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Seattle Neighborhoods: Phinney — Thumbnail History (historylink.org) Seattle’s Phinney neighborhood lies mostly on a high ridge that rises from the western shore of Green Lake. It owes its name to Guy Phinney (1852-1893), a wealthy immigrant from Nova Scotia who developed a private estate that became Woodland Park (later Woodland Park Zoo). The neighborhood is largely a bedroom community that on the east spills off the spine of Phinney Ridge down to Green Lake’s shores, and on the west runs to the edge of Ballard at 8th Avenue NW. The ice age moraine runs north from N 50th Street and peters out somewhere south of N 80th Street, where Phinney and Greenwood community residents disagree over sovereign rights. Phinney residents also lay claim to Woodland Park Zoo and its four-footed residents, but this birthright is contested by the Wallingford and Green Lake neighborhoods.