It's interesting to see that the Colombo family has always operated almost strictly around Brooklyn. They had a big crew in Queens (Vic Orena, Joe Scopo) and had some guys here and there but compared to the other families, the Colombos didn't really expand their territory as much. I think it's one of the main reasons why there has been so much internal feud within the family. There wasn't any balance of power between the boroughs like you could see with the other families.

As for the Genovese, it's interesting to note that their powerbase has always been in Manhattan (Greenwich Village, East Harlem and Little Italy). So many key Genovese leaders are from there (Gigante, Salerno, Ida, Bellomo, Iannello...). It remains the case today despite the fact that the mob are not as strong in Manhattan as theu used to be.

I've only recently understood how much the dynamics of each borough affected the organization of the 5 families. I though this subject was particularly well covered in Al D'Arco's book. He explained quite clearly how the Lucchese family made sure to have a good balance between the different crews in the 5 borough and Jersey. It was obvious in their list of inductees. Whenever they would induct new members they would usually pick guys from every crew.