4 Days as a New York City Commuter.

I love my little city of Burlington and all that Vermont has to offer, but for big cities - you just can't beat New York.

I traveled down to NYC last Monday (St. Patrick's Day) for a conference, and stayed through Thursday. While there, I decided that I would stick with mass transit (subway, bus, train) and avoid the less efficient and more expensive cabs.

An unexpected flight change almost ruined that plan from the start. My Continental flight from Burlington to Newark was delayed by 3 hours, and I was able to beg my way onto a US Airways flight to LaGuardia. The problem is that Newark is connected to Manhattan by rail - while LaGuardia is the only one of the three major NYC airports (JFK being the third) that is not connected to Manhattan by rail. For most LaGuardia travelers, this means taking a cab or shared shuttle bus to Manhattan. Since I arrived during late rush hour on Monday - a cab would have been 40 minutes or more - and $30-$40 including tolls and tip. A shuttle bus or van service would be cheaper ($10 + tip), but they only run every 30 minutes or so and can take up to an hour to get to midtown.

Since I was traveling light (just a backpack), I decided to do some "urban hiking" and I walked across northern Queens to the #7 train (subway) in Jackson Heights. It was an easy and enjoyable walk... about 2 miles, followed by an equally easy 20-minute ride to Grand Central Station. All for $2!!! The whole trip took me about an hour... comparable to a cab or shuttle on a Monday morning. Definitely a fun way to start my trip.

For the rest of the week, I hoofed it or took a subway wherever I went. I spent most of my non-conference time in mid-town, but I took a subway to the Greenwich Village area for dinner Tuesday night... and back to Jackson Heights (Queens) for dinner on Wednesday night. Thursday, I walked to Penn Station and took the train to Newark Airport station... and then the monorail to Newark Airport, thus completing my mass transit adventure.

I was back on my bike last Friday to wrap up my week back in Vermont. What a great week of commuting variety... Planes, Trains/Subways, Automobiles (I did take a cab from my house in South Burlington to the airport on Monday morning), Walking, and Biking!

ICE STORM.

It has been a long winter. We've had snow or ice on the ground (with a brief reprieve in January) since late November... over 3 months. I'm definitely weary of the extra effort to commute in winter conditions. All the layers, the slow studded tires, the slogging through snow, ice and slush. Enough already! This morning was beautiful, but felt like an early February day rather than mid-March. We had an ice storm this past weekend, which soaked the remaining snow before freezing it into a hard-as-rock biking surface. Parts of the path (like the one pictured above) were actually pretty fast. Other parts were frozen into random chunks of ice - very hard to ride. I am going to SO appreciate warm weather!