo the New York Botanical Garden and the Grand Concourse in the Bronx and the Staten Island Ferry shuttling passengers between Staten Island and the South Ferry Terminal bordering Battery Park in Lower Manhattan at the historical birthplace of New York City Media and entertainment Main article Media in New York City Further information New Yorkers in journalism Rockefeller Center is one of Manhattan s media and entertainment hubs New York City has been described as the entertainment 14 398 399 and digital media capital of the world 400 401 The city is a prominent location for the American entertainment industry with many films television series books and other media being set there 402 As of 2019 update New York City was the second largest center for filmmaking and television production in the United States producing about 200 feature films annually employing 130 000 individuals The filmed entertainment industry has been growing in New York contributing nearly 9 billion to the New York City economy alone as of 2015 403 By volume New York is the world leader in independent film production one third of all American independent films are produced there 404 405 The Association of Independent Commercial Producers is also based in New York 406 In the first five months of 2014 alone location filming for television pilots in New York City exceeded the record production levels for all of 2013 407 with New York surpassing Los Angeles as the top North American city for the same distinction during the 2013 2014 cycle 408 New York City is the center for the advertising music newspaper digital media and publishing industries and is also the largest media market in North America 409 Some of the city s media conglomerates and institutions include Warner Bros Discovery the Thomson Reuters Corporation the Associated Press Bloomberg L P the News Corp The New York Times Company NBCUniversal the Hearst Corporation AOL Fox Corporation and Paramount Global Seven of the world s top eight global advertising agency networks have their headquarters in New York 410 Two of the top three record labels headquarters are in New York Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group Universal Music Group also has offices in New York New media enterprises are contributing an increasingly important component to the city s central role in the media sphere Times Square Studios is situated at the Crossroads of the World More than 200 newspapers and 350 consumer magazines have an office in the city 405 and the publishing industry employs about 25 000 people 411 Two of the three national daily newspapers with the largest circulations in the United States are published in New York The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times NYT Nicknamed the Grey Lady the NYT has won the most Pulitzer Prizes for journalism and is considered the U S media s newspaper of record 28 Tabloid newspapers in the city include The New York Daily News which was founded in 1919 by Joseph Medill Patterson 412 and The New York Post founded in 1801 by Alexander Hamilton 413 The city also has a comprehensive ethnic press with 270 newspapers and magazines published in more than 40 languages 414 El Diario La Prensa is New York s largest Spanish language daily and the oldest in the nation 415 The New York Amsterdam News published in Harlem is a prominent African American newspaper The Village Voice historically the largest alternative newspaper in the United States announced in 2017 that it would cease publication of its print edition and convert to a fully digital venture 416 The television and radio industry developed in New York and is a significant employer in the city s economy The three major American broadcast networks are all headquartered in New York ABC CBS and NBC Many cable networks are based in the city as well including CNN MSNBC MTV Fox News HBO Showtime Bravo Food Network AMC and Comedy Central News 12 Networks operated News 12 The Bronx and News 12 Brooklyn WBAI with news and information programming is one of the few socialist radio stations operating in the United States New York is also a major center for non commercial educational media NYC Media is the official public radio television and online media network and broadcasting service of New York City 417 and this network has produced several original Emmy Award winning shows covering music and culture in city neighborhoods and city government The oldest public access television channel in the United States is the Manhattan Neighborhood Network founded in 1971 418 WNET is the city s major public television station and a primary source of national Public Broadcasting Service PBS television programming WNYC a public radio station owned by the city until 1997 has the largest public radio audience in the United States 419 EducationMain article Education in New York City New York City has the largest educational system of any city in the world 14 The city s educational infrastructure spans primary education secondary education higher education and research Primary and secondary education The New York City Public Schools system managed by the New York City Department of Education is the largest public school system in the United States serving about 1 1 million students in more than 1 700 separate primary and secondary schools 420 The city s public school system includes nine specialized high schools to serve academically and artistically gifted students The city government pays the Pelham Public Schools to educate a very small detached section of the Bronx 421 The New York City Charter School Center assists the setup of new charter schools 422 There are approximately 900 additional privately run secular and religious schools in the city 423 Higher education and research Butler Library at Columbia University described as one of the most beautiful college libraries in the United States 424 The Washington Square Arch an unofficial icon of both New York University NYU and its Greenwich Village neighborhood More than a million students the highest number of any city in the United States 425 are enrolled in New York City s more than 120 higher education institutions with more than half a million in the City University of New York CUNY system alone as of 2020 update including both degree and professional programs 426 According to Academic Ranking of World Universities New York City has on average the best higher education institutions of any global city 427 The public CUNY system is one of the largest universities in the nation comprising 25 institutions across all five boroughs senior colleges community colleges and other graduate professional schools The public State University of New York SUNY system includes campuses in New York City including Downstate Health Sciences University Fashion Institute of Technology Maritime College and the College of Optometry New York City is home to such notable private universities as Barnard College Columbia University Cooper Union Fordham University New York University New York Institute of Technology Rockefeller University and Yeshiva University several of these universities are ranked among the top universities in the world 