It is equally convenient for me to start a MR from any of the WAS airports (IAD, DCA, or BWI), since none are more than 40 minutes from my door. PHL is not a geographically desirable starting point, but when the deal is right, I am willing to consider it. (Purchased tickets to FCO starting in PHL when the Priceline opportunity was there in February, but had to cancel at the last minute on account of illness in the family.) Now there is the ANC sale, which ends tonight, and it is considerably cheaper to start from PHL than WAS, about $160 cheaper. So can anyone help with the following question:

getting to PHL other than by car. Would rather not drive to PHL, if there is a practical alternative. Does Amtrak go to the PHL airport, as it does to BWI? Or can one go to via Amtrak to a PHL station, then make it out to the airport by some cheap, easy and fast means (e.g., a local commuter train)? If I could do it other than by car, then I might be able to arrange the return through IAD and simply skip out on the last segment.

You can take Amtrak to the 30th Street Station and connect to the SEPTA R1 Line to the airport.

http://www.septa.org/service/rr_schedules.html

Where do you actually live?

That being said... transport to PHL sucks balls, but JayBrian has it right. A faster but more possibly expensive alternative is a one-way rental, but YMMV on this one, esp. since you'd drop $50 o/w to take Scamtrak.

It's not very time or cost efficient to get to the PHL airport from the DC area any way other than by car (your own or a rental). I recall there are some buses from DC to Philly that I suppose you could take, and then get on that R1 train line. Amtrak also works, but as noted above, Amtrak is overpriced and not terribly convenient once you have to switch to the Septa train.

Some of the Chinatown buses stop/pick up/drop off in PHL on their way to and from NYC. You still need to take SEPTA from there, but it is cheaper than Amtrak.

Thank you for reminding me why I have never started a MR from other than home base (WAS), and was only prepared to fly ex-PHL for the Priceline break of a couple of hundred or so because the trip was to be for 6 days or so and I would have the wife along. I would really like to jump on some of the ex-PHL opportunities like this one that just aren't there ex-WAS, but in the end they usually don't compute. A minimum of an extra 4 hours of driving, 2 on the front end and 2 on the return, plus the expense of driving that distance up 95 and back, makes it not a very appealing proposition.

I'm a PHL area resident and I fly out of BWI all the time... fares from PHL can be freaking horrible compared to BWI. About 75 miles door-to-door. Typically not MRs but parking at BWI is very reasonable.. I just hate the harbor tunnels at 5pm.

Dulles/DCA OTOH are a bit of a stretch for me.

I suppose the ground travel gets annoying if you're bringing along someone (like a wife) who isn't quite so into the MR game. I've started solo MRs at a few other Midwestern cities after taking Amtrak or a bus (Greyhound or Megabus) to get there. SEPTA's infrequent, overpriced R1 does make PHL one of the worse-connected Northeastern airports, although it's pretty quick once on board.

The DC-Philly buses disembark at or near the bus terminal, which is next to SEPTA's Market East station. Not quite so seamless a transfer as Amtrak to SEPTA at 30th, but not bad. Of course, you can't really plan a schedule around Chinatown buses in particular.

My only interest in beginning or ending a trip in PHL is to get a great MR when they have them, and it happens not infrequently that they do, with fares considerably cheaper than to/from the WAS airports. I am about equidistant between all three of them, with PHL 128 miles from my door, according to Mapquest. While I tend not to think of Philadelphia as all that far from us, it would have to be a very significant discount on otherwise fairly expensive travel for me to elect to fly ex-PHL, especially since it would mean
something like a 2.5 hour drive to get to the airport and an equally long one on the return home.