need some advice about driving into JFK, and i'm kinda worried about the traffic
I'll be driving from Pine Grove, PA.

I'll be driving into JFK for a 10:50am int'l departure (so it's a 60 min cut-off).
According to google, it's a 3 hour drive, and up to 4 hours with traffic. is 4 hours realistic?

the route i'm thinking is:
http://maps.google.ca/maps?saddr=Pine+Grove,+PA,+USA&geocode=&daddr=JFK+Airport&f=d&hl=en&sll=40.560243,-76.385193&sspn=0.052036,0.101624&ie=UTF8&z=8&om=1

At the end, I would be taking the I-95N, and then the I-678S.
I'm thinking of getting on the road at 3:30am and aim to arrive at JFK somewhere between 8 and 9.

Or, the other option I'm thinking is I could drive to Long Island the day before and use my spg points to stay at the Sheraton in Hauppage (Long Island), and just drive to JFK from there. I'm wondering if the traffic into JFK will be lighter if I'm driving from the east to west? At the very least, I'll be closer to JFK!
this way, I'd be taking Southern Parkway W, and then the Belt Pkwy W and then the JFK Expy. If google is quoting 1hr10mins, i would leave the hotel at 6:30 (i have this fear of NY traffic and i'm just getting the feeling that google is underestimating.. hmm)

any thoughts on which way I should go, anything I'm missing?

I am from Allentown, Pa., and went to school in New York City. I ended up driving to/from New York about once every month or two months, and am familiar with the roadways but NOT traffic conditions for driving to New York in the morning.

My suggestion would be to drive over the Verrazano Narrows Bridge and take the Belt Parkway through Brooklyn to JFK. I think at about 8:30 am the traffic on the Staten Island Expressway and the bridge might be clearing up.

The alternative is the Holland Tunnel to the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel and then the BQE/Belt, but I think the likelihood of hitting traffic there is higher.

Maybe someone with more experience dealing with morning traffic can be more helpful about that, as this is based on my (somewhat limited) experience. I'm sure there are some PA-NYC daily commuters out there....

The other option is to listen to a traffic report on 1010 WINS the same day of the week that you're leaving for a flight to get an idea of typical delays....

I'm not sure why you would want to go so far north to take the GWB to the Cross Bronx to the Whitestone to the Van Wyck. Seems pretty out-of-the-way to me.

I'd think you'd want to take the Goethals (or the Outerbridge) to the Verrazano to the Belt instead:

http://maps.google.ca/maps?f=d&hl=en&geocode=&saddr=Pine+Grove,+PA,+USA&daddr=40.582671,-73.951721+to:JFK+Airport&mrcr=0,1&mrsp=1&sz=10&mra=dpe&sll=40.684804,-74.10141&sspn=0.447792,0.803375&ie=UTF8&ll=40.497092,-74.292297&spn=0.898099,1.60675&z=9&om=1

Either way, leaving at 3:30am sounds like a reasonable time to me. That gives you a little over 6 hours before the checkin cutoff, which should be plenty. And hopefully you'll arrive around 7am before traffic really gets super-heavy. I'm sure others who do their commuting by car will have more opinions on the subject, though.

As for the hotel option, why not just get a room near the airport instead of way out on LI? You might not be able to use spg points, but you should be able to find a clean room for about $100 that will put you within 5-10 minutes of the airport so you don't have to worry about traffic. Or for $150-200, you can probably find a Sleep-Park-Fly deal where you spend one night at the hotel but leave your car parked there for the duration of your trip. Considering the cost of parking at JFK, that's like getting the hotel room for free.

On the sleep park fly front, parksleepfly.com has the Ramada JFK (which is supposed to be pretty crappy, but it's a bed and the location is good) for $199 for one night + 7 days of parking or $229 for one night + 14 days of parking.

The Holiday Inn also advertises parking specials ($239+ for 5 days of parking and $289+ for 10 days of parking):

http://www.ichotelsgroup.com/h/d/hi/1/en/hotel/NYCJF/packages

thanks for the replies

i should've mentioned this before...
I'm flying in from YYZ to Allentown, picking up a car rental, and dropping off the rental at JFK and flying back to Canada from there. So the parking at JFK isn't a problem.

themicah, thank you so much for the alternate route. I'm obviously not familiar with the area, so i just took whatever google threw my way.

I think driving really early in the morning sounds feasible, so i won't bother getting a hotel.

You don't say what day of the week you will be flying. Weekends will have much less traffic heading to jfk at that hour.
Keep in mind that Verazanno Bridge has the toll in the "reverse direction", heading from Brooklyn to Staten Island. It is "free" from SI to Bklyn--on weekdays you find extra traffic going into to the city via the VZB.

I live just near the GW Bridge, and have to pass the bridge approach roads every day.