428 429 while some of the world s most prestigious institutions like Princeton University and Yale University remain in the New York metropolitan area The city also hosts other smaller private colleges and universities including many religious and special purpose institutions such as Pace University St John s University The Juilliard School Manhattan College Adelphi University Manhattan Mercy College New York The College of Mount Saint Vincent Parsons School of Design The New School Pratt Institute New York Film Academy The School of Visual Arts The King s College Marymount Manhattan College and Wagner College Much of the scientific research in the city is done in medicine and the life sciences In 2019 the New York metropolitan area ranked first on the list of cities and metropolitan areas by share of published articles in life sciences 430 New York City has the most postgraduate life sciences degrees awarded annually in the United States and in 2012 43 523 licensed physicians were practicing in New York City 431 There are 127 Nobel laureates with roots in local institutions as of 2004 update 432 Major biomedical research institutions include Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Rockefeller University SUNY Downstate Medical Center Albert Einstein College of Medicine Mount Sinai School of Medicine and Weill Cornell Medical College being joined by the Cornell University Technion Israel Institute of Technology venture on Roosevelt Island The graduates of SUNY Maritime College in the Bronx earned the highest average annual salary of any university graduates in the United States 144 000 as of 2017 433 Human resourcesPublic health Main articles New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation and New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene New York Presbyterian Hospital affiliated with Columbia University and Cornell University the largest hospital and largest private employer in New York City and one of the world s busiest 434 The New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation HHC operates the public hospitals and outpatient clinics in New York City A public benefit corporation with As of 2021 update HHC is the largest municipal healthcare system in the United States with 10 9 billion in annual revenues 435 HHC is the largest municipal healthcare system in the United States serving 1 4 million patients including more than 475 000 uninsured city residents 436 HHC was created in 1969 by the New York State Legislature as a public benefit corporation Chapter 1016 of the Laws 1969 437 HHC operates 11 acute care hospitals five nursing homes six diagnostic and treatment centers and more than 70 community based primary care sites serving primarily the poor and working class HHC s MetroPlus Health Plan is one of the New York area s largest providers of government sponsored health insurance and is the plan of choice for nearly half a million New Yorkers 438 HHC s facilities annually provide millions of New Yorkers services interpreted in more than 190 languages 439 The most well known hospital in the HHC system is Bellevue Hospital the oldest public hospital in the United States Bellevue is the designated hospital for treatment of the President of the United States and other world leaders if they become sick or injured while in New York City 440 The president of HHC is Ramanathan Raju MD a surgeon and former CEO of the Cook County health system in Illinois 441 In August 2017 Mayor Bill de Blasio signed legislation outlawing pharmacies from selling cigarettes once their existing licenses to do so expired beginning in 2018 442 Public safety Police and law enforcement Main articles New York City Police Department and Law enforcement in New York City Further information Police surveillance in New York City and Crime in New York City The New York Police Department NYPD is the largest police force in the United States The New York Police Department NYPD has been the largest police force in the United States by a significant margin with more than 35 000 sworn officers 443 Members of the NYPD are frequently referred to by politicians the media and their own police cars by the nickname New York s Finest Crime overall has trended downward in New York City since the 1990s 444 In 2012 the NYPD came under scrutiny for its use of a stop and frisk program 445 446 447 which has undergone several policy revisions since then In 2014 New York City had the third lowest murder rate among the largest U S cities 448 having become significantly safer after a spike in crime in the 1970s through 1990s 449 Violent crime in New York City decreased more than 75 from 1993 to 2005 and continued decreasing during periods when the nation as a whole saw increases 450 By 2002 New York City was ranked 197th in crime among the 216 U S cities with populations greater than 100 000 450 In 1992 the city recorded 2 245 murders 451 In 2005 the homicide rate was at its lowest level since 1966 452 and in 2009 the city recorded fewer than 461 homicides for the first time ever since crime statistics were first published in 1963 451 In 2017 60 1 of violent crime suspects were Black 29 6 Hispanic 6 5 White 3 6 Asian and 0 2 American Indian 453 New York City experienced 292 homicides in 2017 454 Police officers of New York Police Department NYPD Sociologists and criminologists have not reached consensus on the explanation for the dramatic long term decrease in the city s crime rate Some attribute the phenomenon to new tactics used by the NYPD 455 including its use of CompStat and the broken windows theory 456 Others cite the end of the crack epidemic and demographic changes 457 including from immigration 458 Another theory is that widespread exposure to lead pollution from automobile exhaust which can lower intelligence and increase aggression levels incited the initial crime wave in the mid 20th century most acutely affecting heavily trafficked cities like New York A strong correlation was found demonstrating that violent crime rates in New York and other big cities began to fall after lead was removed from American gasoline in the 1970s 459 Another theory cited to explain New York City s falling homicide rate is the inverse correlation between the number of murders and the increasingly wet climate in the city 460 Organized crime has long been associated with New York City beginning with the Forty Thieves and the Roach Guards in the Five Points neighborhood in the 1820s followed by the Tongs in the same neighborhood which ultimately evolved into Chinatown Manhattan The 20th century saw a rise in the Mafia dominated by the Five Families as well as in gangs including the Black Spades 461 The Mafia and gang presence has declined in the city in the 21st century 462 463 Firefighting Main article New York City Fire Department The Fire Department of New York FDNY is the largest municipal fire department in the United States The Fire Department of New York FDNY provides fire protection technical rescue primary response to biological chemical and radioactive hazards and emergency medical services for the five boroughs of New York City The FDNY is the largest municipal fire department in