Glendale is a neighborhood in the west-central portion of the New York City borough of Queens. It is bounded by Forest Hills to the east, Ridgewood to the west, Woodhaven to the south, and Middle Village to the north.
Glendale was built on a swampy area previously called Fresh Pond. The neighborhood was later developed into an industrial area, though it is now a more residential neighborhood. Glendale's land area is long on its east-west axis and narrow on its north-south axis. The area is surrounded mainly by cemeteries, although the neighborhood also contains several large parks, including part of Forest Park.
Glendale is located in Queens Community District 5 and its ZIP Code is 11385. It is patrolled by the New York City Police Department's 104th Precinct. Politically, Glendale is represented by the New York City Council's 30th District.Current City Council Districts for Queens County , New York City. Accessed May 5, 2017.
Boundaries Glendale is bordered to the north by a section of the Montauk Branch of the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) in the western portion (Lower and Middle Glendale), and by Cooper and Metropolitan Avenues in the eastern portion (Upper Glendale). To the east, the border is the Rockaway Beach Branch of the LIRR, as well as Woodhaven Boulevard. Forest Park, along with the Jackie Robinson Parkway and a number of contiguous cemeteries, creates the southern and western borders; the borough line with Brooklyn runs through the cemeteries on the western part of the southern border. Glendale's borders are completed from the southwest (from Cooper and Wyckoff Avenues) by the Bay Ridge Branch of the LIRR and Fresh Pond Road from Myrtle Avenue to the BMT Myrtle Avenue Line right-of-way.
History
The land comprising present-day Glendale was originally named Fresh Pond, a swampy area that was part of a area collectively called Newtown. The town of Newtown had been chartered to the Reverend Francis Doughty by the Dutch West India Company in 1642. In turn, Fresh Pond was originally named for two freshwater ponds that, in the early 1900s, were filled in.
19th century
In 1847, New York State's Rural Cemetery Act ended the creation of any new cemeteries in Manhattan. Cemetery owners were encouraged to build in Brooklyn and Queens. Glendale quickly became almost encircled by cemeteries being located in what is called the "Cemetery Belt".
In 1860, developer George C. Schott was given a large amount of land in Fresh Pond as repayment for a debt. Schott renamed Fresh Pond after his native Glendale, Ohio. Nine years later, John C. Schooley, a real estate agent, bought a substantial amount of property and also called it Glendale. Schooley laid out streets and divided his property into 469 lots, measuring , which he then sold off for $300 each. In 1869, a railroad stop at 73rd Street (then named Wyckoff Avenue) was opened by the South Side Railroad, which was sold in 1874 to the North Side Railroad, which then was merged into the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) in 1876, becoming part of the Montauk Branch. In 1927, the station burned down and was never replaced.
The area became a thriving German farming community in the 19th century. Between the 1880s and World War I, Glendale also had many sources of entertainment. It had a bowling alley at Myrtle Avenue and 73rd Street; Herman's Saloon; Liberty; Louis Hellen's Saloon and picnic grove at Cooper Avenue and 73rd Street; and a trolleys along Union Turnpike that ran to Schutzen Park. Development began along Myrtle Avenue, Glendale's main thoroughfare, as many family-run stores began opening and steam powered trolleys were introduced on "The Avenue" in 1891. Owing to the English transliteration options from the original German name, Schutzen Park was also previously known as both "Schuetzen Park" and "Scheutzen Park".
20th century After World War I, Glendale's economic base shifted from farming to textiles and breweries. The largest employer was the Atlas Terminal, a vast industrial park, consisting of 16 factories. Because of the skilled work force living in the area and the many small machine shops located here, Glendale played a big part in the war effort during World War II and, especially in the Manhattan Project, which produced the first atomic bombs. During World War II, most of the aircraft and military equipment made on Long Island was shipped by rail through this area. Meanwhile, new housing was being developed in the area as well; by 1937, the neighborhood's sole extant farm was being developed as housing.
Between 1933 and 1936, the Interborough (now Jackie Robinson) Parkway, designed by New York City parks commissioner Robert Moses, was built through Glendale, displacing hundreds of bodies buried in the Cypress Hills Cemetery. The parkway, strongly opposed by residents of neighborhoods surrounding Forest Park, displaced Riebling's Greater New York Park and Casino, and necessitated the redesign of the Forest Park Golf Course.
Originally, Ridgewood and Glendale (although in Queens) shared ZIP Code 11237 with Bushwick, Brooklyn. However, following the 1977 blackout, the communities of Ridgewood and Glendale expressed a desire to disassociate themselves from Bushwick. Residents voted on a proposal to create a new ZIP Code, and a majority of votes were cast in favor of the proposal. The communities were given the ZIP Code 11385 in 1980.
By the 1980s, Glendale was known as one of the quieter neighborhoods in New York City. Despite disrepair and crime being prevalent in other sections of the city, The New York Times reported in 1986 that "the graffiti, litter and potholes familiar to most New Yorkers are all but unknown in Glendale's three square miles."
The area was mostly middle-class with well-maintained housing stock and had one of the lowest crime rates in New York City, but lacked a major community hub. In 1998, service to the Glendale LIRR station was discontinued. The station suffered from low ridership and inability to operate with the C3 bi-level coaches, which can stop only at stations with high level platforms. This station had only two riders daily at the time of its closure.
