Rego Park is an upscale neighborhood in the New York City borough of Queens, offering its residents a quiet and well maintained living environment. Rego park takes up a small triangular area in central Queens. This neighbor is bounded by three major thoroughfares, Queens Boulevard to the northeast, Yellowstone Boulevard to the southeast and Woodhaven Boulevard to the west. Rego Park has become one of the most ideal places for Queens’ residents to live due to its well-known location and beautiful homes.
A swath of farmland until the early 20th century, the area that came to be called Rego Park was once populated by Dutch & German farmers who sold their produce in Manhattan. Later, the farmers were Chinese, and sold their goods exclusively to Chinatown. Rego Park was named after the Real Good Construction Company, which began development of the area in the mid-1920s. "Rego" comes from the first two letters of the first two words of the Real Good Construction Company. The company built 525 eight-room houses costing $8,000 each. Stores were built in 1926 on Queens Boulevard and 63rd Drive, and apartment buildings were built in 1927–28.
In Rego Park one will typically see many old, English-styled Tudor homes along tree lined streets. The majority of these charming homes were built in the early 1920’s when Rego Park was first built. However, more modern and newly-styled town houses have begun to spring up along the same streets. The rents of the apartments and condos in Rego Park are higher compared to many of the neighbors throughout Queens, but the prices are still fairly cheaper than one would expect to pay in the Big City. The demographics in Rego Park are largely diverse like the rest of the borough despite the fact that the neighborhood is less than two square miles and is only home to 40,000 people.
Shopping Districts with many smaller stores, bakeries, pharmacies and restaurants can be found along 108th Street and 63rd Drive.
Along Queens Boulevard, Rego Park is also home to some of Queens' most popular shopping destinations, including the Rego Park Center a 277,000-square-foot site across the street from Sears that features four floors of shops and a multilevel parking garage. A new shopping center, recently built on 62nd Drive across from Rego Park Center, houses a Kohl's, a Century 21 (department store), a Costco, a T.J. Maxx, a Toys "R" Us, and a Payless ShoeSource, with more stores being built. The Queens Center mall, the borough's largest, lies just to the west in Elmhurst
Aside from the many apartment buildings and multi-family houses which make up Rego Park, many homes in Rego Park are in the colonial and Tudor style with slate roofs. This is especially so in an area called the Crescents, named for its semicircular shaped streets emanating in a concentric pattern from Alderton Street, between Woodhaven Boulevard and the Long Island Rail Road. There is easy access to Manhattan via the 63rd Drive subway stop.
Rego Park is also home several American television's unforgettable characters, Archie Bunker from the 1970s sitcom All in the Family. The house shown in the credits is located at 89-70 Cooper Avenue. Rego Park was the setting of the 1980s sitcom Dear John, which took place at the fictional "Rego Park Community Center." And the CBS sitcom The King of Queens is set in Rego Park, and sometimes shows clips of the area.