New York City is made up of five governmental districts named boroughs: The Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island. Each borough is coextensive with a respective county of New York state: The Bronx is Bronx County; Brooklyn is Kings County; Manhattan is New York County; Queens is Queens County; and Staten Island is Richmond County.

All five boroughs came into existence with the creation of modern New York City in 1898, when New York County (then including the Bronx), Kings County, Richmond County, and part of Queens County were consolidated within one municipal government under a new city charter. All former municipalities within the newly consolidated city were dissolved.

The City of New York began in lower Manhattan and grew to encompass Manhattan Island and the smaller surrounding islands that formed New York County. The city and county continued to grow northward, annexing areas on the mainland, absorbing territory from Westchester County in 1874 (West Bronx) and in 1895 (East Bronx). During the 1898 consolidation, this mainland territory was organized as the Borough of the Bronx, though still part of New York County. In 1914, Bronx County was separated from New York County so that each borough was then coterminous with a county.

When the western part of Queens County was consolidated with New York City in 1898, that area became the Borough of Queens. In 1899, the eastern section of Queens County was separated to form Nassau County, making the borough and county of Queens coextensive.

Terminology The term borough was adopted in 1898 to describe a form of governmental administration for each of the five fundamental constituent parts of the newly consolidated city. Under the 1898 City Charter adopted by the New York State Legislature, a borough is a municipal corporation that is created when a county is merged with populated areas within it.The Charter for the Greater New York, and Acts Supplementary Thereto, as Adopted by the State Legislature, p. 10. Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 1898. Accessed September 21, 2016. Locally, the term outer boroughs is used collectively to refer to all of the boroughs other than Manhattan, which is sometimes (in contrast) called the City.Macchiarola, Frank J. "The Two New Yorks" , City Journal, Spring 1993. Accessed January 18, 2024. "I believe, however, that the most critical distinction is one that is seldom discussed and that cuts across lines of both race and class, separating New Yorkers on the basis of their political and social culture. The distinction is between what are in fact two 'boroughs,' Manhattan and outer borough New York. Both include people of all ethnic groups and various economic conditions."

The limited powers of the boroughs are inferior to the authority of the government of New York City. This contrasts with the powers of boroughs in Connecticut, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, where a borough is an independent level of government; as well as with borough forms used in other states, in Greater London, and boroughs in the United Kingdom.

Background

New York City is often referred to collectively as the five boroughs, which can unambiguously refer to the city proper as a whole, avoiding confusion with any particular borough or with the Greater New York metropolitan area. The term is also used by politicians to counter a frequent focus on Manhattan and thereby to place all five boroughs on equal footing. In the same vein, the term outer boroughs refers to all of the boroughs excluding Manhattan, even though the geographic center of the city is along the Brooklyn–Queens border.

Changes All five boroughs were created in 1898 during consolidation, when the city's modern boundaries were established.

The Bronx originally included parts of New York County outside of Manhattan that had previously been ceded by neighboring Westchester County in two stages; in 1874 (southern Yonkers, and the towns of Kingsbridge, West Farms, and Morrisania) and then following a referendum in 1894 (towns of Westchester, Williamsbridge, and the southern portion of Eastchester)."American Shores: The Bronx and Westchester" , New York Public Library. Accessed January 18, 2024. "The area of Westchester County west of the Bronx River, made up of the towns of Morrisania, West Farms, and Kingsbridge, was annexed to the City of New York in 1874. The eastern part, made up of the town of Westchester and part of the town of Eastchester, was annexed in 1895." In 1914, the present-day separate Bronx County became the most recent county to be created in the State of New York."Birth of a Borough" , A Walk Through the Bronx. Accessed January 3, 2024. "After consolidation in 1898, the twenty-third and twenty-fourth wards became the borough of the Bronx, which with Manhattan remained part of New York County (the other boroughs were already separate counties).... It was not until 1912, however, that the state legislature established the County of the Bronx as the sixty-second county in the state, effective January 1, 1914."

