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Learn about New York City, the most populous and diverse city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State. Explore its history, culture, economy, geography, and attractions.
Sep 22, 2024 · Plan your perfect trip to New York City with this detailed guide that covers the icons, museums, neighborhoods, and food of the Big Apple. Find out how to visit One World Observatory, 9/11 Memorial, Statue of Liberty, and more in 5 days.
- Overview
- Character of the city
- The city site
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New York City is located at the mouth of the Hudson River in southeastern New York state, which is in the northeastern section of the United States.
What are the five boroughs of New York City?
The five boroughs of New York City are Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx, Queens, and Staten Island.
Why is New York City important in the United States?
New York City is the largest and most influential American metropolis and the most populous and the most international city in the country. Located where the Hudson and East rivers empty into one of the world’s premier harbors, New York is both the gateway to the North American continent and its preferred exit to the oceans of the globe.
What does the seal of New York City look like?
New York is the most ethnically diverse, religiously varied, commercially driven, famously congested, and, in the eyes of many, the most attractive urban centre in the country. No other city has contributed more images to the collective consciousness of Americans: Wall Street means finance, Broadway is synonymous with theatre, Fifth Avenue is automatically paired with shopping, Madison Avenue means the advertising industry, Greenwich Village connotes bohemian lifestyles, Seventh Avenue signifies fashion, Tammany Hall defines machine politics, and Harlem evokes images of the Jazz Age, African American aspirations, and slums. The word tenement brings to mind both the miseries of urban life and the upward mobility of striving immigrant masses. New York has more Jews than Tel Aviv, more Irish than Dublin, more Italians than Naples, and more Puerto Ricans than San Juan. Its symbol is the Statue of Liberty, but the metropolis is itself an icon, the arena in which Emma Lazarus’s “tempest-tost” people of every nation are transformed into Americans—and if they remain in the city, they become New Yorkers.
For the past two centuries, New York has been the largest and wealthiest American city. More than half the people and goods that ever entered the United States came through its port, and that stream of commerce has made change a constant presence in city life. New York always meant possibility, for it was an urban centre on its way to something better, a metropolis too busy to be solicitous of those who stood in the way of progress. New York—while the most American of all the country’s cities—thus also achieved a reputation as both foreign and fearsome, a place where turmoil, arrogance, incivility, and cruelty tested the stamina of everyone who entered it. The city was inhabited by strangers, but they were, as James Fenimore Cooper explained, “essentially national in interest, position, pursuits. No one thinks of the place as belonging to a particular state but to the United States.” Once the capital of both its state and the country, New York surpassed such status to become a world city in both commerce and outlook, with the most famous skyline on earth. It also became a target for international terrorism—most notably the destruction in 2001 of the World Trade Center, which for three decades had been the most prominent symbol of the city’s global prowess. However, New York remains for its residents a conglomeration of local neighbourhoods that provide them with familiar cuisines, languages, and experiences. A city of stark contrasts and deep contradictions, New York is perhaps the most fitting representative of a diverse and powerful nation.
Sections of the granite bedrock of New York date to about 100 million years ago, but the topography of the present city is largely the product of the glacial recession that marked the end of the Wisconsin Glacial Stage about 10,000 years ago. Great erratic boulders in Manhattan’s Central Park, deep kettle depressions in Brooklyn and Queens, and the glacial moraine that remains in parts of the metropolitan area provide silent testimony to the enormous power of the ice. Glacial retreat also carved out the waterways around the city. The Hudson and East rivers, Spuyten Duyvil Creek, and Arthur Kill are, in reality, estuaries of the Atlantic Ocean, and the Hudson is tidal as far north as Troy. The approximately 600 miles (1,000 km) of New York shoreline are locked in constant combat with the ocean, as it erodes the land and adds new sediments elsewhere. Although the harbour is constantly dredged, ship channels are continually filled with river silt and are too shallow for more modern deep-sea vessels.
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South of the rockbound terrain of Manhattan stretches a sheltered deepwater anchorage offering easy access to the Atlantic Ocean. In 1524 the Italian navigator Giovanni da Verrazzano was the first European to enter the harbour, which he named Santa Margarita, and he reported that the hills surrounding the vast expanse of New York Bay appeared to be rich in minerals; more than 90 species of precious stone and 170 of the world’s minerals have actually been found in New York. Verrazzano’s daring expedition was commemorated in 1964, when what was then the world’s longest suspension bridge was dedicated to span the Narrows at the entrance to Upper New York Bay.
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Learn about New York City, the largest and most influential American metropolis, with its diverse neighborhoods, iconic landmarks, and global role. Explore its geography, economy, culture, history, and recent news from Britannica.
- George Lankevich
- Visit the iconic Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. The iconic copper-green Statue of Liberty dominates a small island in New York Harbor, casting a protective shadow over neighboring Ellis Island, the site of a stirring Immigration Museum.
- Soak up the views from the Empire State and Chrysler Buildings. The tallest building in the world when it opened in 1931, the 1454ft Empire State Building remains a much-loved character on the NYC skyline.
- Pay tribute to lost lives at the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum. The National 9/11 Memorial is located where the World Trade Center Twin Towers once stood.
- Have family-friendly seaside fun at Coney Island. Jutting like a Brooklyn thumb out into New York Harbor's Lower Bay, Coney Island boasts a wide beach, a popular seaside boardwalk and a lively amusement park, all reachable by subway in about an hour from Midtown Manhattan.
- Statue of Liberty & Ellis Island. Location: Liberty Island and Ellis Island. If it is your first time to New York City, the Statue of Liberty is a must-see.
- Visit Central Park. Location: Manhattan. Taking a stroll through Central Park is one of the best things to do in New York City. It’s free to visit and a beautiful place to unwind, after walking the busy city streets.
- The Empire State Building. Location: Midtown Manhattan. Until 1970, when the World Trade Center was built, the Empire State Building was the tallest building in the world.
- Rockefeller Center & Top of the Rock. Location: Midtown Manhattan. Rockefeller Center is a complex of 19 buildings (14 of which are Art Deco buildings) that were commissioned by the Rockefeller family.
May 30, 2024 · The 42 Best Things to Do in New York City. In the city you could inhabit for a lifetime and never run out of things to do, here's where to start. By Melissa Liebling-Goldberg, Alex Erdekian,...
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Discover the best time to visit, the top attractions, the best neighborhoods and the latest stories from New York City, the epicenter of arts, culture and cuisine. Find out how to plan your trip, save money, get around and enjoy the city with Lonely Planet's expert guidance.
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