is it crazy to accept a job in NYC that lets you fly back to DC on DL Shuttle daily?
 

is it crazy to accept a job in NYC that lets you fly back to DC on DL Shuttle daily? (5 roundtrips per week, paid by the company)

my niece received such a job offer last week. so she can take the first shuttle flight in the morning to LGA... then return to DCA after work on the last shuttle...

right now she drives 2 and half hours to work each way to work anyway... (bad DC area traffice... 2.5 hours to drive the 27 miles each morning)

Are there other people doing this?

Gross. The travel to / from the airport would kill me, unless my office was right next door. Why doesn't she just stay Monday night through Thursday?

Edit: Also, that flight gets cancelled a lot. Seems like a terrible idea.

Is relocating to NYC not an option? Also why couldn't out on Monday and home on Friday not work (I did this for 2 years living in PHX and working in the East Bay of SF)?

Also what happens during IRROPS and she doesn't get home until 2am. Is she expected to turn around and catch the first flight of the day? I would be geting some clear direction on expectations prior to accepting such an arrangement.

No way I would do such an arrangement but I am at a point in my career and traveling that it's more a chore than a joy..

Yes, I think spending that much time commuting is crazy.. although 5 hours daily in a car is also completely nuts.

Not crazy, quite doable.

That is a 'premium' service with special rules and perks. I think depending on how far your niece is from DCA and where in Manhattan (assuming that, Queens might be even better) she is going, she might beat her current commute time. Since she's commuting daily, she won't be checking bags, unless she has to carry verboten items, so her time to check in is only 15 minutes before departure and she has to be at the gate only five minutes before.

However, it might be easier on her to negotiate perhaps staying in NY Monday to Thursday and working from home on Friday. That's infinitely easier, but then she needs to find a place to stay. Her company would save the daily $350 in commuting costs, and divert that to hotel instead. Planning ahead, that price isn't nuts.

Yes -- that sounds miserable. Daily is insane. FWIW, at one point in my life I lived in DC (both in the city near Metro Center and later in Arlington near the Courthouse Metro stop). I had a 6 week project in NYC and insisted on flying every week for the miles and in retrospect that was dumb -- especially when my office was right near Penn Station.

The problem with the Shuttle is it sounds easy but once you add everything up it's not so short.

You have to DCA at least 20 minutes before departure (I used to cut it close at DCA but gate closes at T5 so you can't cut it much closer in case security is a problem). There are almost always some sort of weather or traffic related delays so you sit on the tarmac for a while. Once you get to LGA you have to deal with the Uber/Lyft/Taxi situation, then you have to take the 45 - 90 minute drive into the city (depending on where you are going).

Then you have to do the reverse to get back to LGA (and PreCheck can be a big hassle there, you can't cut it as close as with DCA) and if you are doing it daily it's not like you can leave work at 330pm every day to make the 5pm shuttle. So you have to take the last Shuttle -- which is always risky because LGA can be a cluster and so you are always at risk for your evening flight to be cancelled (and if you are on the last one of the day and it's canceled you are hosed).

I would do it on a weekly basis (and get company to pay for hotel) or take the train (but still just do it weekly and get company to pay for a hotel)

I vaguely recall reading a story about someone who did a daily commute on Southwest (on some equally short route), maybe in their in flight magazine.

Couldn't find any reference in a Google search, but did turn up this old FT thread from 2006:

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trav...an-legend.html

EDIT: and a DL thread from 2015: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/delt...y-commute.html

Google search with "site:flyertalk.com" will turn up additional examples.

Assuming her end point in NYC is Midtown-ish and and she is close to the DC train would just take the Acela before I'd take the shuttle every day. On the best day for LGA/DCA, the Acela is an hour slower, but the whole thing is so uch more reliable and pleasant plus less "disruption" time (getting on the plane, laptops off because of takeoff, etc).

If she does go down this route, she needs to make sure she has a sub-2 pound laptop she can keep out on the long apron delays she'll experience on both ends.

Agree with the general comment of just grab a hotel. The shuttle can be significantly cheaper if you play booking games (nested round trips can be had for <$200) and Delta rarely goes after that, but if you do it every day for a year they may decide to smack you down - and same day turns are more like $500 than $150 - and at that point even the $400/night hotel starts to look pretty equivalent.

Shouldn't there be consideration of the overall attractiveness of the new job versus her current situation? Also, would this be an internal transfer or promotion or a new employer? Is the commuting between NYC and the DC area expected to be permanent?

Bad idea. There is such a thing as winter, ice storms, snow storms, all will screw up flights. Forget about it.

From someone who did the LGA-BOS shuttle 1-2x/week for day trips for 6+ months I wouldn't recommend a 5x/week commute for months/years on end
1) my travel was outbound from LGA which meant not having to be stuck in NYC traffic coming into the city which makes the most painful part of her trip the LGA-city part
2) shuttle on a good day is amazingly quick, definitely with a CLEAR + Pre-check combo I caught flights from curb side at T-15 to making the flight at T-5, though repeated exposure to that experience is probably not good for your life expectancy given the somewhat unnecessary stress
3) 2/3 flights out of LGA are delayed so her evening commute will at least every other day be a hustle to get SDC/SDS on the flight that actually leaves early, or indeed getting home at 2am, or staying in a hotel when you don't expect it
4) more than once I ended up having to uber back from Boston to the city since all flights got cancelled (and the last train had left) and I ended up home well into the night (it's fun to fly without carryon until you have no fresh clothes nor toothbrush with you)
5) "the last shuttle" means getting home pretty late every day... to then take the 6 or 7am shuttle back? That sounds not even realistic. My example was 8am shuttle outbound and anywhere between 4pm-7pm back

If the job is that good and relocating is not an option I'd recommend her to plan for a hybrid solution e.g., flying in and out on a quiet / good weather day, and staying overnight 1-3 nights a week as needed. And ask to work some days remotely from home (e.g., Fridays).

Given the construction issues at LGA and the overall hideousness of NYC traffic this sounds brutal. Add in weather delays at LGA — snow sleet and rain — it sounds worse. Is she going to leave on the 6 am and be back on the 730 pm? And how long is the travel from DCA to home?

My 2 cents would be fly in Monday morning and home Tuesday night. Work from home on Wednesdays. Then fly in Thursday morning and home Friday night. 4 flights plus 2 hotels per week instead of 10 flights.

Climate change?

What do you mean by "lets". Are the company expecting her to do it or is it them being flexible so that she and family don't have to move to NYC in order to attract a good
empoyee?

Did she exress a view to them during the interview about this?

Unless she lives and works very close to the respective airports then she will still have a very long commtute. A log commute is still a ling commute even if someone else is doing the driving.

I suggest she looks at some of the other options already suggested and e.g. fly up Monday and back Thursday and stay in a hotel and works from home on Fridays (or works from home on Monday and goes to NTC on Tuesday and flies back on Friday.