the United States and the second largest in the world after the Tokyo Fire Department The FDNY employs approximately 11 080 uniformed firefighters and more than 3 300 uniformed EMTs and paramedics The FDNY s motto is New York s Bravest The fire department faces multifaceted firefighting challenges in many ways unique to New York In addition to responding to building types that range from wood frame single family homes to high rise structures the FDNY also responds to fires that occur in the New York City Subway 464 Secluded bridges and tunnels as well as large parks and wooded areas that can give rise to brush fires also present challenges The FDNY is headquartered at 9 MetroTech Center in Downtown Brooklyn 465 and the FDNY Fire Academy is on the Randalls Island 466 There are three Bureau of Fire Communications alarm offices which receive and dispatch alarms to appropriate units One office at 11 Metrotech Center in Brooklyn houses Manhattan Citywide Brooklyn and Staten Island Fire Communications the Bronx and Queens offices are in separate buildings Public library system The Stephen A Schwarzman Headquarters Building of the New York Public Library at 5th Avenue and 42nd Street The New York Public Library NYPL which has the largest collection of any public library system in the United States serves Manhattan the Bronx and Staten Island 467 Queens is served by the Queens Borough Public Library QPL the nation s second largest public library system while the Brooklyn Public Library BPL serves Brooklyn 467 In 2013 the New York Public Library and the Brooklyn Public Library announced that they would merge their technical services departments into a new department called BookOps This proposed merger anticipated a savings of 2 million for the Brooklyn Public Library and 1 5 million for the New York Public Library Although not currently part of the merger it is expected that the Queens Public Library will eventually share some resources with the other city libraries 468 469 Culture and contemporary lifeMain article Culture of New York City Further information Broadway theatre LGBT culture in New York City List of museums and cultural institutions in New York City Music of New York City List of nightclubs in New York City List of LGBT people from New York City List of people from New York City New York Fashion Week and Met Gala New York City has been described as the cultural capital of the world by Manhattan s Baruch College 470 A book containing a series of essays titled New York Culture Capital of the World 1940 1965 has also been published as showcased by the National Library of Australia 471 In describing New York author Tom Wolfe said Culture just seems to be in the air like part of the weather 472 Numerous major American cultural movements began in the city such as the Harlem Renaissance which established the African American literary canon in the United States 473 474 The city became the center of stand up comedy in the early 20th century jazz 475 in the 1940s abstract expressionism in the 1950s and the birthplace of hip hop in the 1970s 476 The city s punk 477 and hardcore 478 scenes were influential in the 1970s and 1980s New York has long had a flourishing scene for Jewish American literature The city is the birthplace of many cultural movements including the Harlem Renaissance in literature and visual art abstract expressionism also known as the New York School in painting and hip hop 175 punk salsa freestyle Tin Pan Alley certain forms of jazz and along with Philadelphia disco in music New York City has been considered the dance capital of the world 479 480 The city is also frequently the setting for novels movies see List of films set in New York City and television programs New York Fashion Week is one of the world s preeminent fashion events and is afforded extensive coverage by the media 481 482 New York has also frequently been ranked the top fashion capital of the world on the annual list compiled by the Global Language Monitor 483 Pace The fast paced streets of New York City January 2020 One of the most common traits attributed to New York City is its fast pace 484 485 486 which spawned the term New York minute 487 Journalist Walt Whitman characterized New York s streets as being traversed by hurrying feverish electric crowds 486 Arts New York City has more than 2 000 arts and cultural organizations and more than 500 art galleries 488 The city government funds the arts with a larger annual budget than the National Endowment for the Arts 488 Wealthy business magnates in the 19th century built a network of major cultural institutions such as Carnegie Hall and the Metropolitan Museum of Art which have become internationally renowned The advent of electric lighting led to elaborate theater productions and in the 1880s New York City theaters on Broadway and along 42nd Street began featuring a new stage form that became known as the Broadway musical Strongly influenced by the city s immigrants productions such as those of Harrigan and Hart George M Cohan and others used song in narratives that often reflected themes of hope and ambition New York City itself is the subject or background of many plays and musicals Performing arts Main articles Broadway theatre and Music of New York City Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts Broadway theatre is one of the premier forms of English language theatre in the world named after Broadway the major thoroughfare that crosses Times Square 489 also sometimes referred to as The Great White Way 490 491 492 Forty one venues in Midtown Manhattan s Theatre District each with at least 500 seats are classified as Broadway theatres According to The Broadway League Broadway shows sold approximately 1 27 billion worth of tickets in the 2013 2014 season an 11 4 increase from 1 139 billion in the 2012 2013 season Attendance in 2013 2014 stood at 12 21 million representing a 5 5 increase from the 2012 2013 season s 11 57 million 493 Performance artists displaying diverse skills are ubiquitous on the streets of Manhattan Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts anchoring Lincoln Square on the Upper West Side of Manhattan is home to numerous influential arts organizations including the Metropolitan Opera New York City Opera New York Philharmonic and New York City Ballet as well as the Vivian Beaumont Theater the Juilliard School Jazz at Lincoln Center and Alice Tully Hall The Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute is in Union Square and Tisch School of the Arts is based at New York University while Central Park SummerStage presents free music concerts in Central Park 494 The Metropolitan Museum of Art part of Museum Mile is one of the largest museums in the world 495 Visual arts Main article List of museums and cultural institutions in New York City New York City is home to hundreds of cultural institutions and historic sites Museum Mile is the name for a section of Fifth Avenue running from 82nd to 105th streets on the Upper East Side of Manhattan 496 in an area sometimes called Upper Carnegie Hill 497 Nine museums occupy the length of this section of Fifth Avenue making it one of the densest displays