Prospect Park is a somewhat small borough located in the state of New Jersey. With a population of 6,219 people and just one neighborhood, Prospect Park is the 272nd largest community in New Jersey. Much of the housing stock in Prospect Park was built prior to World War II, making it one of the older and more historic boroughs in the country.
Housing costs in Prospect Park are among some of the highest in the nation, although real estate prices here don't compare to real estate prices in the most expensive communities in New Jersey.
Because occupations involving physical labor dominate the local economy, Prospect Park is generally considered to be a blue-collar town. 37.07% of the Prospect Park workforce is employed in blue-collar occupations, compared to the national average of 27.7%. Overall, Prospect Park is a borough of service providers, sales and office workers, and professionals. There are especially a lot of people living in Prospect Park who work in office and administrative support (12.91%), healthcare suport services (8.37%), and teaching (6.85%).
Also of interest is that Prospect Park has more people living here who work in computers and math than 95% of the places in the US.
The education level of Prospect Park citizens is a little higher than the average for US cities and towns: 24.45% of adults in Prospect Park have at least a bachelor's degree.
The per capita income in Prospect Park in 2022 was $28,671, which is low income relative to New Jersey, and lower middle income relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $114,684 for a family of four. However, Prospect Park contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
Prospect Park is an extremely ethnically-diverse borough. The people who call Prospect Park home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. People of Hispanic or Latino origin are the most prevalent group in Prospect Park, accounting for 63.73% of the borough’s residents (people of Hispanic or Latino origin can be of any race). The greatest number of Prospect Park residents report their race to be White, followed by Black or African-American. Important ancestries of people in Prospect Park include Dutch, Italian, Czech, Haitian, and Jamaican.
Foreign born people are also an important part of Prospect Park's cultural character, accounting for 41.87% of the borough’s population.
The most common language spoken in Prospect Park is Spanish. Other important languages spoken here include English and Other Indo-European.
The way a neighborhood looks and feels when you walk or drive around it, from its setting, its buildings, and its flavor, can make all the difference. This neighborhood has some really cool things about the way it looks and feels as revealed by NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research. This might include anything from the housing stock to the types of households living here to how people get around.
Three-deckers, duplexes, old Victorian homes cut up into apartments. Independent stores on the corner selling pizza. These are some of the hallmarks of neighborhoods with lots of small 2, 3, and 4 unit apartment buildings. The neighborhood really stands out in this regard, however, as it is dominated by such small apartment buildings more than nearly any other neighborhood in America. This is a stunning visual and lifestyle example of this type of neighborhood. In fact, 72.2% of the real estate here are small 2, 3, or 4 unit apartment buildings, which is a higher proportion than found in 99.8% of America's neighborhoods.
In addition, even if you drive or take transit to your place of employment, many people enjoy being able to walk in their neighborhood. What many people don't realize is that most of America's premier vacation locations are also very walkable. The neighborhood is among the top 5% of American neighborhoods in terms of walkability.
Single parenting is hard. But you don't have to tell the neighborhood about it; they already know. 20.0% of this neighborhood's households are run by single mothers, which is a higher concentration than NeighborhoodScout found in 97.0% of American neighborhoods. Further NeighborhoodScout research showed strong statistical correlations among high rates of children living in single parent households, and neighborhood crime, particularly violent crime, neighborhood poverty, and, importantly, the percentage of low weight births and rates of infant mortality.
Did you know that the neighborhood has more South American and Dominican ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 24.1% of this neighborhood's residents have South American ancestry and 19.1% have Dominican ancestry.
How wealthy a neighborhood is, from very wealthy, to middle income, to low income is very formative with regard to the personality and character of a neighborhood. Equally important is the rate of people, particularly children, who live below the federal poverty line. In some wealthy gated communities, the areas immediately surrounding can have high rates of childhood poverty, which indicates other social issues. NeighborhoodScout's analysis reveals both aspects of income and poverty for this neighborhood.
The neighbors in the neighborhood in Prospect Park are lower-middle income, making it a below average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 84.2% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 37.0% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 87.5% of U.S. neighborhoods.
What we choose to do for a living reflects who we are. Each neighborhood has a different mix of occupations represented, and together these tell you about the neighborhood and help you understand if this neighborhood may fit your lifestyle.
In the neighborhood, 36.6% of the working population is employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is executive, management, and professional occupations, with 23.6% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations (21.3%), and 18.1% in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants.
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is Spanish, spoken by 54.7% of households. Some people also speak English (36.9%).
Culture is shared learned behavior. We learn it from our parents, their parents, our houses of worship, and much of our culture – our learned behavior – comes from our ancestors. That is why ancestry and ethnicity can be so interesting and important to understand: places with concentrations of people of one or more ancestries often express those shared learned behaviors and this gives each neighborhood its own culture. Even different neighborhoods in the same city can have drastically different cultures.
In the neighborhood in Prospect Park, NJ, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as South American (24.1%). There are also a number of people of Dominican ancestry (19.1%), and residents who report Puerto Rican roots (8.5%), and some of the residents are also of Mexican ancestry (5.7%), along with some Dutch ancestry residents (4.6%), among others. In addition, 41.9% of the residents of this neighborhood were born in another country.
How you get to work – car, bus, train or other means – and how much of your day it takes to do so is a large quality of life and financial issue. Especially with gasoline prices rising and expected to continue doing so, the length and means of one's commute can be a financial burden. Some neighborhoods are physically located so that many residents have to drive in their own car, others are set up so many walk to work, or can take a train, bus, or bike. The greatest number of commuters in neighborhood spend between 15 and 30 minutes commuting one-way to work (47.6% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.
Here most residents (74.9%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In addition, quite a number also carpool with coworkers, friends, or neighbors to get to work (20.0%) . In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.