Port Jefferson Station/Living In - Versatile Housing, in Both Kind and Cost Donna Alberico for The New York Times ENTRY POINTS Long Island in general may be short on apartments, but Port Jefferson Station, an affordable community in Suffolk County, has several complexes, among them Woodcrest Estates. AS it slices east to west through Port Jefferson Station, the thoroughfare called Nesconset Highway, or Route 347, is a dividing line in more than just a physical sense. According to the Census Bureau, the southern portion of town actually has a different name: Terryville. Not that Port Jefferson Station residents in general seem aware of the distinction. "It's a good place to live, from one end of town to the other," said Edward Garboski, an operating engineer who arrived in 1980 in search of "wide open spaces" that, he admits, have been disappearing. "The school district defines the community," he added, pointing out that Friday-night football games at the high school are popular. And the fact that nearly all the houses on either side of the highway are in the same school district - called Comsewogue - certainly fosters community spirit. "This place has a small-town feel, with small-town values," said Jack Smith, a retired special education teacher who is the president of the Cumsewogue Historical Society, which uses a slightly different spelling of the Native American word ultimately replaced as the area's name by "Port Jefferson Station." The society is based in the former Terryville Union Hall, which began life in 1887 as a community center and is now part of a historic district. Mr. Smith founded the society in 2008, inspired by a planning document that the Town of Brookhaven, of which the 5.8-square-mile Port Jefferson Station is a part, published that year. The town covered all the name bases by including Terryville on the title page and designating the document the Comsewogue Hamlet Comprehensive Plan. The plan also revitalized the Port Jefferson Station/Terryville Civic Association, of which Mr. Garboski is now president. According to 2010 census data, the combined population from both sides of the highway exceeds 19,600 and is more than 85 percent white. The largest ethnic minority is Hispanic. But Mayra Reyes, an agent with the Re/Max Selden office who has lived in Port Jefferson Station for 19 years, sees the area as more diverse than the numbers imply. She counts Portuguese, Italian, Irish and Filipino families among her neighbors. "I call it a little spice of life," she said. She and her husband moved from Queens Village, looking for a nice place with good schools to raise their three children. "My kids had such a sense of peace and friendship here," she said. It's what I wanted. The one major physical change that the civic association hopes to help make, said Laurie Green, the association's vice president, is the addition of a public gathering space that isn't a shopping mall. Ms. Green, a claims investigator who moved here from Selden with her husband 21 years ago, mentioned plans to add a band shell for outdoor concerts and other amenities on state-owned property on Route 347. Also, she said, group members are working with the historical association to rehabilitate an oval track once the site of world-class harness races. Ms. Green cited affordability as a factor in her family's choice of Port Jefferson Station in the 1990s, and its importance to new arrivals hasn't diminished. Jason Long, who last year paid $340,000 for a four-bedroom two-bath Cape with taxes under $7,000, said, "The houses in Port Jefferson Station were the most affordable for good houses in a good school district and, most importantly, the taxes are very low." Mr. Long, a college athletic trainer who grew up in East Northport, said he and his wife, Christina, a public school music teacher, had been looking for a yard for their Labradoodle and a family-oriented neighborhood with sidewalks. Three months ago, they became parents of a daughter, Catherine. Homes vary from tiny cottages on small plots to large homes on several acres. Some date to the 19th century, although the area's real housing boom started after World War II and lasted into the 1960s, said Barbara M. Russell, the Brookhaven town historian. Census data for this arrowhead-shaped Suffolk County community indicate a higher income level in the more southerly Terryville section ($88,785 versus $69,962 in 2010), though this was a surprise to several brokers. According to Diane Wolyniec of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage's Setauket office, homes closer to the waterfront village of Port Jefferson, to the north, are often more desirable. But she said Terryville's newer developments with higher-priced homes probably accounted for the income discrepancy. Lois A. Nash, an agent at Exit Realty Achieve in Smithtown who grew up in Port Jefferson Station and moved back in 1999 after 20 years in Nassau County, says the community attracts returnees like herself in addition to first-time buyers, pointing out that some of the teachers in the local schools were once students there. "It's a comfortable, convenient community," she said, citing the proximity of Stony Brook University and Suffolk County Community College, as well as Port Jefferson, with its many restaurants and "touristy" atmosphere, just to the north. Of 140 recent listings for stand-alone houses on the Multiple Listing Service of Long Island, the least expensive was $152,000, the most $694,995. In addition, 44 condominiums or co-ops were listed, at prices ranging from $52,500 to $439,000. The most expensive were in the Ranches at Long Lake Estates in the Terryville area. All homes, however, are listed as being in Port Jefferson Station. Twenty-five rentals were also available.