of culture in the world 498 Its art museums include the Guggenheim The Metropolitan Museum of Art the Neue Galerie New York and The Africa Center which opened in late 2012 In addition to other programming the museums collaborate for the annual Museum Mile Festival held each year in June to promote the museums and increase visitation 499 Many of the world s most lucrative art auctions are held in New York City 500 501 Cuisine Main articles Cuisine of New York City List of restaurants in New York City and List of Michelin starred restaurants in New York City Smorgasburg opened in 2011 as an open air food market and is part of the Brooklyn Flea 502 New York City s food culture includes an array of international cuisines influenced by the city s immigrant history Central and Eastern European immigrants especially Jewish immigrants from those regions brought bagels cheesecake hot dogs knishes and delicatessens or delis to the city Italian immigrants brought New York style pizza and Italian cuisine into the city while Jewish immigrants and Irish immigrants brought pastrami 503 and corned beef 504 respectively Chinese and other Asian restaurants sandwich joints trattorias diners and coffeehouses are ubiquitous throughout the city Some 4 000 mobile food vendors licensed by the city many immigrant owned have made Middle Eastern foods such as falafel and kebabs 505 examples of modern New York street food The city is home to nearly one thousand of the finest and most diverse haute cuisine restaurants in the world according to Michelin 506 The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene assigns letter grades to the city s restaurants based upon their inspection results 507 As of 2019 there were 27 043 restaurants in the city up from 24 865 in 2017 508 The Queens Night Market in Flushing Meadows Corona Park attracts more than ten thousand people nightly to sample food from more than 85 countries 509 Parades The annual Macy s Thanksgiving Day Parade the world s largest parade 510 The annual Halloween Parade in Greenwich Village the world s largest Halloween parade with its roots in New York s queer community 511 The ticker tape parade for the Apollo 11 astronauts The annual Philippine Independence Day Parade the largest outside the Philippines New York City is well known for its street parades which celebrate a broad array of themes including holidays nationalities human rights and major league sports team championship victories The majority of parades are held in Manhattan The primary orientation of the annual street parades is typically from north to south marching along major avenues The annual Macy s Thanksgiving Day Parade is the world s largest parade 510 beginning alongside Central Park and processing southward to the flagship Macy s Herald Square store 512 the parade is viewed on telecasts worldwide and draws millions of spectators in person 510 Other notable parades including the annual New York City St Patrick s Day Parade in March the LGBT Pride March in June the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade in October and numerous parades commemorating the independence days of many nations Ticker tape parades celebrating championships won by sports teams as well as other heroic accomplishments march northward along the Canyon of Heroes on Broadway from Bowling Green to City Hall Park in Lower Manhattan Accent and dialect Main articles New York City English and New York accent The New York area is home to a distinctive regional accent and speech pattern called the New York dialect alternatively known as Brooklynese or New Yorkese It has generally been considered one of the most recognizable accents within American English 513 The traditional New York area speech pattern is known for its rapid delivery and its accent is characterized as non rhotic so that the sound ɹ does not appear at the end of a syllable or immediately before a consonant therefore the pronunciation of the city name as New Yawk 514 There is no ɹ in words like park pɑek or pɒek with vowel backed and diphthongized due to the low back chain shift butter bʌɾe or here hie In another feature called the low back chain shift the ɔ vowel sound of words like talk law cross chocolate and coffee and the often homophonous ɔr in core and more are tensed and usually raised more than in General American English In the most old fashioned and extreme versions of the New York dialect the vowel sounds of words like girl and of words like oil became a diphthong ɜɪ This is often misperceived by speakers of other accents as a reversal of the er and oy sounds so that girl is pronounced goil and oil is pronounced erl this leads to the caricature of New Yorkers saying things like Joizey Jersey Toidy Toid Street 33rd St and terlet toilet 514 The character Archie Bunker from the 1970s television sitcom All in the Family was an example of this pattern of speech The classic version of the New York City dialect is generally centered on middle and working class New Yorkers The influx of non European immigrants in recent decades has led to changes in this distinctive dialect 514 and the traditional form of this speech pattern is no longer as prevalent among general New Yorkers as it has been in the past 514 Sports Main article Sports in the New York metropolitan area The New York Marathon is the largest marathon in the world 515 The U S Open Tennis Championships are held every August and September in Flushing Meadows Corona Park Queens Citi Field also in Flushing Meadows Corona Park has been home to the New York Mets since 2009 Madison Square Garden in Midtown Manhattan is home to the New York Knicks New York Rangers and St John s Red Storm New York City is home to the headquarters of the National Football League 516 Major League Baseball 517 the National Basketball Association 518 the National Hockey League 519 and Major League Soccer 520 The New York metropolitan area hosts the most sports teams in the first four major North American professional sports leagues with nine one more than Los Angeles and has 11 top level professional sports teams if Major League Soccer is included also one more than Los Angeles Participation in professional sports in the city predates all professional leagues The city has played host to more than forty major professional teams in the five sports and their respective competing leagues Four of the ten most expensive stadiums ever built worldwide MetLife Stadium the new Yankee Stadium Madison Square Garden and Citi Field are in the New York metropolitan area 521 Madison Square Garden its predecessor the original Yankee Stadium and Ebbets Field are sporting venues in New York City the latter two having been commemorated on U S postage stamps New York was the first of eight American cities to have won titles in all four major leagues MLB NHL NFL and NBA having done so following the Knicks 1970 title In 1972 it became the first city to win titles in five sports when the Cosmos won the NASL final New York has been described as the Capital of Baseball 522 There have been 35 Major League Baseball World Series and 73 pennants won by New York teams It is one of only five metro areas Los Angeles