With an estimated 2010 population of 2,230,722, Queens is the second most populous borough in New York City. More than 1 in 10 residents of New York State live in the dozens of unique neighborhoods that make up Queens.
It’s impossible to label all the neighborhoods of Queens on a single map. Each of the neighborhoods labeled here is made up of so many different subsections that only local residents can even attempt to describe them accurately.
Population densities in Queens range from dense urban concentrations in Flushing and Elmhurst-Jackson Heights, to middle-density communities of rowhouses and duplexes in area like Astoria and Forest Hills, to completely suburban neighborhoods that look no different than adjoining suburbs in Nassau County.
Looking at demographic information such as homeownership and public transit usage also reveal important contrasts among the different areas of Queens.
The denser neighborhoods with subway access are majority-tenant communities, as are downtown Flushing and downtown Jamaica. The eastern half of the borough has a much more suburban character, with a majority of residents owning their own homes. The majority-homeowner neighborhoods of Middle Village and Forest Hills in central Queens are more akin to Eastern Queens than the surrounding denser neighborhoods of renters.
Similar patterns also hold when looking at public transit commuting. The areas west of Flushing Meadows-Corona Park have much better subway access than areas to the east, as subway lines in Queens terminate in downtown Flushing and downtown Jamaica.
Looking at median household incomes, the demographics also closely follow the contrasts revealed by homeownership and public transit usage. While most of Queens is middle class, with median household incomes falling between $45,000 and $70,000, Forest Hills-Middle Village and the eastern part of the borough are generally wealthier.
Area of lower-income working class concentrations are downtown Flushing, Corona, Woodside, and parts of central Jamaica.
Queens’ character as a “working class borough” is very visible in educational attainment. Only small areas of the borough have majorities that have a college degree – Long Island City, some parts of Astoria, Forest Hills, and some parts of Northeast Queens (Utopia-Fresh Meadows, Auburndale-Bayside-Little Neck).
As we would expect, higher educational attainment in these neighborhoods corresponds with higher percentages of the population in “white collar” professional or management jobs (and also corresponds with higher median household incomes).
Looking at employment in “blue-collar” jobs in construction, transportation, and manufacturing, we see that many Queens residents depend on these sectors for employment. Blue collar jobs are especially important in Ridgewood-Bushwick, Woodside, Corona, Richmond Hill, and Ozone Park.
For individuals without a college degree, employment in service sectors jobs like retail, hospitality, and the restaurant industry are typically the alternative to blue-collar work so it’s no surprise to see service sector employment concentration in the same neighborhoods. The restaurant industry and ethnic retail sectors are especially important in Flushing, Corona, Elmhurst-Jackson Heights, and Astoria.
Discussions of Queens demographics typically focus on the borough’s tremendous ethnic diversity, so we’ve deliberately begun with general socio-economic factors in order to point out these differences in the borough’s population before moving on to look at how race, ethnicity, and immigration interrelate with these factors.
Queens is known as “the Borough of Immigrants” and has dense populations of foreign-born residents in many of its neighborhoods. While many immigrants are attracted to urban areas like Flushing, Corona, and Jackson Heights, some suburban neighborhoods like Jamaica Estates are also majority-immigrant.
Now let’s move on to look at some of the demographic changes that have taken place in Queens during the last decade. Queens’ growing immigrant population is driving major demographic changes in the borough that will be especially important factors in redistricting.
The Census Bureau estimates that Queens gained only 1,343 residents between 2000 and 2010, with sharp population losses in the Astoria area. This estimate of nearly flat growth has been challenged by the Bloomberg administration, which argues that the Census undercounted the populations of Brooklyn and Queens by nearly 50,000. On the other hand, New York demographer Andrew Beveridge contends that the Census likely got it right.
Looking at the changes since 2000, Queens shares one major trend in common with many areas of upstate that we’ve looked at – a steep decline in the white population that was offset by a rapid rise in the minority population.
In the case of Queens, the borough’s demographics continue to shift with the steady decline of long-established white and black communities offset by the rapid rise of newer immigrant populations.
Both non-Hispanic white and black populations in Queens declined by 116,168 (-15.8%), and 26,950 (-6.3%) respectively, while Hispanic and Asian populations grew by 57,145 (+10.3%) and 119,031 (+30.6%).
The non-Hispanic White voting age population of Queens fell throughout most of the borough, most sharply in the Flushing area in the northeast and in the Richmond Hill-Howard Beach area. Closer to Manhattan, the gentrifying Long Island City and Ridgewood neighborhoods, as well as parts of Elmhurst, Corona, and Jamaica, defied the borough-wide trend and gained significant numbers of white residents
The non-Hispanic Black voting age population declined substantially in East Elmhurst (more than 4,600 lost) and in parts of Jamaica (almost 8,000 lost) as well.
While East Elmhurst is rapidly shifting to a majority-Hispanic community, Jamaica remains an important black community both within New York City and on the national level as well, known as a stronghold of the black middle class. But the decline in the black population of Jamaica since 2000 may foreshadow a larger decline in the decade to come as some studies note an increasing trend of black New Yorkers leaving the city for the lower cost of living in the south.
Hispanic voting age population increased most in Corona-Elmhurst, Ridgewood-Bushwick, Ozone Park, Woodhaven, Howard Beach, and Jamaica, and appears to have declined in Astoria. Looking at this pattern citywide, it appears that many Hispanic New Yorkers may be seeking relief from rising housing prices in neighborhoods like Williamsburg and Astoria by relocating to neighborhoods further from Manhattan like Corona, Ridgewood-Bushwick, and Woodhaven.
