Walking in New York
 

Hi. I'm planning a trip to NYC in early September, and part of it will revolve around shopping (but of course!)

I was looking at the map of Manhattan, but can't figure out the distances.

On one of my shopping days, I had hoped to cover Century 21, with a walk over Nolita, Soho, and ending in the west village.

Is the walking doable? The shopping will depend on my shopping speed, generally pretty fast. But are the distances too far to walk?

Thanks all!

The distance you will be walking is berween 2 and 3 miles. probably closer to 2 miles. It is simple to judge distance in NYC from 1st St. to 125th Street. . Twenty blocks is one mile when going north/south (street to street). When going east /west one block is almost the equivalent of three north/south blocks.

the bus system is pretty good in the city, inexpensive, and between walking and the buses you would do fine to hit an even bigger area. we took the bus from midtown down to battery city and starting walking up town, then at the end of the day got transportation back from soho. piece of cake.

Does the map you're looking at not have a scale marker? RQF is right that it's easier to judge distances uptown where the streets are more uniform. Downtown is trickier. The area you are looking to cover is definitely do-able, but you should be aware that you will cross several major thoroughfares like Canal Street which, depending on your route, can be a little tough for pedestrians to manage.

Oh yeah, I should have mentioned that you can easily take the subway from near Century 21 (to the south is the Wall Street stop, to the north is the Fulton Street stop) on the 4,5 line, switch to the 6 local train at Brooklyn Bridge/City Hall and get out at, say, Spring Street where you will be smack in the middle of SoHo.

Downtown isn't on a grid like much of Manhattan island however, you can pretty much count on:

10 Crosstown blocks= 1 mile

20 Street blocks= 1 mile

You could also walk on a path that would take you through Chinatown, Little Italy, Canal Street, Lower Broadway, and the East Village. This walk is doable too.

Listtemac -

I can;t believe your remark about crossing "main" streets like Canal. You'll have people thinking they're 8 lane superhighways and you need to run for your life.

They're perfectly normal 2-way main (2 lanes in each direction) streets (most streets in Manhattan are one way only) and there's so much traffic during the day it moves very slowly anyway.

Anyone who canl;t figure out how to cross Canal street should be back in elementary school with a crossing guard.

And if you are like many people, being told something is a mile really doesn't mean much. I like to think that it takes roughly a minute to walk one block in Manhattan (north/south -- the short blocks), and 3 to 4 minutes to walk each east/west block. In other words, generally speaking it will take about 10 minutes to walk from 24th to 14th Street. Obviously this doesn't take into account stopping to window shop.

The grid distances posted above are not entirely accurate.

North/south, yes, 20 blocks is one mile. (So if you walk from 42nd St to 82nd St, that's 2 miles.)

East/west, the "long" blocks are about 4 north/south blocks and the "short" blocks are about two. The short blocks are those between 5th and 3rd Avenues.

In my opinion, if you're healthy, few distances in Manhattan are too far to walk. You wouldn't want to walk from Battery Park to the Guggenheim, of course, but that should be obvious.

Enjoy NYC!

NYTraveler -- I was thinking of that part of Canal that is near the tunnel. Say, over around Hudson Street. If you've ever tried to cross there, it is way more than 2 lanes and the lights aren't long enough to make it across. I disagree that a person who isn't from NY and may not walk as much as we do here needs to be "back in elemenary school" if they find that difficult! I also think that's a kind of a snide way to make your point.

Gekko, according to

http://www.nycvisit.com/content/index.cfm?pagePkey=492


Facts and Stats
20 uptown/downtown blocks and 10 crosstown blocks equal approximately one mile Manhattan total area in square miles: 22.7 Manhattan length: 13.4 miles (21.5 km) long Manhattan widest point: 2.3 miles (3.7 km) Manhattan narrowest point: 0.8 miles (1.3 km) at narrowest point New York City total area in square miles: 301

GoTravel, I don't care what that website says, no way do crosstown blocks AVERAGE the equivalent of only 2 north/south blocks.
Gekko's posting is much more accurate!

Not to belabor what's obvious if one looks at a map, but the distance between 5th & Madison, Mad & Park, Park & Lex, and Lex & 3rd is roughly half that as the distance between the other avenues.

The long blocks, west of 5th and east of 3rd, are approximately 4 north/south blocks, and the short blocks between are only two. Trust me -- it makes a big difference if you're walking from point-to-point crosstown.

On old NYC maps you will see that Park Avenue was originally called 4th Avenue. It is midway between 5th and 3rd avenues. A small bit of 4th Avenue still exists, between Astor Place (8th St) and 14th St.

