About the City of New Haven
Connecticut (CT)
06501-11, 06513, 06515, 06520-21, 06530-38 & 06540

New Haven is the second-largest municipality in Connecticut (after Bridgeport and just ahead of Hartford) and the sixth-largest municipality in New England with a core population of about 123,000 people. "New Haven" may also refer to the wider Greater New Haven area. It is located in New Haven County, on New Haven Harbor, on the northern shore of Long Island Sound.

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About New Haven, CT:

One year after its founding in 1638, eight streets were laid out in a grid of four streets by four streets creating what is now commonly known as the "Nine Square Plan," which is recognized by the American Institute of Certified Planners as a National Historic Planning Landmark. The central common block is New Haven Green a 16 acre square, now a National Historic Landmark and the center of Downtown New Haven.

New Haven had the first public tree planting program in America, producing a canopy of mature trees (including some large elms) that gave New Haven the nickname "The Elm City."

The city is the home of Yale University. Along with Yale, health care (hospitals, biotechnology), professional services (legal, architectural, marketing, engineering), financial services and retail trade form the base of the economy. Since the mid-1990s, the city's downtown area has seen extensive revitalization.

New Haven was incorporated as a city in 1784, and Roger Sherman, one of the signers of the Constitution and author of the "Connecticut Compromise", became the new city's first mayor.

The city struck fortune in the late 18th century with the inventions and industrial activity of Eli Whitney, a Yale graduate who remained in New Haven to develop the cotton gin and establish a gun-manufacturing factory in the northern part of the city near the Hamden town line. That area is still known as Whitneyville, and the main road through both towns is known as Whitney Avenue. The factory is now the Eli Whitney Museum which has a particular emphasis on activities for children, and exhibits pertaining to the A. C. Gilbert Company. His factory, along with that of Simeon North, and the lively clock-making and brass hardware sectors, contributed to making early Connecticut a powerful manufacturing economy; so many arms manufacturers sprang up that the state became known as 'The Arsenal of America'. It was in Whitney's gun-manufacturing plant that Samuel Colt invented the automatic revolver in 1836.

The Farmington Canal, created in the early 1800s, was a short-lived transporter of goods into the interior regions of Connecticut and Massachusetts, and ran from New Haven to Northampton, Massachusetts.

New Haven was home to one of the important early events in the burgeoning anti-slavery movement when, in 1839, the trial of mutineering Mendi tribesmen being transported as slaves on the Spanish slaveship Amistad was held in New Haven's United States District Court. There is a statue of Joseph Cinqué, the informal leader of the slaves, beside City Hall. See "Museums" below for more information.

The American Civil War boosted the local economy with wartime purchases of industrial goods. After the war, New Haven's population grew and doubled by the start of the 20th century, most notably due to the influx of immigrants from southern Europe, particularly Italy. Today, roughly half the populations of East Haven, West Haven, and North Haven are Italian-American. Jewish immigration to New Haven has left an enduring mark on the city. Westville was the center of Jewish life in New Haven, though today many have fanned out to suburban communities such as Woodbridge and Cheshire.

New Haven's growth continued during the two World Wars, with most new inhabitants being African Americans from the South and Puerto Ricans. The city reached its peak population after World War II. The area of New Haven is only 17 square miles (44 km²), encouraging further development of new housing after 1950 in adjacent, suburban towns. Moreover, as in other US cities in 1950s, New Haven began to suffer from an exodus of middle-class workers.

In 1954, then-mayor Richard C. Lee began some of the earliest major urban renewal projects in the United States. Certain sections of Downtown New Haven were destroyed and rebuilt with new office towers, a hotel, and large shopping complexes. Other parts of the city were affected by the construction of Interstate 95 along the Long Wharf section, Interstate 91 and the Oak Street Connector. The Oak Street Connector (Route 34), running between Interstate 95, downtown and The Hill neighborhood, was originally intended as a highway to the city's western suburbs but was only completed as a highway to the downtown area, with the area to the west becoming a boulevard.

Neighborhoods:

The city has many distinct neighborhoods. In addition to Downtown, centered on the central business district and the Green, are the following neighborhoods: the west central neighborhoods of Dixwell and Dwigt; the southern neighborhoods of The Hill, historic water-front City Point (or Oyster Point), and the harborside district of Long Wharf; the western neighborhoods of Edgewood, West River, Westville, Amity, and West Rock-Westhills; East Rock, Cedar Hill, Prospect Hill, and Newhallville in the northern side of town; the east central neighborhoods of Mill River and Wooster Square, an Italian-American neighborhood; Fair Haven, a neighborhood that is with majority Puerto Rican families and other Latino groups, located between the Mill and Quinnipiac rivers; Quinnipiac Meadows and Fair Haven Heights across the Quinnipiac River; and facing the eastern side of the harbor, The Annex and East Shore (or Morris Cove).

Schools:

Yale University at the heart of downtown is one of the city's best known features and its largest employer. New Haven is also home to other centers of higher education, including Southern Connecticut State University and Albertus Magnus College. Gateway Community College has a campus in New Haven, located in the Long Wharf district.

There are institutions immediately outside of New Haven, as well. Quinnipiac University is located just to the north, in the town of Hamden. The University of New Haven is located not in New Haven but in West Haven.

Wilbur Cross High School and Hillhouse High School are New Haven's two largest public secondary schools. Hopkins School, a private school, was founded in 1660 and is the fifth oldest educational institution in the United States. New Haven is home to a number of other private schools as well as public magnet schools including High School in the Community, Hill Regional Career High School, Co-op High School, ACES-Educational Center for the Arts, and the Sound School, all of which draw students from New Haven and suburban towns. New Haven is also home to two Achievement First charter schools, Amistad Academy and Elm City College Prep. It is also home to Common Ground, an environmental charter school.

The school district is called New Haven Public Schools. Almost all have been renovated under a 15-year, $1.5 billion School Construction Program; the immense effort to improve city public schools is slowly erasing the bad reputation that New Haven public schools had acquired in past decades, though it will yet take years to see if the program has truly been a success.

Community Information:

• New Haven School Website
• City of New Haven Website
• Metro North Railroad
• What's in the area (just for fun)?
• About New Haven County, CT

*Some content provided by Wikipedia.org