Central New York

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search
Central New York State

Central New York is a term used to broadly describe the central region of New York State, roughly including the following counties and cities:

Cayuga County Auburn
Cortland County Cortland
Herkimer County Little Falls
Madison County Oneida
Oneida County Rome, Sherrill (Smallest City In New York) & Utica
Onondaga County Syracuse (Largest city in the region)
Oswego County Fulton & Oswego
Tompkins County Ithaca

Under this definition, the region has a population of about 1,177,073.

Major newspapers in the region include the Oneida Daily Dispatch, Syracuse Post-Standard, Auburn Citizen, Ithaca Journal, and Utica Observer-Dispatch, as well as the alternative newsweekly Syracuse New Times.

Hamilton College, Cornell University, Le Moyne College, SUNY Oswego, Colgate University, SUNY Cortland, Ithaca College, Syracuse University and the SUNY ESF are some of the major colleges and universities in the region.

The region is served by several television stations based in Syracuse including ABC affiliate WSYR-TV, NBC affiliate WSTM-TV, CBS affiliate WTVH, Fox affiliate WSYT and PBS affiliate WCNY-TV.

Note: Tompkins County and Cortland County are often considered part of the region in New York State called the Southern Tier; the ski country demarcation line runs through Cortland County. Tompkins County, which features Ithaca at the end of Cayuga Lake, is often considered part of the Finger Lakes. Oneida County and Herkimer County are often considered part of the region in NYS called the Mohawk Valley, although the "Central New York" and "Mohawk Valley" definitions overlap and neither definition is mutually exclusive. Therefore Tompkins County, Cortland County, Oneida County and Herkimer County are only Central New York in the broader sense of the phrase "Central New York".

Only Onondaga County, Cayuga County, Oswego County and Madison County are always considered "Central New York".

The New York State Department of Transportation defines the Central/Eastern region as including the counties of Albany, Broome, Chenango, Columbia, Cortland, Delaware, Fulton, Greene, Herkimer, Madison, Montgomery, Oneida, Onondaga, Oswego, Otsego, Rensselaer, Saratoga, Schenectady, Schoharie, Sullivan, Ulster, and Washington, but does not commit itself to a definition of Central New York per se. [1]


[edit] History

During the early historic period, the Iroquois successfully excluded Algonquin tribes from the region.

The Central New York Military Tract, land reserved from soldiers of the American Revolution, was located here. Many towns derived from the tracts have classical names.

[edit] Speech patterns

Many Central New Yorkers pronounce elementary as /ɛlʌmɛntɛɹi/ instead of the General American pronunciations of /ɛlʌmɛntɝi/ and /ɛlʌmɛntri/. The r-colored vowels in documentary and complimentary follow suit.

Central New Yorkers tend to not use certain accents and speech patterns heard in Western New York. (I.e., the Western New York tendency to say "the" before a route number, such as "the 90" for Interstate 90, is not observed in Central New York.)

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Central/Eastern Region", New York State Dept of Transportation. Retrieved 25 January 2009.

Personal tools