Community Information

Queens was home to the tribes of the Delaware Indian when the European colonizers began to arrive in the early seventeen century. The Dutch vied with the English for control of the colony in the 1600s until a treaty between the two nations in 1679 gave the American colony to the British. It was then that Queens received its name — after the wife of Charles II of England, Queen Catherine of Braganza.

Today, the Dutch and the English are gone, but Queens is home to virtually everyone else. There are approximately fifty neighborhoods in Queens on a piece of land about 112 square miles in size, each with its own unique ethnic character and flavor. You'll find a variety of housing in the borough equal to the diversity of the population. Queens is largely a collection of middle income, middle class neighborhoods with one- and two-family homes situated on small neatly sectioned lots.



Flushing is typified by these attached and detached homes variously made of brick and/or frame construction. Jamaica is older, and the construction there is mostly framed. Douglaston, at the other extreme, is one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the borough, along with Jamaica Estates and Malba, and here you can find mansions 

reminiscent of European baronial estates. In Holliswood, no two homes appear to be alike as you travel down its charming winding streets. Driving along Queens Boulevard through Rego Park and Forest Hills is like driving through a valley with mountainous apartment buildings on each side. Co-ops and condominiums are another type of housing available in the borough. Whitestone features the 1,500-unit Le Havre apartment complex. The Bay Club is an exclusive condominium complex in Bayside. There is little land left for new development in Queens. Some of the older housing in the borough — frame homes on large property lots — is giving way to new brick construction.

Queens, which was incorporated into the City of New York in 1898, is just a stone's throw away from Manhattan. Many Queens residents commute daily into the city through the Queens Midtown Tunnel or across the many bridges or by mass transit. Others frequent the city for its cultural offerings. Long Island City is the closest neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan, located on the opposite bank of the East River. Most points in Queens are no more than a twenty-minute drive away from Manhattan.

New York's two major airports are both located in Queens, John F. Kennedy International Airport and LaGuardia Airport. A number of major colleges are also located in the borough, including Queens College, St. John's University, York College, and LaGuardia Community College. Queens has its own major league baseball team — the New York Mets, who play out of Citi Field in Flushing. Tennis fans also know that Flushing is also the home of the U.S. Open, which takes place in late summer every year in Flushing Meadow Park.