Chicago Baltimore Washington and the San Francisco Bay Area being the others to have two baseball teams Additionally there have been 14 World Series in which two New York City teams played each other known as a Subway Series and occurring most recently in 2000 No other metropolitan area has had this happen more than once Chicago in 1906 St Louis in 1944 and the San Francisco Bay Area in 1989 The city s two Major League Baseball teams are the New York Mets who play at Citi Field in Queens 523 and the New York Yankees who play at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx These teams compete in six games of interleague play every regular season that has also come to be called the Subway Series The Yankees have won a record 27 championships 524 while the Mets have won the World Series twice 525 The city also was once home to the Brooklyn Dodgers now the Los Angeles Dodgers who won the World Series once 526 and the New York Giants now the San Francisco Giants who won the World Series five times Both teams moved to California in 1958 527 There is also one Minor League Baseball team in the city the Mets affiliated Brooklyn Cyclones 528 and the city will gain a club in the independent Atlantic League when the Staten Island FerryHawks begin play in 2022 529 The city is represented in the National Football League by the New York Giants and the New York Jets although both teams play their home games at MetLife Stadium in nearby East Rutherford New Jersey 530 which hosted Super Bowl XLVIII in 2014 531 The metropolitan area is home to three National Hockey League teams The New York Rangers the traditional representative of the city itself and one of the league s Original Six play at Madison Square Garden in Manhattan The New York Islanders traditionally representing Nassau and Suffolk Counties of Long Island play in UBS Arena in Elmont New York and played in Brooklyn s Barclays Center from 2015 to 2020 The New Jersey Devils play at Prudential Center in nearby Newark New Jersey and traditionally represent the counties of neighboring New Jersey which are coextensive with the boundaries of the New York metropolitan area and media market The city s National Basketball Association teams are the Brooklyn Nets previously known as the New York Nets and New Jersey Nets as they moved around the metropolitan area and the New York Knicks while the New York Liberty is the city s Women s National Basketball Association team The first national college level basketball championship the National Invitation Tournament was held in New York in 1938 and remains in the city 532 The city is well known for its links to basketball which is played in nearly every park in the city by local youth many of whom have gone on to play for major college programs and in the NBA In soccer New York City is represented by New York City FC of Major League Soccer who play their home games at Yankee Stadium 533 and the New York Red Bulls who play their home games at Red Bull Arena in nearby Harrison New Jersey 534 NJ NY Gotham FC also plays their home games in Red Bull Arena representing the metropolitan area in the National Women s Soccer League Historically the city is known for the New York Cosmos the highly successful former professional soccer team which was the American home of Pele A new version of the New York Cosmos was formed in 2010 and most recently played in the third division National Independent Soccer Association before going on hiatus in January 2021 New York will be one of eleven US host cities for the 2026 FIFA World Cup 535 The annual United States Open Tennis Championships is one of the world s four Grand Slam tennis tournaments and is held at the National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows Corona Park Queens 536 The New York City Marathon which courses through all five boroughs is the world s largest running marathon 515 with 51 394 finishers in 2016 537 and 98 247 applicants for the 2017 race 515 The Millrose Games is an annual track and field meet whose featured event is the Wanamaker Mile Boxing is also a prominent part of the city s sporting scene with events like the Amateur Boxing Golden Gloves being held at Madison Square Garden each year 538 The city is also considered the host of the Belmont Stakes the last longest and oldest of horse racing s Triple Crown races held just over the city s border at Belmont Park on the first or second Sunday of June The city also hosted the 1932 U S Open golf tournament and the 1930 and 1939 PGA Championships and has been host city for both events several times most notably for nearby Winged Foot Golf Club The Gaelic games are played in Riverdale Bronx at Gaelic Park home to the New York GAA the only North American team to compete at the senior inter county level EnvironmentMain article Environmental issues in New York City As of 2012 update the city had about 6 000 hybrid taxis shown in service the largest number of any city in North America 539 Environmental issues in New York City are affected by the city s size density abundant public transportation infrastructure and location at the mouth of the Hudson River For example it is both one of the country s biggest sources of pollution and has the lowest per capita greenhouse gas emissions rate and electricity usage Governors Island is planned to host a US 1 billion research and education center with the intention of making New York City the global leader in addressing the climate crisis 540 Environmental impact reduction New York City has focused on reducing its environmental impact and carbon footprint 541 Mass transit use in New York City is the highest in the United States Also by 2010 the city had 3 715 hybrid taxis and other clean diesel vehicles representing around 28 of New York s taxi fleet in service the most of any city in North America 542 New York City is the host of Climate Week NYC the largest Climate Week to take place globally and regarded as major annual climate summit New York s high rate of public transit use more than 200 000 daily cyclists as of 2014 update 543 and many pedestrian commuters make it the most energy efficient major city in the United States 544 Walk and bicycle modes of travel account for 21 of all modes for trips in the city nationally the rate for metro regions is about 8 545 In both its 2011 and 2015 rankings Walk Score named New York City the most walkable large city in the United States 546 547 548 and in 2018 Stacker ranked New York the most walkable U S city 549 Citibank sponsored the introduction of 10 000 public bicycles for the city s bike share project in the summer of 2013 550 New York City s numerical in season cycling indicator of bicycling in the city had hit an all time high of 437 when measured in 2014 551 The city government was a petitioner in the landmark Massachusetts v Environmental Protection Agency Supreme Court case forcing the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases as pollutants The city is a leader in the construction of energy efficient green office buildings including the Hearst Tower among others 184 Mayor Bill de Blasio has committed to an 80 reduction in greenhouse gas emissions between 2014 and 