Driving to New York

Driving in New York City is stressful. I am not surprised that many New Yorkers do not own a car – more than half of total households according to recent census estimates. New York’s great public transit system makes this possible.

My wife and I have a pied-à-terre in the Forest Hills section of NYC. In the past, we traveled there by train from our home in West Chester, PA. We got very adept at it and came to affectionately refer to travel on the rails as the “four-train cocktail:” One train took us Philadelphia, the next to Trenton, the third to New York’s Penn Station and the fourth, a subway to Forest Hills.  Once in our apartment, we could get to just about anywhere in New York City via the subway system.

We would drive occasionally when we needed to bring a load of things to the apartment, but then we had to find a parking spot – never an easy proposition in our neighborhood. And even when we found a great parking spot, we would have to move the car to another spot to accommodate street sweeping on Thursdays and Fridays.

Train travel took a little longer than driving, but it was more relaxing and spared us dealing with the stress of bumper-to-bumper traffic and finding a place to park once we arrived. Then, along came COVID. New York was hit particularly hard in the early days of the pandemic. So much so that our main reason for coming to New York – to visit our son and his family – disappeared as they moved into our home in West Chester. They stayed with us for five months during which time we traveled to New York only once or twice to check on things.

Once we were fully vaccinated in the spring of 2021, we felt bold enough to resume our visits to our Forest Hills apartment, but not bold enough to travel there by train and subway. Instead, we drove. By car, it’s about 135 miles from West Chester to Forest Hills. Our GPS tried to direct us through Manhattan but driving into the heart of New York City to get to Queens seemed crazy to us. So, we exited the New Jersey Turnpike at the Goethals Bridge, crossed Staten Island on I-278, crossed the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, and continued on I-278 through Brooklyn, eventually getting on I-495 after the Kosciusko Bridge, and finally exiting onto Queens Boulevard in Forest Hills.

We got quite comfortable with this route and enjoyed marking our progress by various landmarks such as the beehive dome of St. Michael’s, the stained-glass water tower designed by artist Tom Fruin, and the iconic Brooklyn Bridge. We also caught occasional glimpses of the Manhattan skyline and the Statue of Liberty. When traffic was lighter, the stretch from the Verrazano to Forest Hills took us about 45 minutes to traverse. However, when traffic was heavy, it could easily take twice that long, and, most times, traffic was heavy.

The alternative was to take the Belt Parkway from the Verrazano Bridge, which our GPS often advised us to do. But there is comfort in the familiar, and perhaps because I am older and not as open to trying new things, I persisted in driving on the Brooklyn Queens Expressway (I-278) even though I knew we would be crawling along at 20 miles per hour or less.

Perhaps out of frustration that it could take up to two hours to cover about twenty miles, my wife and I decided to give the Belt Parkway a try. From the Verrazano the Belt Parkway route takes us about seventeen miles to Exit 19 near John F. Kennedy airport. Exit 19 puts us briefly on the Nassau Expressway before exiting onto the Van Wyck Expressway (I-678 North), and finally, Queens Boulevard.

In contrast to I-278 which runs through the heart of Brooklyn, the Belt Parkway winds around Brooklyn’s southern edge with parks and beaches on one side and businesses and apartment buildings on the other. You see glimpses of Coney Island, such as the flower-like parachute tower and the Cyclone roller coaster.  Shirley Chisholm State Park and Rockaway Beach are other destinations that can be viewed while driving along the Belt Parkway. There is far more greenery on this route and enclaves of single-family homes which are largely absent along I-278.

Most importantly, traveling the Belt Parkway significantly cuts the drive time to our Forest Hills apartment. Now in most cases we can make the trip in less than three hours. Traffic is lighter and moves faster than it does on I-278 resulting in a less stressful driving experience. We recently began to rent a parking space in our apartment’s building, so that has reduced the stress of finding a spot on the street.

Driving in New York will never be as stress free as it is in our small town of West Chester, PA (population 20,000). So, until we feel safe to resume our four-train cocktail, we will follow the advice of our GPS and take the Belt Parkway when driving to New York.