For an 11 am flight, it can take anywhere from 20 minutes to 3 hours to get from my house to JFK in the morning, and there's no way to know how long it will take until about 7am.

So I too strongly suggest getting a hotel closer to the airport for the night before.

need some advice about driving into JFK, and i'm kinda worried about the traffic
I'll be driving from Pine Grove, PA.

I'll be driving into JFK for a 10:50am int'l departure (so it's a 60 min cut-off).
According to google, it's a 3 hour drive, and up to 4 hours with traffic. is 4 hours realistic?

the route i'm thinking is:
http://maps.google.ca/maps?saddr=Pine+Grove,+PA,+USA&geocode=&daddr=JFK+Airport&f=d&hl=en&sll=40.560243,-76.385193&sspn=0.052036,0.101624&ie=UTF8&z=8&om=1

At the end, I would be taking the I-95N, and then the I-678S.
I'm thinking of getting on the road at 3:30am and aim to arrive at JFK somewhere between 8 and 9.

Or, the other option I'm thinking is I could drive to Long Island the day before and use my spg points to stay at the Sheraton in Hauppage (Long Island), and just drive to JFK from there. I'm wondering if the traffic into JFK will be lighter if I'm driving from the east to west? At the very least, I'll be closer to JFK!
this way, I'd be taking Southern Parkway W, and then the Belt Pkwy W and then the JFK Expy. If google is quoting 1hr10mins, i would leave the hotel at 6:30 (i have this fear of NY traffic and i'm just getting the feeling that google is underestimating.. hmm)

any thoughts on which way I should go, anything I'm missing?

I agree with taking the "southern approach." Only problem is that the Goethals Bridge is very narrow and if there is a traffic problem on it, it can take a long time to sort out. Similarly if you hear of a back up on the "inbound" Staten Island Expressway, it may prove to be nerve racking.

If I were in your position, I would come up the night before and stay close to the airport. Take a look at http://yp.yahoo.com/ and type in JFK for location and then click on "Hotels" and skip all the sponsored pages until you get to the list of hotels by distance from the main terminal buildings.

One way to save money would be to stay in Brooklyn at the Golden Gate Inn, http://www.sanpedro.com/hotelinfo/79476.html which is located just off the Knapp Street exit from the Belt Parkway. That is only a few exits from the one for the airport and in the morning almost all the traffic is going in the other direction. Mapquest says less than 20 minutes and that seems reasonable to me. http://www.mapquest.com/directions/main.adp?go=1&do=nw&rmm=1&un=m&cl=EN&ct=NA&rsres=1&1ffi=&1l=&1g=&1pl=&1v=&1n=&2ffi=1&2l=rc1BPdyWNuEE%2FyHkUzMwAg%3D%3D&2g=RuyuFe8vnw8RrAFRxHEoGg%3D%3D&2pl=718-244-4444&2v=ADDRESS&2n=&1pn=&1a=3867+SHORE+PARKWAY&1c=brooklyn&1s=NY&1z=&2pn=John+F.+Kennedy+International+Airport+%28JFK%2 9&2a=Jfk+International+Airport&2c=Jamaica&2s=NY&2z=11430&r=f

Note that I have never stayed there as I live in Brooklyn. I only know of it from its past reputation as a notorious "no-tell motel" but that should be no concern to you. Take a look at the online reviews which are mixed (ranging from awful to good) and see for yourself. It will cost you around $100+ for a night.

Nearby is the less controversial and newer Best Western Brooklyn Bay which can cost $150.

i'll be flying out on a Wednesday, so I expect regular mid-week rush-hour traffic

I finally decided to play it safe, and just booked a room at the Best Western. It's supposed to be really close to the airport (144-25 153rd Ln).

Thanks for all the input, and for knocking some sense into me.

edit: and I get a decent night's sleep this way :)

update: I ended up getting the Doubletree JFK for 101$ + tax (126 total) from priceline, and it was worth every penny!

that was one HECK of a storm that hit NYC the night before...
I heard of people being stuck in traffic for 5-6 hours that morning while I was listening to the radio.
Apparently, the Lincoln tunnel was closed, and the Holland tunnel (which I had crossed the night before in mere minutes) was roughly an hour to cross.

thanks again everyone, and I learned my lesson not to underestimate NYC traffic

update: I ended up getting the Doubletree JFK for 101$ + tax (126 total) from priceline, and it was worth every penny!

that was one HECK of a storm that hit NYC the night before...
I heard of people being stuck in traffic for 5-6 hours that morning while I was listening to the radio.
Apparently, the Lincoln tunnel was closed, and the Holland tunnel (which I had crossed the night before in mere minutes) was roughly an hour to cross.

thanks again everyone, and I learned my lesson not to underestimate NYC traffic

Glad to hear everything worked well for you. The subway system is not yet completely up to speed and we have a lot of downed trees to clear in Brooklyn but give us a couple of days and all will be well.