Quick Profile
Bay Ridge is an old-world neighborhood neatly tucked into the southwest corner of Brooklyn within the shadows of the Verrazano Bridge. The neighborhood is encircled by the Belt Parkway along the shore line and the Gowanus Expressway inland.
Bay Ridge, long known for its generational pull, has historically been home to a diverse number of ethnic groups. While the area is flush with people of Irish, Italian and Greek descent, these ethnic communities have been joined by larger numbers of new groups, including people with Russian, Polish, Asian and Middle Eastern backgrounds. The Arab American community today in Bay Ridge represents the largest concentration of Arab Americans in New York City.
For many years, Bay Ridge and its waterside location, would attract the affluent. But most of the mansions that once lined Shore Road are long gone and have been replaced by six-story apartment buildings.
Aside from the low-rise apartment buildings, the neighborhood pretty much consists of one and two-family homes. Lush front yards and trimmed hedges are pretty common here.
Current zoning and limitations on building heights restrict any out of the norm development. At present, the future beholds small development on some of the commercial strips and teardowns of older homes for smaller residential projects.