AreaProfile

14217Tonawanda Town, New York

Area Profile

Income, jobs, climate, physical risk and development data for ZIP code 14217.

Area Score unavailable

Missing required signals: opportunity, growth. AreaProfile withholds a score rather than inferring the missing dimensions.

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Housing affordabilityTop 9% of 6,685 published ZIP areas100
Climate5111th of 6,789 published ZIP areas62
Physical resilienceTop 24% of 6,709 published ZIP areas80
AccessTop 32% of 6,791 published ZIP areas97
Economic stabilityTop 27% of 6,742 published ZIP areas72
The quick read

Housing is more affordable relative to local incomes than in most published city profiles, with rent taking 17% of median household income.

Natural-hazard exposure is lower than in most comparable published ZIP profiles, placing 14217 in the top 24% for physical resilience.

A major airport is 8 miles away, giving the area unusually direct access to the national air network.

At a glance

Population
22,471
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$73,800
Top 47% nationally
Density
7,016/sq mi
3.2 sq mi of land
Median age
41.2
2024 ACS 5-Year
City
Tonawanda Town
New York
Metro area
Buffalo-Cheektowaga, NY
Nearest major airport
BUF
8 mi · Buffalo Niagara Intl
Median home value
$207,500
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

43% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 82% of measured US ZIP areas.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$5,573$73,800Top 47%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,171$43,076Top 31%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate10.6%Top 50%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute20.9 minBottom 16%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher42.7%Top 18%2024 ACS 5-Year
Labor force participation70.4%Top 14%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$66,480Bottom 44%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$50,790Top 49%2025 OEWS
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202474k62k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $73,800 in the 2024 ACS 5-Year. Consecutive releases share four years of sample, so AreaProfile shows them as a record of successive estimates and does not compute a year-over-year change from them.
Largest occupations — Buffalo-Cheektowaga, NY
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Home Health and Personal Care Aides18,090$36,570
Retail Salespersons15,160$34,910
Fast Food and Counter Workers14,170$34,560
Registered Nurses13,830$99,060
General and Operations Managers11,100$103,280
Cashiers10,590$33,850

Occupational employment and wages are published for metropolitan areas rather than for individual cities or ZIP areas, so these describe the wider labor market this location sits in. 2025 OEWS, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

There are 7.8 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
1
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
7.8
across all schools here
Math proficiency
Reading proficiency
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
KENMORE JUNIOR-SENIOR HIGH SCHOOLKENMORE-TONAWANDA UNION FREE SCHOOL DISTRICT1807.8

58.3% of students here are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. That describes the circumstances families arrive with rather than how the schools perform, which is why AreaProfile shows it and does not score it.

Public schools only, from the NCES Common Core of Data. Schools are placed by ZIP code, so this is which schools are in this place rather than which one a particular address is zoned for — district boundaries do not follow municipal ones, and enrollment zones change. Fully virtual schools are excluded: they enroll students from across the state while reporting one administrative address, and counting them here would describe a school population this place does not have. The assessment covers grades 3 through 8, so a high school shows no proficiency figure — a dash in those columns means the test was not given at that school, not that it performed badly. Proficiency is measured against New York’s own standard, so it compares cleanly within the state and only broadly against other states; AreaProfile therefore ranks it within state. The directory is current, while the proficiency figures are from the last school year with national coverage before the pandemic interrupted testing.

Housing & affordability

How it’s calculated →

Median rent of $1,026 takes 17% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 2.8 times median household income here, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.

Rent as a share of income
16.7%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
2.8×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,026
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$207,500
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income2.81Bottom 40%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate66.0%Bottom 23%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±45511,093Top 14%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$64$1,026Top 49%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$8,013$207,500Bottom 46%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income16.7%Bottom 43%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate3.2%Bottom 13%2024 ACS 5-Year

Both affordability measures come from the same ACS release as the income they are compared with, so the comparison is like for like. They describe housing cost against local earnings and are not a cost-of-living index — transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes are not included, and a place can look affordable here and still be expensive to live in for reasons this does not capture.