2050 to reduce the city s contributions to climate change beginning with a comprehensive Green Buildings plan 541 Water purity and availability Main articles Food and water in New York City and New York City water supply system The New York City drinking water supply is extracted from the protected Catskill Mountains watershed 552 As a result of the watershed s integrity and undisturbed natural water filtration system New York is one of only four major cities in the United States the majority of whose drinking water is pure enough not to require purification through water treatment plants 553 The city s municipal water system is the largest in the United States moving over one billion gallons of water per day 554 a leak in the Delaware aqueduct results in some 20 million gallons a day being lost under the Hudson River 555 The Croton Watershed north of the city is undergoing construction of a 3 2 billion water purification plant to augment New York City s water supply by an estimated 290 million gallons daily representing a greater than 20 addition to the city s current availability of water 556 The ongoing expansion of New York City Water Tunnel No 3 an integral part of the New York City water supply system is the largest capital construction project in the city s history 557 with segments serving Manhattan and the Bronx completed and with segments serving Brooklyn and Queens planned for construction in 2020 558 In 2018 New York City announced a 1 billion investment to protect the integrity of its water system and to maintain the purity of its unfiltered water supply 554 Air quality According to the 2016 World Health Organization Global Urban Ambient Air Pollution Database 559 the annual average concentration in New York City s air of particulate matter measuring 2 5 micrometers or less PM2 5 was 7 0 micrograms per cubic meter or 3 0 micrograms within the recommended limit of the WHO Air Quality Guidelines for the annual mean PM2 5 560 The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene in partnership with Queens College conducts the New York Community Air Survey to measure pollutants at about 150 locations 561 Environmental revitalization Newtown Creek a 3 5 mile 6 kilometer a long estuary that forms part of the border between the boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens has been designated a Superfund site for environmental clean up and remediation of the waterway s recreational and economic resources for many communities 562 One of the most heavily used bodies of water in the Port of New York and New Jersey it had been one of the most contaminated industrial sites in the country 563 containing years of discarded toxins an estimated 30 million US gallons 110 000 m3 of spilled oil including the Greenpoint oil spill raw sewage from New York City s sewer system 563 and other accumulation Government and politicsMain articles Government of New York City and Politics of New York City Government New York City Hall is the oldest City Hall in the United States that still houses its original governmental functions New York City has been a metropolitan municipality with a Strong mayor council form of government 564 since its consolidation in 1898 In New York City the city government is responsible for public education correctional institutions public safety recreational facilities sanitation water supply and welfare services The mayor and council members are elected to four year terms The City Council is a unicameral body consisting of 51 council members whose districts are defined by geographic population boundaries 565 Each term for the mayor and council members lasts four years and has a two consecutive term limit 566 which is reset after a four year break The New York City Administrative Code the New York City Rules and the City Record are the code of local laws compilation of regulations and official journal respectively 567 568 The New York County Courthouse houses the New York Supreme Court and other offices Each borough is coextensive with a judicial district of the state Unified Court System of which the Criminal Court and the Civil Court are the local courts while the New York Supreme Court conducts major trials and appeals Manhattan hosts the First Department of the Supreme Court Appellate Division while Brooklyn hosts the Second Department There are also several extrajudicial administrative courts which are executive agencies and not part of the state Unified Court System Uniquely among major American cities New York is divided between and is host to the main branches of two different U S district courts the District Court for the Southern District of New York whose main courthouse is on Foley Square near City Hall in Manhattan and whose jurisdiction includes Manhattan and the Bronx and the District Court for the Eastern District of New York whose main courthouse is in Brooklyn and whose jurisdiction includes Brooklyn Queens and Staten Island The U S Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and U S Court of International Trade are also based in New York also on Foley Square in Manhattan Politics Eric Adams the current and 110th Mayor of New York City The present mayor is Eric Adams He was elected in 2021 with 67 of the vote and assumed office on January 1 2022 The Democratic Party holds the majority of public offices As of April 2016 69 of registered voters in the city are Democrats and 10 are Republicans 569 New York City has not been carried by a Republican presidential election since President Calvin Coolidge won the five boroughs in 1924 A Republican candidate for statewide office has not won all five boroughs of the city since it was incorporated in 1898 In 2012 Democrat Barack Obama became the first presidential candidate of any party to receive more than 80 of the overall vote in New York City sweeping all five boroughs Party platforms center on affordable housing education and economic development and labor politics are of importance in the city Thirteen out of 27 U S congressional districts in the state of New York include portions of New York City 570 New York is one of the most important sources of political fundraising in the United States At least four of the top five ZIP Codes in the nation for political contributions were in Manhattan for the 2004 2006 and 2008 elections The top ZIP Code 10021 on the Upper East Side generated the most money for the 2004 presidential campaigns of George W Bush and John Kerry 571 The city has a strong imbalance of payments with the national and state governments It receives 83 cents in services for every 1 it sends to the federal government in taxes or annually sends 11 4 billion more than it receives back City residents and businesses also sent an additional 4 1 billion in the 2009 2010 fiscal year to the state of New York than the city received in return 572 TransportationMain article Transportation in New York City New York City is home to the two busiest train stations in the U S including Grand Central Terminal New York City s comprehensive transportation system is both complex and extensive Rapid transit Mass transit in New York City most of which runs 24 hours a day accounts for