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Where Upstate Begins -- And What to Do There

Adirondack mountains forests and lakes landscape view

Alexandra Zissu, contributing editor at the Times Union, weighs in on the question of where exactly "Upstate" New York begins. Callers share their opinions, along with ideas for how to find apples, bike trails and foliage once you get there.

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Nancy Solomon: It's The Brian Lehrer Show. I'm Nancy Solomon filling in for Brian who's out today. Now we're going to tackle on a lighter note, where is Upstate New York? We'll take your calls. Give us a call and tell us your opinion. 212-433-WNYC or 212-433-9692 or tweet us at @BrianLehrer. Tell us. Where is Upstate New York? Where do you draw the line? With me now is Alexandra Zissu, contributing editor at the Times Union and author of the recent Times Union article, Where does Upstate New York actually begin? Hi Alexandra. Welcome to WNYC.

Alexandra Zissu: Hi. Thanks for having me.

Nancy Solomon: What do you think? Tell us, where does Upstate begin?

Alexandra Zissu: I have differing opinions. I was born and raised in New York City, so I have many friends still from high school and beyond who think it's above 14th Street. Now I live in the Hudson Valley and I have for about a decade. Then there are many people I know in Buffalo and Rochester and even Albany, who don't think I live upstate. I think it's a matter of perspective and mostly I think it's pretty funny.

Nancy Solomon: Now, you did do some reporting on this?

Alexandra Zissu: I did.

Nancy Solomon: What methodology did you use to assess this?

Alexandra Zissu: Well it was fascinating. First I did this Facebook crowdsource, which is where I got a lot of the 14th Street Inwood, 125th Street answers from the people I knew from my prior life in New York City. Then I also called a historian who lives outside Albany and his methodology was pretty cool. There was many different ways to look at it. There's maps, there's congressional districts. There's the MTA line where the MTA stops.

My editor had heard somebody say that it's actually where the Stewart's Shops begin. We started talking about this Stewart Meridian line. For people who have never been to a Stewart Shop. It's just a place to get gas, newspapers, ice cream, milk, and such. It's like a Wawa Mart if you go to Philly or New Jersey. That Stewart's was really fun I hadn't heard that before. Later on, the deputy mayor of New Paltz told me she also felt it was the Stewart's Meridian line. Many, many different ways to look at this. I feel I'm upstate, but I know some people don't think I am.

Nancy Solomon: You're in the Hudson Valley?

Alexandra Zissu: I am. I'm in New Paltz. We have multiple Stewart's here I think. At least one I know of but Ulster County feels low to some people. I guess if you go directly across and you're thinking about where it is, the Metro-North stop, Poughkeepsie is directly across the river so maybe I'm not high enough.

Nancy Solomon: Well, we have a caller who has a lot of opinions about this. Jon Campbell, Albany reporter for WNYC in Gothamist is calling in. Hi, Jon.

Alexandra Zissu: The Cape Union people always say they have very strong opinions about Upstate.

Nancy Solomon: Of course, I believe Jon fits into that category. Do we have him there?

Jon Campbell: Yes, can you hear me?

Nancy Solomon: Hey, there you are. Good.

Jon Campbell: Hey, Nancy. How are you?

Nancy Solomon: I know that this is a very important issue to you. Where does Upstate begin?

Jon Campbell: Oh, it's my life's work. I'm going to answer it someday, but it is this topic that I have taken great delight in the last seven to eight years of really trolling people on social media and asking and highlighting when somebody has a Upstate New York definition in, say, a news article or something like that because there is no answer. There is no one right answer, but there are just thousands of people who think that they know the answer. There's no one legal definition or anything. You hear the MTA line thing a lot as that being the dividing case, but it's where you feel it in your heart. It's a gut feeling more than it is a geographic border.

Nancy Solomon: Now, is it true this story, I heard that you got a polling company to actually ask a question on this.

Jon Campbell: Oh yes. Oh, absolutely. It was the 2016 presidential election company called Public Policy Polling was doing a New York poll. They were looking for insight into what they might ask the New York electorate about what are the real burning issues in New York State. I convinced them to ask where people find Upstate New York to be. Where that dividing line is, and the answers-- it was all over the map.

Nancy Solomon: All over.