Growth & development

How it’s calculated →

No building-permit activity is published for this location by the Census Building Permits Survey.

Weather & climate

5 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 80°F and January a low of 19°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 40.7 inches, including 95.4 inches of snow.

10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station BUFFALO, 7.3 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.1"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation40.7"1991-2020 Normals
Annual snowfall95.4"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low19°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high80°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months51991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing46°F1991-2020 Normals

Climate figures are thirty-year normals, not current conditions. They describe what a typical year looks like rather than what the weather is doing today.

Physical risk

80 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are inland flooding and heat wave.

Inland floodingElevated
Heat waveModerate

Low or minimal exposure: cold wave, winter weather, tornado, ice storm, lightning, earthquake, strong wind, hurricane, wildfire, landslide, coastal flooding, hail, drought, avalanche.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA publishes at county level. ZIP values are the land-area-weighted mean of the counties the ZIP Code Tabulation Area intersects. Expected annual loss is not allocated below county level. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

What this profile does not cover

Three things people look for are missing from every AreaProfile page, and each is missing for a reason rather than by oversight. The Area Score is calculated without them and the weighting is documented on the methodology page.

Crime
The FBI’s Crime Data Explorer is the only source with national coverage and a published method, and it requires an API key AreaProfile does not hold. Arrest counts, news volume and commercial “safety scores” are not substituted in the meantime. Reported crime is also easy to misread: agency participation varies year to year, and a city that draws a large daytime workforce carries incidents its residents did not generate.
Taxes
No tax dataset has met the source admission test for coverage, transparent methodology and update cadence. Nothing here is individualized tax advice.
Full cost of living
No public source publishes one with national coverage and a documented method. Housing affordability above is computed from published rent, price and income, and excludes transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes — commuting cost in particular tends to offset suburban housing savings.

Access

3 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 8 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Buffalo Niagara IntlBUF8 mi8,829 ft
Frederick Douglass/Greater Rochester IntlROC62 mi8,001 ft
Erie Intl/Tom Ridge FldERI90 mi8,420 ft

Airport identity, position and runway data come from the FAA. “Major airport” is an AreaProfile classification — a public-use civil airport with a paved runway of at least 8,000 feet — not an FAA hub designation. Distances are straight-line, not driving distance.

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Data & methodology

Used forSourceSource periodUpdated
AccessFederal Aviation Administration
Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service
NASR current cycle28-day NASR cycle
Physical riskFederal Emergency Management Agency
National Risk Index
National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0)Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current)
ClimateNOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly)
1991-2020 NormalsEvery ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period)
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics
2025 OEWSAnnual (spring release)
Demographics, Housing, Income, JobsU.S. Census Bureau
American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File)
2024 ACS 5-YearAnnual (5-year estimates released each December)
schoolsU.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics
Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments
2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them

Profile recalculated August 29, 2026. Recalculation is not the same as new source data — each figure above shows the period its source actually covers. Read the full methodology or browse every source.

14217 vs Tonawanda Town

How this ZIP area compares with Tonawanda Town as a whole. Both figures come from the same ACS release, so the comparison is like for like.

14217
Tonawanda Town
Median household income
$73,800
vs
$77,679
Per capita income
$43,076
vs
$44,748
Population density
7,016/sq mi
vs
3,284/sq mi
Median home value
$207,500
vs
$215,200
Median gross rent
$1,026
vs
$1,102
Homeownership rate
66.0%
vs
73.1%
Bachelor's degree or higher
42.7%
vs
39.4%
Poverty rate
10.6%
vs
10.0%
Median age
41.2
vs
42.3

Some demographic statistics use Census ZIP Code Tabulation Areas, which approximate but do not exactly match USPS ZIP delivery geography. See the methodology for how AreaProfile maps between them.