Oneida County, NY

Oneida County is a county located in the U.S. state of New York. As of the 2010 census, the population was 234,878. The county seat is Utica. The name is in honor of the Oneida, an Iroquoian tribe that lives in the region.

Oneida County is in the central portion of New York State, east of Syracuse, and west of Albany. Oneida Lake is on the northwestern corner of the county, and the Adirondack Park is on the northeast. Part of the Tug Hill Plateau is in the northern part of the county. Interestingly, Oneida County’s highest point does not lie on either the plateau nor in the Adirondack Park, but in the county’s southern extremity. The peak’s name is Tassel Hill. It is located slightly southeast of Hardscrabble Road (Tassel Hill Road), between the villages of Waterville and Cassville.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oneida_County,_New_York

Cassville and the Bridgewater Flats

The rich farm country of the Bridgewater Flats turns into a deep gully in Cassville that NY 8 Expressway and the Norwich - Utica railine run. 

Utica – Rome Land Use

South of Utica you will find many acres of cultivated land, while north of the city there is some cultivated acres, but much of the land is of poorer quality and used for timber production, grazing, and hay production. Even further north you get into the foothills of the Adirondack Park and it's highly forested. To the west of Rome, you can see the marshy lands along the Wood Creek and the Barge Canal, along with the confers of the Rome Sand Plains, a pine barriens.

Utica – Rome Expressway Upgrades

In the early 2000s, the last section of the Utica - Rome Expressway (NY 49) was upgraded to full limited access, by paralleling the NY Thruway and bypassing Marcy.

LEFT - Circa 1995
RIGHT - Circa 2020