one in every three users of mass transit in the United States and two thirds of the nation s rail riders live in the New York City metropolitan area 573 574 Rail The iconic New York City Subway system is the largest rapid transit system in the world when measured by stations in operation with 472 and by length of routes Nearly all of New York s subway system is open 24 hours a day in contrast to the overnight shutdown common to systems in most cities including Hong Kong 575 576 London Paris Seoul 577 578 and Tokyo The New York City Subway is also the busiest metropolitan rail transit system in the Western Hemisphere with 1 76 billion passenger rides in 2015 579 while Grand Central Terminal also referred to as Grand Central Station is the world s largest railway station by number of train platforms The New York City Subway is the world s largest rapid transit system by number of stations Public transport is essential in New York City 54 6 of New Yorkers commuted to work in 2005 using mass transit 580 This is in contrast to the rest of the United States where 91 of commuters travel in automobiles to their workplace 581 According to the New York City Comptroller workers in the New York City area spend an average of 6 hours and 18 minutes getting to work each week the longest commute time in the nation among large cities 582 New York is the only U S city in which a majority 52 of households do not have a car only 22 of Manhattanites own a car 583 Due to their high usage of mass transit New Yorkers spend less of their household income on transportation than the national average saving 19 billion annually on transportation compared to other urban Americans 584 New York City s commuter rail network is the largest in North America 573 The rail network connecting New York City to its suburbs consists of the Long Island Rail Road Metro North Railroad and New Jersey Transit The combined systems converge at Grand Central Terminal and Pennsylvania Station and contain more than 250 stations and 20 rail lines 573 In Queens the elevated AirTrain people mover system connects 24 hours a day JFK International Airport to the New York City Subway and the Long Island Rail Road a separate AirTrain system is planned alongside the Grand Central Parkway to connect LaGuardia Airport to these transit systems 585 586 For intercity rail New York City is served by Amtrak whose busiest station by a significant margin is Pennsylvania Station on the West Side of Manhattan from which Amtrak provides connections to Boston Philadelphia and Washington D C along the Northeast Corridor and long distance train service to other North American cities 587 The Staten Island Railway rapid transit system solely serves Staten Island operating 24 hours a day The Port Authority Trans Hudson PATH train links Midtown and Lower Manhattan to northeastern New Jersey primarily Hoboken Jersey City and Newark Like the New York City Subway the PATH operates 24 hours a day meaning three of the six rapid transit systems in the world which operate on 24 hour schedules are wholly or partly in New York the others are a portion of the Chicago L the PATCO Speedline serving Philadelphia and the Copenhagen Metro Multibillion dollar heavy rail transit projects under construction in New York City include the Second Avenue Subway and the East Side Access project 588 Buses The Port Authority Bus Terminal the world s busiest bus station at 8th Avenue and 42nd Street 589 New York City s public bus fleet runs 24 7 and is the largest in North America 590 The Port Authority Bus Terminal the main intercity bus terminal of the city serves 7 000 buses and 200 000 commuters daily making it the busiest bus station in the world 589 Air New York s airspace is the busiest in the United States and one of the world s busiest air transportation corridors The three busiest airports in the New York metropolitan area include John F Kennedy International Airport Newark Liberty International Airport and LaGuardia Airport 130 5 million travelers used these three airports in 2016 591 JFK and Newark Liberty were the busiest and fourth busiest U S gateways for international air passengers respectively in 2012 as of 2011 update JFK was the busiest airport for international passengers in North America 592 John F Kennedy Airport in Queens the busiest international air passenger gateway to the United States Plans have advanced to expand passenger volume at a fourth airport Stewart International Airport near Newburgh New York by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey 593 Plans were announced in July 2015 to entirely rebuild LaGuardia Airport in a multibillion dollar project to replace its aging facilities 594 Other commercial airports in or serving the New York metropolitan area include Long Island MacArthur Airport Trenton Mercer Airport and Westchester County Airport The primary general aviation airport serving the area is Teterboro Airport Ferries The Staten Island Ferry shuttles commuters between Manhattan and Staten Island The Staten Island Ferry is the world s busiest ferry route carrying more than 23 million passengers from July 2015 through June 2016 on the 5 2 mile 8 4 km route between Staten Island and Lower Manhattan and running 24 hours a day 595 Other ferry systems shuttle commuters between Manhattan and other locales within the city and the metropolitan area NYC Ferry a NYCEDC initiative with routes planned to travel to all five boroughs was launched in 2017 with second graders choosing the names of the ferries 596 Meanwhile Seastreak ferry announced construction of a 600 passenger high speed luxury ferry in September 2016 to shuttle riders between the Jersey Shore and Manhattan anticipated to start service in 2017 this would be the largest vessel in its class 597 Taxis vehicles for hire and trams See also Taxicabs of New York City Yellow medallion taxicabs are widely recognized icons of the city Other features of the city s transportation infrastructure encompass 13 587 yellow taxicabs 598 other vehicle for hire companies 599 600 and the Roosevelt Island Tramway an aerial tramway that transports commuters between Roosevelt Island and Manhattan Island Streets and highways 8th Avenue looking northward uptown Most streets and avenues in Manhattan s grid plan incorporate a one way traffic configuration Despite New York s heavy reliance on its vast public transit system streets are a defining feature of the city The Commissioners Plan of 1811 greatly influenced the city s physical development Several of the city s streets and avenues including Broadway 601 Wall Street 602 Madison Avenue 362 and Seventh Avenue are also used as metonyms for national industries there the theater finance advertising and fashion organizations respectively New York City also has an extensive web of freeways and parkways which link the city s boroughs to each other and to North Jersey Westchester County Long Island and southwestern Connecticut through various bridges and tunnels Because these highways serve millions of outer borough and suburban residents who commute into Manhattan it is quite common for motorists to be stranded for hours in traffic congestion that are a