21st century At the beginning of the 21st century, some of Glendale's industrial buildings were redeveloped. Atlas Terminal was demolished in 2004 and replaced by a shopping center called The Shops at Atlas Park, which opened in April 2006. In other parts of Glendale, companies such as Trader Joe's and Chili's took over former industrial buildings.
In 2012, all passenger service on the Lower Montauk Branch was discontinued. However, freight trains still operate, although in recent years, controversy over trains transporting radioactive waste through the community has arisen. All goods shipped by rail with a destination on Long Island (Brooklyn, Queens and Nassau and Suffolk counties), must come through the Fresh Pond/Fremont Yards, located in Glendale, which is the crossroads of the LIRR Montauk Branch, the Bay Ridge Branch (which serves the docks and float barges in Sunset Park, Brooklyn), the Bushwick Branch and the New York Connecting Railroad, which connects them all to the rest of the country by traveling north to Selkirk, New York, and across the Hudson River to New Jersey and west. The biggest product currently shipped from here is municipal waste and construction and demolition debris.
Demographics
Based on data from the 2010 United States census, the population of Glendale was 32,496.Table PL-P5 NTA: Total Population and Persons Per Acre – New York City Neighborhood Tabulation Areas*, 2010 , Population Division – New York City Department of City Planning, February 2012. Accessed June 16, 2016.
The racial makeup of the neighborhood was 61.4% (19,793) White, 1.2% (384) African American, 0.2% (67) Native American, 3.1% (1,004) Asian, 1.0% (5) Pacific Islander, 0.2% (78) from other races, and 0.9% (310) from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 33.4% (10,855) of the population.Table PL-P3A NTA: Total Population by Mutually Exclusive Race and Hispanic Origin – New York City Neighborhood Tabulation Areas*, 2010 , Population Division – New York City Department of City Planning, March 29, 2011. Accessed June 14, 2016.
The entirety of Community Board 5, which comprises Maspeth, Ridgewood, Middle Village, and Glendale, had 166,924 inhabitants as of NYC Health's 2018 Community Health Profile, with an average life expectancy of 81.4 years. This is about equal to the median life expectancy of 81.2 for all New York City neighborhoods. Most inhabitants are youth and middle-aged adults: 22% are between the ages of 0–17, 31% between 25–44, and 26% between 45–64. The ratio of college-aged and elderly residents was lower, at 8% and 13% respectively.
As of 2017, the median household income in Community Board 5 was $71,234. In 2018, an estimated 19% of Glendale, Ridgewood, and Maspeth residents lived in poverty, compared to 19% in all of Queens and 20% in all of New York City. One in seventeen residents (6%) were unemployed, compared to 8% in Queens and 9% in New York City. Rent burden, or the percentage of residents who have difficulty paying their rent, is 46% in Glendale, Ridgewood, and Maspeth, lower than the boroughwide and citywide rates of 53% and 51% respectively. Based on this calculation, , Maspeth, Ridgewood, Middle Village, and Glendale are considered to be high-income relative to the rest of the city and not gentrifying.
Neighborhood
Glendale, a part of Queens Community Board 5,Queens Boards, New York City. Accessed January 26, 2024. is a working to middle class neighborhood surrounded by Forest Hills, Ridgewood, Woodhaven, Middle Village, and Kew Gardens.Media:Queens neighborhoods map.png The neighborhood is somewhat suburban in feel although it still is served by the subway and buses. Its-tree lined streets contain many different architectural styles.
Compared to most other Queens neighborhoods, Glendale is long and narrow since it is essentially sandwiched by cemeteries and Forest Park. As a result, it is considered to have three areas: from east to west, they are Upper Glendale, Middle Glendale, and Lower Glendale. Each area has its own unique attributes.
The easternmost portion near the Shops at Atlas Park is known as Upper Glendale and in general has more expensive homes and slightly higher income levels than the rest of Glendale. Upper Glendale has detached and semi-attached single- and two-family houses of above-average size, semi-detached wood frame houses and a number of brick townhomes with often meticulously maintained grassy front yards. Many of these were built after the 1920s.
The middle portion of Glendale that straddles Myrtle Avenue is the primary business district and has a mix of semi-detached, wood frame, single-family houses as well as a number of multi-family dwellings and townhomes. The housing stock here often dates back to the late 1800s/early 1900s and as a result, a significant number of them are made of yellow Kreischer brick much like similar, landmarked buildings in neighboring Ridgewood.
The western or "lower" part of Glendale has three national historic districts and includes the neighborhoods of Evergreen (near and around Evergreen Park) and Liberty Park, which is bordered by Cypress Hills Street, Cooper Avenue, 61st Street and cemeteries to the south. Like most of Glendale, Evergreen is relatively flat. It has mostly late 1800s/early 1900s semi-detached, multi-family, wood frame houses and a significant number of townhomes made of yellow Kreischer brick again similar to landmarked buildings in neighboring Ridgewood. In contrast, Liberty Park, developed in the 1920s, is built on the north slope of a hill and is dominated by detached single-family, wood-frame houses with private driveways and backyards.
Architecture