The borough of Queens consists of what formerly was only the western part of a then-larger Queens County. In 1899, the three eastern towns of Queens County that had not joined the city the year before—the towns of Hempstead, North Hempstead, and Oyster Bay—formally seceded from Queens County to form the new Nassau County.Williams, Keith. "How Queens Became New York City's Largest Borough" , Curbed, October 20, 2015. Accessed September 21, 2016. "On April 28, 1898, the state Legislature approved the creation of a new county, which some in the eastern half of the former Queens County had wanted for nearly 60 years."

The borough of Staten Island, coextensive with Richmond County, was officially the borough of Richmond until the name was changed in 1975 to reflect its common appellation, while leaving the name of the county unchanged.Kaufman, Michael T. "Council Weighs Making 'Staten Island' Official" , The New York Times, August 28, 1974. Accessed September 21, 2016. "Yesterday a committee of the City Council sought to right matters with a resolution that, if adopted by the full Council and approved by the Mayor, would have the borough's name officially changed to Staten Island.... The resolution only affects the name of the borough. The county would remain Richmond, in the way that the borough of Manhattan is the county of New York, and Brooklyn is the county of Kings."

Description of the boroughs

There are hundreds of distinct neighborhoods throughout the five boroughs of New York City, many with a definable history and character to call their own.

Manhattan

Manhattan (co-extensive with New York County) is the geographically smallest and most densely populated borough. It is the symbol of New York City, as home to most of the city's skyscrapers and prominent landmarks, including Times Square and Central Park; and may be locally known simply as The City.Purdum, Todd S. "Political memo; An Embattled City Hall Moves to Brooklyn" , The New York Times, February 22, 1992. Accessed August 23, 2017. ""Leaders in all of them fear that recent changes in the City Charter that shifted power from the borough presidents to the City Council have diminished government's recognition of the sense of identity that leads people to say they live in the Bronx, and to describe visiting Manhattan as 'going to the city. Manhattan's (New York County'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 U.S. city. 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. Manhattan is often described by Americans as the cultural, financial, media, and entertainment capital of the world.Barry, Dan. "A Nation challenged: in New York; New York Carries On, but Test of Its Grit Has Just Begun" , The New York Times, October 11, 2001. Accessed November 20, 2016. "A roaring void has been created in the financial center of the world." "In 1980 there were still the remains of the various downtown revolutions that had reinvigorated New York's music and art scenes and kept Manhattan in the position it had occupied since the 1940s as the cultural center of the world." "As the Archbishop of the media and cultural center of the United States, Cardinal O'Connor has extraordinary power among Catholic prelates."

Most of the borough is situated on Manhattan Island, at the mouth of the Hudson River. Several small islands are also part of the borough of Manhattan, including Randall's Island, Wards Island, and Roosevelt Island in the East River, and Governors Island to the south in New York Harbor; Liberty Island, on which the Statue of Liberty stands, is a Manhattan exclave, as is the original portion of Ellis Island.New York City Administrative Code Section 2-202 Division into boroughs and boundaries thereof – Division Into Boroughs And Boundaries Thereof. , Justia. Accessed January 18, 2024. "The borough of Manhattan shall consist of the territory known as New York county, which shall contain all that part of the city and state, including that portion of land commonly known as Marble Hill and included within the county of New York and borough of Manhattan for all purposes pursuant to chapter nine hundred thirty-nine of the laws of nineteen hundred eighty-four and further including the islands called Manhattan Island, Governor's Island, Bedloe's Island, Ellis Island, Franklin D. Roosevelt Island, Randall's Island and Oyster Island..."

Manhattan Island is loosely divided into 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. Marble Hill was part of the northern tip of Manhattan Island, but the Harlem River Ship Canal, dug in 1895, separated it from the remainder of Manhattan.Gray, Christopher. "Streetscapes: Spuyten Duyvil Swing Bridge; Restoring a Link In the City's Lifeline" . The New York Times, March 6, 1988. Accessed January 18, 2024. "At some point, the wooden bridge was replaced by an iron one, certainly by 1895 when the Spuyten Duyvil Creek and the Harlem River were widened and joined as the Harlem River Ship Canal, linking the East and Hudson Rivers."