TraveL from Hartford to NYC
 

We will be traveling to Hartford for a conference this summer and flying in and out of Bradley. We want to visit New York for a few days and wonder what would be the best way to get back and forth from New York. We haven't booked a hotel yet. From what I gather driving is tough and prking very expensive. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks.

You could drive from Hartford South to the LI Sound and take the Metro North RR into Manhattan. Many people park their cars at the Norwalk (or maybe it's the S. Norwalk) station. Or New Haven might be easier drive from Hartford.

AMTRAK ... Hartford to Penn Station

Amtrak from Hartford to NY Penn is not very frequent and requires a connection at New Haven. (Literally a connection, as the train is attached to a southbound train from Boston.)
www.amtrak.com (NYP = NYC Penn Station; NHV = New Haven)

If you will have a rental car anyway, you may want to look into Metro North from New Haven, as J62 suggested. Significantly cheaper and more frequent than Amtrak, with plenty of parking in the vicinity. I-91 is a straight shot south from Hartford to New Haven. (There are more scenic routes, also.)
http://as0.mta.info/mnr/schedules/sched_form.cfm
This page has Metro North info on New Haven Station, including driving directions:
http://as0.mta.info/mnr/stations/sta...il.cfm?key=252

Amtrak will put you in Penn Station; MetroNorth in Grand Central Terminal.

Hope this helps!
ggreen

hi- getting to New York will take alot of travel time no matter how you figure it. Have you thought about renting a car and going north to Boston?

Thanks for the responses. I would love to go to Boston but my daughter has never been to New York and has her heart set on it. The Amtrak and or Metro North solutions seem a little intimidating to someone from Savannah, Ga. We will have all of our luggage with us so we will have that to contend with as well. I'll take a look at the links and see if I can figure it out. Thanks again.

i The Amtrak and or Metro North solutions seem a little intimidating to someone from Savannah, Ga.

If you can drive to the airport to fly to Hartford, you can drive to a train station and take a train to NYC. It's the exact same concept. Every Metro North train goes into NYC from Norwalk or New Haven.

If you are going to have your luggage with you I would take Amtrak. They have better storage available for luggage. You can pick it up further up the shoreline (i.e Old Saybrook) so you can get on ahead of the areas where there will be more people boarding. Bring some smaller bags to use for NYC and leave your other luggage in the car trunk. Old Saybrook is unbelievably safe. Or, take the Amtrak from Hartford and ask the hotel you will be staying at if they will hold your luggage for you.

Driving into NYC is not as daunting as it sounds. See if you can rent a car with neverlost navigation. Parking is expensive but it might be less expensive than taking the train.

Depending upon your hotel, I would consider driving in. Daily parking at NYC hotels range from about $30-$60 for valet service.

If you take the trian in, you're going to pay about $50-$75 round trip on Metro-North. If you drive to a train station, some shoreline stations charge up to $30/day for non-resident parking. Once you're off the train at Grand Central (with your luggage in tow), you'll likely have to pay another $10-$20 for cab fare to your hotel. Ditto for your trip back to Grand Central at the end of your trip.

Thanks for the replies. It sounds like it may be simpler to be brave and drive in and just pay the parking fees. We were planning on renting a car in Hartford anyway and we have a portable GPS navigation system which should help.

Thanks so much for the advice.

Okay, you find the idea of taking the train complicated, but the idea of driving in a city you aren't familiar with isn't???? That doesn't make any sense.

I can't imagine that the cost of car rental, parking in the city, tolls, and the frustration of driving into the city is more than the idea of parking at a parking lot and getting on a train.

Taking the train seems difficult because of luggage. Looking at the Amtrak schedule (we're talking a weeks worth of luggage for myself daughter and husband, it looks like there is limited ability to check luggage. Then we'd have to get a taxi to the hotel and reverse the process to get back to Hartford in time to catch our flight home. I would not plan on driving around the City once we got there. I've had pretty good experience using the portable navigation system around Atlanta - it may have taken me the long way but got me to where I was going.

As I said, I'm trying to figure out the best thing to do - not necessarily the cheapest (but within reason - I'd really like to take a limo back and forth but that would probably be cost prohibitive)

Thanks for the response!

With luggage, I would definitely simply rent a car right at Bradlee
Field and drive to NYC. Arrange for a hotel reservation that provides parking for a fee. The distance is not far, and the drive is easy, except possibly the very last stretch within the city proper.

You could also look into 1 way rentals from Bradley to Manhattan, return the car while there, then pick up another for return (rather than paying both rental and parking for your car to sit in a garage for a few days. I'm willing to bet it'd be more expensive than a RT rental from Bradley, but you may luck out. All the big guys have offices all over Manhattan.

Ya'll have been so nice to help me think this through. I think I've got a plan now. Thanks again. If you need any Savannah advice let me know.