Diversity Leads to Tranquility in Astoria, Queens

"Queens, N.Y., is one of the most diverse urban spaces in the world, and one of the most diverse neighborhoods in Queens is Astoria, across the East River from upper Manhattan," writes Alexandra Starr of NPR's Code Switch team. [Listen here.] People of different races, ethnicities, and cultures "coexist pretty peacefully, but that wasn't always the case. The explosion of diversity has helped foster a more tranquil community."

No one group dominates numerically. That's a change from a few decades ago, when Astoria's newer immigrants were basically Greeks and Italians, and there was a great deal of tension between the Italians and African-Americans living in the neighborhood.

An African American store-owner confirms that tension. "When I was growing up, kids would say, 'You can't go across 21st Street' [considered a racial barrier, explains Sofya Aptekar, a sociologist at the University of Massachusetts], because something is going to happen to you," he says. "Now things are much more peaceful. With the increase in minority groups, everyone seems to have found their own space.

"The neighborhood isn't done changing, says Aptekar. New luxury housing is going up, including two buildings right next to public housing," writes Starr, suggesting the next transformation for the neighborhood may be rooted in economics rather than cultural diversity.

"I think a lot of people who have lived in the neighborhood for a long time are worried," says Aptekar. "Does it mean ultimate displacement?"

Queens expert, John Roleke, says not to worry. "The last few years lots of young professional and hipsters have discovered the neighborhoods, but unlike parts of Brooklyn, they're not really gentrifying the neighborhood, just raising the demand for housing," he writes in his introduction to "Top 7 Reasons To Live in Astoria, Queens." Of course, many would assert that he is describing the basis of gentrification.

Another Queens neighborhood was recently profiled in real estate section of The New York Times: "Sunnyside, Queens, ‘Mayberry’ Near Midtown."