Hispanic majorities in Elmhurst-Corona, Woodhaven, and Ridgewood have become more firmly established with the Hispanic population growth since 2000.
The continued growth of the Asian community in Queens is the major story when looking at the Census 2010 data. This growth occurred throughout the borough but was most explosive in the Flushing area of Northeast Queens (gaining almost 38,000 voting-age Asians) and in Elmhurst-Jackson Heights (gaining almost 14,000 voting-age Asians).
With these changes, Asians now make up the majority of voting-age residents in many parts of Queens including Elmhurst, Jackson Heights, and Flushing, as well as suburban areas like Bayside, Bellerose, Jamaica Estates. Flushing is now New York’s largest Chinatown and is also home to a large Korean population, and these growing populations have increasingly spread to the east to areas like Bayside. Richmond Hill, Jamaica Estates, and Bellrose are heavily South Asian, and Elmhurst-Jackson Heights is an incredibly diverse mixture.
Now let’s look at the current districts and how they might be affected by these changing demographics.
Queens is currently divided between five Congressional districts.
District 5 (Ackerman-D) stretches into Queens from Nassau County and joins a huge area of Northern Queens to the suburbs of Long Island. As we’ve seen from demographics such as homeownership, transit, usage, and median income, this combination make some sense if it was only adding the suburban areas in Northeast Queens like Little Neck, Bayside, and Auburndale.
But instead the district goes all the way through Flushing and Corona and into Jackson Heights. These urban, working-class, immigrant neighborhoods are very different from the rest of the district. This District also manages to simultaneously crack the growing Asian and Hispanic communities in Corona, Jackson Heights, and Elmhurst.
District 7 (Crowley-D) is the other half of this cracking, taking half of Corona and Jackson Heights and joining it with the East Bronx, while District 14 (Maloney-D) joins Astoria with the much more wealthy and less ethnically diverse upper East Side of Manhattan.
With New York State losing two Congressional seats this cycle, one of these seats lost will almost certainly be in New York City. The most likely candidate for elimination is District 9 (formerly Weiner-D), not only because the longtime incumbent resigned, but also due to the shifting demographics within the district from white to Asian and Hispanic populations.
If District 9 were eliminated, a new district could be drawn from Jackson Heights across Flushing Meadows park through Flushing to Bayside that is over 35% Asian VAP – allowing the Queens Asian community a greater opportunity for representation in Congress. District 5 could still take the eastern, mostly heavily suburban fringe of Northeast Queens to join it with Nassau County.
Changes will also be in store for District 6 (Meeks-D). Due to Black population loss and the larger size of the new districts, the Congressional district based in Jamaica must be expanded either into Elmont in Nassau County Queens, and/or expanded to Brooklyn’s East New York if it is to remain a Black voting age majority district.
The current State Senate districts in Queens are also problematic.
Districts 11 (Avella-D) and 16 (Stavisky-D) currently crack the Asian community in Flushing right down the middle. A majority-Asian state senate district can easily be drawn in Flushing consisting of downtown Flushing and the areas to the south and east. Such a district would also make far more sense based on neighborhood geography than the current District 16.
The current district geography of Elmhurst-Jackson Heights cracks the Asian community even more egregiously than in Flushing, cracking it into four pieces with parts in District 16 (Stavisky-D), 13 (Peralta-D), 15 (Addabo Jr-D), and 12 (Gianaris-D).
While it’s not possible to draw a majority Asian district based in Jackson Heights, the current lines in this area stand for much improvement. Beyond concerns of ethnic representation, we believe that neighborhoods should never be cracked into arbitrary pieces in this manner.
Many of Queens Assembly districts are bizarrely gerrymandered, dividing coherent local communities into strangely curving and swerving puzzle pieces. The two districts in Far Rockaway, Districts 23 (Pfeffer-D) and District 31 (Titus-D), are one such example, but the effects of this pattern overall are most damaging to the Asian population of the borough.
In the Assembly, Queens currently has 18 seats. Of these eighteen seats, only one of them as currently drawn forms an Asian majority seat in Downtown Flushing (District 22 Meng-D), while three can be drawn to properly reflect the 30% growth of the Asian population during the last decade.
The Asian community is currently cracked into numerous districts that divide coherent neighborhoods like Jackson Heights and Richmond Hill into oddly curving slices that have no basis in any demographics.
In the Flushing area only one Asian majority seat is currently drawn in Downtown Flushing (District 22 Meng-D). The rest of the Asian community is cracked into three other districts: 24 (Weprin-D), 25 (Lancman-D), 26 (Braunstein-D). Two majority Asian VAP districts can be easily created in Northeast Queens to reflect the explosive growth of the Asian community there.
The current Corona and Jackson Heights Assembly districts are equally problematic, dicing the neighborhoods into arbitrary pieces and cracking both the Asian and Hispanic communities. Asian majority areas in Jackson Heights are sliced into five districts: District 34 (DenDekker-D), District 39 (Moya-D), District 35 (Aubrey-D), District 28 (Hevesi-D), and District 30 (Markey-D). An Asian-majority Assembly seat can be drawn based in Jackson Heights while also drawing the two Hispanic-majority districts in Elmhurst-Corona area into two more compact, neighborhood-based shapes.
Richmond Hill is another significant Asian neighborhood that is sliced into multiple pieces by the current Assembly Districts, depriving the South Asian community there from the opportunity to have a voice.
The way in which LATFOR chooses to redraw the districts in Queens, some of which are in need of radical change, will be a major test of whether or not it is capable of drawing fair districts based on communities of interest rather than political gamesmanship.
Lennin Reyes
October 4, 2011