I am traveling by car to New York city next week with my two teenage sons. I do not want to drive into the city but would rather find a hotel outside the city that is walking distance to a subway line into the city. Could anyone make a recommendation about where we might look into staying?

Well - it's the NYC subway - so all stations are IN the city. I assume you mean you want to stay outside Manhattan. Not sure what direction you are coming from - but your best bet is probably a hotel in Long Island City. There are several there - but some NOT near the subway - so be sure you pick one that is. Also they don;t have unlimited parking - so since that is important for you try to arrange for guaranteed parking in their garage.

The area is safe - but somewhat dreary - and there aren;t a lot of services or places to eat.

Your other option - if you are coming from the West is to stay in Jersey City and pick a hotel right near the PATH station. But again - you need to be sure they have parking and you can have one of a limited number of spaces. Then yuo can take the PATH - a local train but separate from the subway system - under the river to Manhattan.

If you tell us where you are coming from people may have other suggestions.

Can we convince you to come into the city by train whether it be Metro North LIRR or Amtrak? http://www.mta.info/mnr/
Let us know where you are coming from.

Obviously staying IN the city is a much better choice. And there are large manned garages at some train stations where you can leave the car for days and hop a train (not subway) into the city.

If you tell us where you are coming from and how many of you there are (train fares for a bunch of people can start to get expensive) people can make more specific recos.

We were there last week. We stayed in Staten Island at the Holiday Inn. ($120 per night) It was small but nice! They have a free bus drive over to the Staten Island Ferry port. The ferry is free and runs every 1/2 hour 24/7. You pass the Statue of Liberty too. It dumps you off right next to the subway red line. They do not have a pool though. Free parking which is great for NYC.

Thank you for all your suggestions. More info: my two teenagers and I are traveling North from Asheville North Carolina, then staying in Baltimore for a couple of days, then heading to NYC. From NYC we head out to Boston, so we would like to stay at a hotel north of NYC yet convenient to enter on train or subway. We were looking at New Rochelle, perhaps? Any other ideas? Thanks again!

Amy, How often did the bus to the ferry run? What about coming back in the late evening? How did that work?

Stamford (CT) might be a good choice. There's at least 1 (and maybe more) good hotels ery close to the train station, and you have a choice of either MetroNorth or Amtrak train to the city. (MetroNorth is usually the better choice -- less expensive and more frequent service).

That said, I'd encourage you to figure out the $$ difference between staying in the city and staying outside, including commuting costs. When you consider all the time that you would lose by staying outside the city, you might well want to re-think your plan.

Just to amplify: you could, for example, stay at the Holiday Inn Express in Brooklyn, with good access to the subway and Manhattan, and the parking is only $24/day.

IIRC, the Travel Inn (in Manhattan) has free parking.

I sugget another approach. Drive into the city. You're wasting energy searching for alternates. It will be an experience.

I agree w/330east. You will waste time & energy staying further away from the city. The Travel Inn on West side does have free parking.

Staying north of the city is not really convenient. You don't want to stay in the Bronx near a subway line - the few hotels/motels there tend to rent by the hour or house homeless families. Much of New Rochelle is not very pleasant, the parking lot there is full by 8 am and there is no way I would leave a car there overnight - likely to be gone or stripped in the morning. Stamford would work - you pay for a manned garage - but you are more than an hour from the city.
Commuting back and forth would be a major waste of time and money.

You can look into the latter - or you can look at the Travel Inn. This is the only hotel in Manhattan with free parking (saving you $40 per night) and is right near the Lincoln Tunnel, meaning you drive very little on entering the city. To go to Boston afterwards you simply hop on the West Side Highway and it's all parkways or highways from there - only a couple of blocks of city driving. This saves you trekking on the train two hours a day - and making evening activities inconvenient, since inStamford you would have to match limited train schedules.