Jon Campbell: It was something like-- just like a real even split between people saying above Westchester County, above New York City. Then there was some that said above Poughkeepsie, but not including Buffalo. I'm a Buffalo guy myself, and I grew up thinking that I was not in Western New York, but I went to college with enough Long Island Institute.

Nancy Solomon: Where did you think you were?

Jon Campbell: What? Say that again.

Nancy Solomon: I said because I had a babysitter from Rochester once, and she doesn't call herself upstate. In Buffalo what were you calling yourself growing up?

Jon Campbell: Well, there are people in Western New York who say, we are from Western New York. We're not from Upstate but most other people would say Upstate is inclusive of Western New York and Central New York in the Mohawk Valley, et cetera.

Nancy Solomon: We could do our own little informal poll here. We have lots of calls, as you can imagine. Let's start with Terry in Manhattan. Hi Terry.

Terry: Hi. How are you? How are you doing? I think I have maybe a little perspective on this because I've lived in Manhattan for about 40 years, but I grew up in Orange County, just below the Ulster County border. My dad grew up on an Apple farm there. I think I have a little bit of perspective. I would say its where farming starts. Nowadays I would say that's Orange County on the west side and probably Duchess County on the east side of the Hudson. Below that, there's not really a lot of farming left today. That may be a border that moves as development [unintelligible 00:06:43] up in Hudson.

Nancy Solomon: That's a good point. We're going to jam on, try to get as many calls in as possible. Daniel in Buffalo. What do you have to say about where upstate begins?

Daniel: There is no upstate New York.

Nancy Solomon: Oh, Daniel.

Daniel: I was born in Washington Heights. I live for several-- the beginning of my life in Valhalla in Westchester. I've lived for many decades now in Buffalo that I consider Western New York. I've traveled around all of New York State, to the north country, to the Finger Lakes, to the southern tier, to the Adirondack and the Hudson River Valley. I've never seen on any map, maybe there is such a map someplace called upstate New York.

To think that Watertown and Buffalo, and Jamestown and Syracuse and Amsterdam New York are in the same geographic region. It's just absurd. I've often thought, sometimes you might think I'm a little sensitive about this, but that it's an exclusionary term made up by New Yorkers who never say they live downstate.

Nancy Solomon: We're getting some very great responses. Thanks, Daniel so much.

Alexandra Zissu: That one is a very emotional response too, which is something that I found and I think is important. I think that's why the perspective of people like Daniel who had both lived in New York City and then out of New York City, there's a lot of strong feelings.

Nancy Solomon: Now, Jon, I'm going to let you go, but I just wanted to get-- you have a couple of suggestions for what to do upstate in this fall leaf-peeping season.

Jon Campbell: Well, you just said it there, leaf-peeping. There's no better leaf peeing than in Upstate New York. Wherever you say that definition is. The Adirondacks, the Catskills, it's incredible. I would also say, good fall activity, the museums. The FDR Museum in Duchess County, some of the art museums, Dia Beacon, Storm King, they're great for day trips from New York.

Nancy Solomon: Jon Campbell is the Albany Reporter for WNYC in Gothamist, thanks for calling in. We're going to squeeze in one more call, Ann, in Great Neck.

Ann: Hi, thanks for taking my call. As I said to the screener, I grew up in Upstate in Syracuse and I've lived in and around New York City for most of my adult life. I've lived in what is truly Upstate New York, under any definition. New York City where I lived for 25 years and now on Long Island. I think I've seen it from all sides. My husband and son were both born in New York City and it's a family joke that upstate starts at the Bronx Westchester line, which of course, I ferociously dispute.

I tell them that they are provincial yahoos if that's what they think. Seriously, I think the line, well, the joking line is it goes from Albany to Binghamton and I have a slashing motion I use when they start getting uppity about it but seriously, it's two different states. It's one state that has been hollowed out by the disappearance of the industrial base. Very poor people, very neglected and forgotten people north and west of the Albany Binghamton line. Below that, you're affected by New York City.

Nancy Solomon: Of course.

Ann: There are jobs, there's transportation, there's communication.

Nancy Solomon: Absolutely. I'm sorry, but we're out of time but that's a terrific point to make. Call again, please. That was such a great point. Thanks, everybody to your calls. Thank you Alexandra Zissu from the Times Union newspaper for her reporting on this. I'm Nancy Solomon. This is The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Brian will be back on Monday. Have a great weekend everybody.

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