daily occurrence particularly during rush hour 603 604 Congestion pricing in New York City will go into effect in 2022 at the earliest 605 606 607 New York City is also known for its rules regarding turning at red lights Unlike the rest of the United States New York State prohibits right or left turns on red in cities with a population greater than one million to reduce traffic collisions and increase pedestrian safety In New York City therefore all turns at red lights are illegal unless a sign permitting such maneuvers is present 608 River crossings The George Washington Bridge connecting Upper Manhattan background from Fort Lee New Jersey across the Hudson River is the world s busiest motor vehicle bridge 609 610 New York City is located on one of the world s largest natural harbors 611 and the boroughs of Manhattan and Staten Island are primarily coterminous with islands of the same names while Queens and Brooklyn are at the west end of the larger Long Island and the Bronx is on New York State s mainland This situation of boroughs separated by water led to the development of an extensive infrastructure of bridges and tunnels The George Washington Bridge is the world s busiest motor vehicle bridge 609 610 connecting Manhattan to Bergen County New Jersey The Verrazano Narrows Bridge is the longest suspension bridge in the Americas and one of the world s longest 612 613 The Brooklyn Bridge is an icon of the city itself The towers of the Brooklyn Bridge are built of limestone granite and Rosendale cement and their architectural style is neo Gothic with characteristic pointed arches above the passageways through the stone towers This bridge was also the longest suspension bridge in the world from its opening until 1903 and is the first steel wire suspension bridge The Queensboro Bridge is an important piece of cantilever architecture The Manhattan Bridge opened in 1909 is considered to be the forerunner of modern suspension bridges and its design served as the model for many of the long span suspension bridges around the world the Manhattan Bridge Throgs Neck Bridge Triborough Bridge and Verrazano Narrows Bridge are all examples of structural expressionism 614 615 Manhattan Island is linked to New York City s outer boroughs and New Jersey by several tunnels as well The Lincoln Tunnel which carries 120 000 vehicles a day under the Hudson River between New Jersey and Midtown Manhattan is the busiest vehicular tunnel in the world 616 The tunnel was built instead of a bridge to allow unfettered passage of large passenger and cargo ships that sailed through New York Harbor and up the Hudson River to Manhattan s piers The Holland Tunnel connecting Lower Manhattan to Jersey City New Jersey was the world s first mechanically ventilated vehicular tunnel when it opened in 1927 617 618 The Queens Midtown Tunnel built to relieve congestion on the bridges connecting Manhattan with Queens and Brooklyn was the largest non federal project in its time when it was completed in 1940 619 President Franklin D Roosevelt was the first person to drive through it 620 The Brooklyn Battery Tunnel officially known as the Hugh L Carey Tunnel runs underneath Battery Park and connects the Financial District at the southern tip of Manhattan to Red Hook in Brooklyn Cycling network Main article Cycling in New York City Cycling in New York City is associated with mixed cycling conditions that include urban density relatively flat terrain congested roadways with stop and go traffic and many pedestrians The city s large cycling population includes utility cyclists such as delivery and messenger services cycling clubs for recreational cyclists and an increasing number of commuters 621 Cycling is increasingly popular in New York City in 2017 there were approximately 450 000 daily bike trips compared with 170 000 daily bike trips in 2005 622 As of 2017 update New York City had 1 333 miles 2 145 km of bike lanes compared to 513 miles 826 km of bike lanes in 2006 622 As of 2019 there are 126 miles 203 km of segregated or protected bike lanes citywide 623 PeopleMain article List of people from New York CityGlobal outreachMain article List of sister cities of New York City In 2006 the Sister City Program of the City of New York Inc 624 was restructured and renamed New York City Global Partners Through this program New York City has expanded its international outreach to a network of cities worldwide promoting the exchange of ideas and innovation between their citizenry and policymakers New York s historic sister cities are denoted below by the year they joined New York City s partnership network 625 New York City Global Partners networkAfricaAccra Ghana Addis Ababa Ethiopia Cairo Egypt 1982 Cape Town South Africa Lagos Nigeria Libreville Gabon Johannesburg South Africa 2003 Nairobi KenyaAsia East Bangkok Thailand Beijing China 1980 Bien Hoa Vietnam Changwon South Korea Chongqing China 626 Guangzhou China Ho Chi Minh City Vietnam Hong Kong China Jakarta Indonesia Kuala Lumpur Malaysia 627 Manila Philippines Seoul South Korea Shanghai China Shenyang China Singapore Singapore Taipei Taiwan Tokyo Japan 1960 South Bangalore India Delhi India Dhaka Bangladesh Karachi Pakistan Mumbai India West Dubai United Arab Emirates Istanbul Turkey transcontinental Jerusalem Israel 1993 Tel Aviv Israel 628 AustraliaMelbourne Australia Sydney AustraliaEurope Central Berlin Germany Budapest Hungary 1992 Dusseldorf Germany Geneva Switzerland Hamburg Germany Heidelberg Germany Munich Germany Prague Czech Republic Vienna Austria Warsaw Poland East Kyiv Ukraine Moscow Russia St Petersburg Russia North Copenhagen Denmark Helsinki Finland Oslo Norway Stockholm Sweden South Barcelona Spain Bucharest Romania Istanbul Turkey transcontinental Lisbon Portugal Madrid Spain 1982 Milan Italy Pristina Kosovo Rome Italy 1992 West Amsterdam Netherlands Antwerp Belgium Belfast United Kingdom Brussels Belgium Dublin Ireland Edinburgh United Kingdom Glasgow United Kingdom London United Kingdom 2001 Luxembourg City Luxembourg Lyon France Paris France Rotterdam Netherlands The Hague NetherlandsNorth America Canada Calgary Alberta Canada Edmonton Alberta Canada Montreal Quebec Canada Ottawa Ontario Canada Quebec City Quebec Canada Toronto Ontario Canada Vancouver British Columbia Canada Victoria British Columbia Canada Winnipeg Manitoba Canada Mexico Central America and Caribbean Cuernavaca Morales Mexico Mexico City Distrito Federal Mexico Monterrey Nuevo Leon Mexico Panama City Panama Santo Domingo Dominican Republic 1983 United States Baltimore Maryland United States Boston Massachusetts United States Chicago Illinois United States Los Angeles California United States Philadelphia Pennsylvania United StatesSouth AmericaBogota Colombia Brasilia Brazil 2004 Buenos Aires Argentina Caracas Venezuela Cordoba Argentina Curitiba Brazil Lima Peru Medellin Colombia Rio de Janeiro Brazil Santiago Chile Sao Paulo BrazilSee also Cities portal World portal United States portal img, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

article

, read, download, free, free download, mp3, video, mp4, 3gp, jpg, jpeg, gif, png, picture, music, song, movie, book, game, games.