Anyway, most New Yorkers would say that they walk a mile (20 N/S blocks) in 20 minutes. To walk the route miranti describes, without stopping, might take an hour. One could spend a nice afternoon along this route, with interesting shops and neighborhods along the way. There are plenty of transportation options if you decide you've walked enough.

The hardest part of that walk will not be the walking...it'll be the schlepping. Don't buy more than you can carry for a few miles.

The walk is technically doable, but I wouldn't recommend it. Go to Century 21 and then take the subway as one of the other posters recommended up to Spring St - the 6 train stops there and you will be smack in the middle of Soho. From there you can walk around Soho, Nolita and the West Village. Depending on how much you explore, it will still be a nice walk to cover all of these areas - but these areas are worth it. I would concentrate on Soho & the West Village (vs Nolita). Soho has great shopping and restaurants, the Village has quaint tree lined streets, little boutiques and nice restaurants.

Lissettemac -

I'm sorry if I seem snide - but in fact what I said was perfectly correct. Crossing Canal st is no major challenge to the average person. (Why would you assume anyone would chose to walk across the entrance to the Holland tunnel?)

To someone who's not familiar with the area you;re giving a very skewed point of view. And creating anxiety/concern when there is no reason for any.

HI--the last time we were in NY, we figured we walked 4-6 miles/day. It is really easy to cover a lot of ground there!!! However, that does not take into account packages, if shopping. That would change things a lot.

hi everyone! thanks for all the great advice. I think I'll take the tip on taking the train from Century 21 to Spring St. I forgot about lugging around the shopping bags!

While I am a well-traveled person, ny traveler, NYC was confusing at first glimpse!! I hated the first day there and then got used to the streets and maps. Great shopping, sights and plays. The people there wre nicer than thoe at home!! Please, nytraveler, don't make fun of us southerners who venture up north, where things are so different...It is hard to cross streets the first day until you learn to look at the cross street, or follow fellow NYorkers!!!!!

All agree that 20 blocks, going North/South, is equal to one mile. There were different figures presented with regard to how many north/south blocks equals an avenue to avenue block going east/west.

This morning I was driving on W. 72nd Street and from Central Park West (8th Ave) to West End (11th Ave). My car odometer showed the distance covered was 4/10s of a mile - 8 north /south blocks. Divide by 3 and you get a block, avenue to avenue, is equivalent to 2.67 north/south blocks. I assume my car odometer is reasonably accurate.

iw -

I'm not trying to make fun of anyone. but I do wonder if you're so well-traveled why crossing a street in NYC would be a challenge. There are traffic lights at every intersection, walk/don;t walk signs on every corner, marked pedestrian crosswalks painted on the street, most streets are one-way only - and the traffic usually moves so slowly there's no need to dodge between moving cars making turns - as you do in the burbs.

How did you manage in London (where the traffic is going the "wrong" way) or Paris (where the boulevards can be 8 lanes wide) - never mind Rome (where there are few traffic lights and no rules at all)???

Sorry, rqf, but either your odometer is way off, or you made a mistake.

Again, look at a scale map or punch addresses into Yahoo driving directions -- the distance between Avenues west of 5th and east of 3rd is .20 miles, or 4 north/south blocks.

iw, we found crossing some of the streets in NY to be a little daunting at first also. We very quickly learned to follow those who looked like they knew what they were doing.

Within a day we had it down and felt comfortable. I think the reason it is so different from where I come from (northern Canada) is the amount of traffic that one needs to be aware of in ALL directions. We just don't have that much traffic here ever. I think also that the noise is distracting, there seems to be such a blur of so many things going on at once to someone who is not used to it. I should add though, that I have never felt as safe as I did while in NY. With the amount of pedestrians and a very visible police presence, we felt safe walking to our hotel even late into the night.

First a couple of thoughts on your suggested itenary.

I've walked it many, many times in the opposite direction down through Soho to Tribecca and then on to Century 21. You should have no problem walking all those distances except NoLita is on the east Side and you want to end up in the west village.

Plus you'll be carying shopping bags. when you walk up from Century 21, you'll hit the edge of Canal street, walk towards Broadway if you want more shopping in China town.

Then of course just a few blocks north is SoHo. But you need to head back west. Get off of Broadway b/c it is not true SoHo.

Don't worry about crossing Canal, Houston is the one you need to worry about. So be careful when crossing Houston.

Then you'll end up in the area south of Washington Square Park. watch out for Bleecker, take it going west and you can follow it all the way to the West village. Try to stay on the west side of Broadway so that you don't end up too far east when you try to walk to the West Village.

Make sure you have a good subway map because most of the lines are in that area, but then start to spread out depending on which direction you want to go.

Enjoy it and if I could remember which streets my favorite little jewelry guy was on in SoHo, I would post it.