Sara

I hope someone with experience driving between eastern Massachusetts and NYC the weekend after Thanksgiving can give me some advice about the best time to travel. My son is moving to Manhattan this Thursday, renting as small a truck or van as is practical to move his furniture and large boxes, and plans to come back to our house in Concord early next week for Thanksgiving, probably on the bus. I've agreed to drive him and the rest of his smaller boxes and items back to NYC in my minivan after Thanksgiving. We can leave either Saturday afternoon (have to take older son to the airport Saturday morning to fly back to CA), or anytime on Sunday. I'll probably drive home Monday morning.

I know traffic will be awful driving down, but any opinions on when it will be least awful, of those times? I do have FastPass, so hopefully that will help where the tolls will be backed up getting off the Mass Pike at I-84. I do know to take the Parkways once I get past Hartford.

Thanks for any helpful information.

GoTravel

I think driving down Saturday morning would be the least busy.

SharonG

I've done this trip several times in my lifetime and I don't care to repeat it. But I would go Saturday and avoid driving anywhere Sunday. Wait till late Monday morning if you can.

tchoiniere

As a former toll collector in MA, go on Saturday. Sunday will be very heavy traffic all day Or very early Sunday morning. Your Fast Lane will work well for you. Now living in Hartford, you shouldn't see very much traffic until you hit NY.

china_cat

agreeing with everybody else...I've made the drive in both directions on Thanksgiving. Go on Saturday and it will be okay. Do not drive on Sunday at all. I think if you leave relatively early on Saturday that will be best.

Sara

Thanks, everyone. As I said, I have to drive my older son to the airport Saturday morning, so couldn't leave until about noon at the earliest on Saturday. Given that, do you think there's much difference between leaving then, or leaving mid-to-late afternoon on Saturday? Monday morning isn't an option, I need to be back Monday afternoon.

kealalani

I used to drive the masspike route, but due to my south of boston location, I now drive 95 to the Merrit Pkwy which may work well for you. The backups at the pike on holidays are famous. Safe Journey!

gail

Saturday noonish should be fine - the later in the day you get, the worse it will get since everyone tries to avoid the Sunday traffic horror.

While no personal knowledge, I expect traffic around NYC on Monday AM will not be a pleasant experience. Leave as late as possible, but forget trying Sunday.

Do not know what route you take in Massachusetts west of Boston, but keep in mind that NE Patriots are playing home game that Sunday evening (8:15) so traffic on Rte 495 and even parts of Rtes 93 and 1 will have an added horror feature.

kealalani

great call gail on mentioning the Pats game.

canyonjane

Thanks for mentioning the game on Sunday night! My sons will be home for Thanksgiving in Connecticut from Boston and New York so this post is very helpful to me!

travelbuff2

Sara,

When you are driving down the easiest way to get into Manhattan and the closest to your son't apartment is to take the 155th St Bridge which crosses St. Nicholas Place and one more block up to St. Nicholas (St. Nicholas Place is only a couple of blocks and is an offshoot of St. Nicholas Ave.)

When you can see Yankee Stadium, you are close.

Tell him welcome to the neighborhood and if he has any questions or needs some help, let me know I am just down the block.

How about meeting up for coffe at our local coffee shop Bonjour Cafe on 147th St and St. Nicholas?
Would love to say HI when you are here.

Sara

Thanks everyone, this is a lot of help. It sounds like Saturday is definitely the day to go, the earlier, the better.

Travelbuff2, you've been especially helpful, both here in in another post. That is so kind of you to offer to meet with us, we'd love to take you up on that. Once we figure out our plans, we can arrange that. If you want to contact me directly, you can do that at sara (at) sb dot org (I assume this is clear?). If you contact me there, I'll have your e-mail address, and we can make arrangements to meet. Thanks again for your help.

travelbuff2

Sara, I sent you and email with my phone numbers so give me a call if I can be of any help and let me know when you have a few minutes while you are here.