Far Rockaway 

Thirty-one miles of carbon steel connect Inwood in Upper Manhattan to what is effectively a different world in the same city. On a good day, it would take at least two hours to go from terminus-to-terminus on the A line, the longest in the New York City subway system. The southern end of the A is housed in the oldest subway station still in use, opening on July 29, 1869 in what was then and still is Far Rockaway.

Far Rockaway is often used as a catch-all for the entirety of the peninsula, or at least the eastern half of it, but the nominal neighborhood starts at around Beach 32nd Street and encompasses everything east of that, excluding the Bayswater area. The extension of the Long Island Railroad in the 1880s led to massive growth for Far Rockaway, both a tourist destination and a residential area. Between Beach 24th and Beach 26th Streets, a number of small bungalows were built in the 1920s which now make up the federally-recognized Far Rockaway Beach Bungalow Historic District. By the 1950s, the discontinuation of the majority of LIRR service to the Rockaways, a drastic increase in the amount of public housing, and the subsequent flight of wealthy residents to the suburbs led to the end of Far Rockaway’s prominence as a getaway spot and its transition to a diverse, low-to- middle income residential and commercial area.

Community Board 14’s headquarters are located in the heart of the neighborhood on Mott Avenue. In addition to being the home of the subway/LIRR station, Mott Avenue houses several bus lines, restaurants, businesses large and small, numerous churches, and the 101st Precinct. Further down on Beach 9th Street is a popular playground and the beginning (or end) of the boardwalk that now runs continuously for 5.5 miles.

What’s new? The Rockaway Village apartment complex has officially opened and so will the new public library on the corner of Mott Ave. and Central Ave.