Gigli

Hi! I ended up with a traveling issue due to a bit of misinformation. A friend has a car waiting for me in what he referred to as "the New York area." Unfortunately, he meant "by the Newark Airport." I will be landing at JFK. Can anyone provide any tips on a cheap and not too time-consuming way of getting there? I tried doing some research on the web, but found some alternatives that go through Manhattan for a relatively inexpensive price, but they appeared to take 3 hours! Yikes!

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!

travelbuff

Newark is FAR from JFK so yes it will take more than an hour to get there. Can you change the car rental to JFK and forget Newark. That would be the simplest way to do it.

Options would be "cab", figure at least $80.00, "car service", again at least $80, "bus" from Newark to JFK, and yes you will go through Manhattan $30, "subway/train" $20, and yes that will take more than 2 hours, so again I go back to get the rental car at JFK.

RoamsAround

travel buff is right - When going between JFK and EWR there's no such thing as "cheap and not too time consuming" as they are mutually exclusive concepts. You have to pick one or the other.

Generally, the quickest (and that's a relative term since it will take at least an hour, maybe more) is to go by car - (i.e. limo, cab or private car) but that's also the most expensive way. Public transportation (i.e. a combination of buses and trains), will cost considerably less but, as you found will take 2 to 3 hours - maybe even longer, depending on the connections.

doug_stallings

ETS Airport Shuttle costs $29 to take a nonstop bus from JFK to EWR. This will be the fastest than any other form of transport, and it's probably about the cheapest as well (an hour or a bit more once you leave JFK but the bus will probably stop at several terminals, so it could take 90 minutes).

A much better solution would be to cancel the car rental if it's not prepaid and non-cancellable. You'll probably pay a little more to rent a car at JFK, but on the way back, this is going to be a nightmare scenario to drop off the car and then go to JFK.

sf7307

I have a feeling this is the friend's car, not a rental car.

nytraveler

Trekking out to Newark - unless your final destination is New Jersey - is a gigantic waste of time, energy and money.

Where are you going from JFK? that can help people make better recos.

Gigli

Hi everyone! Thanks for your replies. I am borrowing a friend's car, which is why I can't switch the pick up location. After picking it up I plan on heading to Seaside Park in NJ. Otherwise, I'd probably head into NY City first. So I think I have a couple of options:
1. Take a cab from JFK to EWR = at least $80 and possibly 1 hour drive
2. Take a train into the city and another to EWR = at least $30, but up to 3 hours

Ugh... I was hoping the train option would be speedier since there's no traffic (I think) in the subway. If anyone else has any tips, I'm all ears!

bspielman

Hopstop.com, in my experience very reliable, charts this trip by rail at about 1:40 at virtually any time of day. The route is the JFK AirTrain to Jamaica Station, then the LIRR to NY Penn Station, then NJTransit to the EWR Rail Station, then the EWR AirTrain to the airport.

Gigli

Thanks for the Hopstop advice! I hadn't heard of this site. How do I use it to plan an itinerary like the one you shared with me? I'd like to try different scenarios and see what works best.

doug_stallings

Gigli ... why aren't you putting the direct ETS Shuttle bus that goes nonstop from JFK to EWR on your list? That's a much better option. A regular cab is going to cost more than $100 rather than just $80 so I'm not sure that's a very workable option. If you are seriously considering a taxi, it would probably be cheaper to pay the change fee so you could fly directly into EWR.

Hopstop is nice, but it's still no less than 2 hours from JFK to EWR by public transit, no matter how you slice it. And you don't need to run different scenarios. The fastest way is Airtrain to LIRR, then NJ Transit to Airtrain.

bspielman

Gigli (I note the operatic reference), when you access hopstop.com, you're able to enter your starting and ending points, the mode of travel, and the time of day and day of the week you're traveling.

In the case of your itinerary, I simply entered JFK (literally, the three character airport identifier) as the origin and EWR as the destination.

The site reported the routing as I and others have described, and I tried several times of day and days of the week to come up with a rough idea of transit time. Barring unforeseen mass transit delays, hopstop.com is actually very accurate, despite what others here may say. It even takes into account scheduled subway (and other) reroutings, when necessary, because of maintenance.

Also, not that you'll be particularly concerned with this, it also takes into account the fact that not all subway lines run all the time, sometimes being substituted for by other lines at certain times of the day.

I also tried using a taxi as a transit mode, but the travel time (not to mention the expense) exceeded that of rail travel, and, of course, taxis are prone to traffic delays (depending upon time of day and day of the week) that trains aren't.

bspielman

Re ETS Shuttle, their website (www.etsairportshuttle.com) shows a very attractive $29 one-way fare from JFK to EWR. It is unclear whether this is non-stop or via LGA.

In either case, the travel time (stated to be "approximately 20-30 minutes" from JFK to LGA and "approximately 45 minutes to 1½ hours depending on traffic conditions and shuttle volume" from LGA to EWR) would undoubtedly be affected by traffic, particularly in rush hour.

Your choice between this service and rail will depend on how much time you want to allot to make the trip.

travelbuff

hotstop in some cities might be a great idea, but here it is more a "in a perfect world", it will take ____, but in NY there is traffic, problems with transit, distance from point to point, so the "time tables" are more like a suggestion.

As we have all said, JFK and EWR are far apart, and in 2 different states, so no matter how you go, it will take 1-3 hours to get there.

I'd suggest changing your flight arrangements and fly into Newark and forget JFK.

bspielman

We'll have to agree to disagree about the reliability of hopstop.com for the New York area. In my opinion, not even the most experienced, not to mention skeptical, New Yorker can hope to keep up with the MTA's never-ending maintenance re-routings. Ever try to decipher an MTA sign in the subway?

nytraveler

Well if you're going to Jersey anyway your friend really didn't do you a disservice. If the car were at JFK you would then have to make a long trek in traffic to get to Jersey anyway.

I wold check out the details of the shuttle bus to EWR. If it shows a time of 1.5 hours or less - definitely do it. Much better than fooling around with 3 different modes of transit with luggage. And I don;t care what HopStop says - it's good but not perfect. And you wold have a lot of trouble doing Air Train to LIRR to Jersey Transit in less than an area unless you gallop from train to train and each one pulls in and departs immediately you get there. (Normal walking and 3 sets of waiting time will take you to 1.5 hours anyway.)