The North Bronx is the northern section of the Bronx, one of the five boroughs of New York City. It is bordered by Westchester County to the north, the South Bronx to the south, the Hudson River to the west and the Long Island Sound to the east. The western part is more urbanized and hilly than its eastern counterpart, just like the rest of the borough. Despite being recognized as different from the South Bronx, the actual borders of the North Bronx is undefined. One commonly set border is Fordham Road/Pelham Parkway, the upper limit for widespread poverty and arson during the 1970s and 1980s.
Overall, the North Bronx is better off than the South Bronx despite gentrification occurring in both. The North Bronx has the affluent cluster of neighborhoods centered around Riverdale, including the former, Fieldston, Spuyten Duyvil, Hudson Hills, and to a lesser extent, Kingsbridge. The North Bronx is home to the largest shopping district along Fordham Road, with shops as far west as University Avenue and as east as Third Avenue. Tracey Towers, the second tallest buildings in the Bronx are located here. Only the Harlem River Park Towers are taller, at 404 feet compared to 400 feet for Tracey Towers. However, the North Bronx is home to the largest housing development in Co-op City.
Neighborhoods include Riverdale, Bedford Park, Fordham, Norwood, Woodlawn Heights, Wakefield, Baychester, and Co-op City.
History
European contact with the Bronx first occurred almost 400 years ago. In 1609, Henry Hudson, probably the first European to see the shoreline, sought cover from a storm for his vessel the Halve Maen in Spuyten Duyvil Creek. Thirty years later in 1639, the mainland was settled by Jonas Bronck, a Swedish sea captain from the Netherlands who eventually built a farmstead at what became 132nd Street and Lincoln Avenue; a small group of Dutch, German, and Danish servants settled with him.
Most of the eastern half of the area now known as the Bronx was bought in 1654 by Thomas Pell (Pelham Bay is named after him) of Connecticut, who invited sixteen families to form the village of Westchester near what is now Westchester Square. Westchester was between 1683 and 1714 the seat of Westchester County (which included the Bronx until the second half of the nineteenth century) and as a chartered borough was the only town in the colony with an elected mayor. In addition, it was the first town without a property qualification for suffrage: settlers chose a representative to the provincial assembly and had their own municipal court. Horses, cattle, sheep and wheat were the main agricultural products and a cottage industry in cloth making thrived.