It is inconvenient for me because I would have the added step of schlepping my luggage and laptop to the shuttle. That involves taking a taxi and stressing out if the traffic is at a stand still. It's an extra step which adds more headache than travelling should have.


[This message has been edited by Analise (edited Dec 18, 2003).]

I Was wondering if anyone knows if you have to use the airtrain to get to the rental cars at Federal circle or will each car company still operate their buses as well?

Having just done a trip from JFK to Hoboken. I will weigh in on my opinion.

Airtrain is worth the $5 over the bus system. (Have we confirmed if it is $5 for Howard Beach also?).

First of all the "free" bus stops are outside. While most of the Airtrain station can be accessed without going outside.

On my last trip the taxi lineup was very long... too long. The "free" bus that went to Howard Beach was so full the first THREE buses that until a fourth one came was I able to get on. You then have to hit all the terminals AND all (about 8) long-term parking stops before you get to Howard Beach.

So for this case; Airtrain would have trimmed about an hour off of my commute home.

Granted it takes 50 minutes via the A (Express) train from Howard Beach to PA Bus Terminal.

I arrived at Rush Hour (4:30PM), so any car based service would have been dodgy.

Getting to JFK by car is always best at optimal times. But during tough times the train is the way to go.

As with Europe's superior rail connections. The Europeans have a couple of advantages. World War II. This detroyed most infrastructure so that when it was "rebuilt" you didn't have to worry about right of way right etc. Everything was blown to S*** (especially in Germany). So it was very easy to redesign your rail and airport network. Also Europeans don't have the dependence on cars as Americans because of gas prices, so there is more impetus to build a rail network of quality and service.

NYC's rail network is almost over 100 years old. Also, right of way would be a huge undertaking to have a dedicated train into Manhattan. The last time NYC was brash enough to take away whole neighborhoods for "good of the city" projects was when Robert Moses was running the city parks and transport departments. He leveled whole neighboorhoods for such projects as the Cross Bronx Expressway etc.

Now because of Robert Moses it is now much harder and more expensive to get right of way (though you can argue that his foresight allowed the city to grow longterm for the sake of the few short term local negatives).

If you notice they built Airtrain on the Van Wyck right of way. I see all of you are complaining about how expensive the project was; but it would have been inordinately and exponentially more expensive if they built a train to Manhattan. Also, for a "dedicated" train to ride on current gauge rails it would defeat the prupose because you would lose speed because the train would still have to share rails with subways. Also, the NYC subway system is old. The rail system is old. Any new subway nowadays is using rubber tires and different technology.

And the guy who died? wasn't that human error? He was running the train too fast than the rating of the track?

Is Airtrain MY first choice. No driving still is and EWR will always trump JFK. However, every other world class city in the world has a valid rail connection into its airports. Until Airtrain EWR/JFK came online NYC didn't.

You can now hit Amtrak and NJ Transit out of EWR and now you can link up to the NYC subway system and LIRR to JFK. Maybe for us "rich" folk who can afford car service, taxis and long-term parking; access to the airport is now available to every NYC resident who is close to a subway line and to LI residents who don't want to deal with their horrible traffic problems.

This a good thing and makes the city better. JFK is a pain to get to plain and simple, but now access is expanded, JFK can now grow (LGA cannot and EWR is slowly getting filled out).

For Rush Hour travel and for people who cannot afford taxis and car service; airtrain gives people seemless access to public rail system.

It is a good thing and I wish it was operating on 1-Dec when I came back to JFK. I lost an hour waiting for that stupid bus. Airtrain would have cut my time in almost half. It's worth the 5 bucks.

- HobokenFlyer

What if they save the billions to build the rail system, and just build the bus routes INTO the terminal, covered, and totally air-conditioned, buy more buses, run each bus straight from the terminals to the train station without stopping at long-term lots, AND give people $2 instead of charging them $5 with the money saved. Would that be better than the train?

Not really.

The traffic around and in JFK is bad enough as it is without adding more of it.

Personally, if the transfer at Jamaica LIRR is good, I will use it in preference to taxis. As I do in any airport with a decent transport connection. Buses and crowded roads are just too unpredictable to catch a flight.

This is not the Europe that those of use who live here recognise.

Not one of the airport connections in the UK has in any way benefited from land destroyed in WW2. In fact the majority of what was destroyed was reconstructed like-for-like within about 10 years anyway, and that was before airport rail connections really started (the first was London Gatwick in 1958, but that was an open-field project tied in to an existing rail route).

I like JFK because I can get there for $2. Okay, now $7. ...?

I used to take the F to the A, and then catch the free shuttle to the terminals. Now I can ride a train instead of a shuttle. This would be nice for $0, but FIVE BUCKS????

Same for most of the other European airports I know of. Does everyone in the US think Europe was flattened after the war?

Airports like Amsterdam didn't get their rail link till the early 1980's, they built it in 4 years. Heathrow got it's express several years ago, CDG connects to the mainline tracks outside the airport etc...

None of these projects have anything to do with WWII yet they were built fast and efficiently. The problem at JFK is that they waited MUCH too long, did very poor planning when they expanded the airport etc...

What about the LIRR? That should be better than the Subway?
-JBLU.

Except you can only get that in a few places in the city and have to get to those places. You can get a subway just about anywhere, and connect to get to kennedy fairly easily.

You also now have to get a LIRR ticket (as one of the news stories this morning said the lines were way too long to get a ticket and make the train, so they paid more to purchase it on the train), more money.

If you are near one of the places you can get a train, then it's probably better. If you have to travel to get to one of those places, then you may as well stick with the subway.

They need something that goes from the airport to the city without two or three transfers. Get me to Penn Station or Grand Central direct from the terminal, and that's a good thing. Have me take a subway to get to the LIRR, then purchase a ticket, get on the LIRR, then purchase another ticket, and get on the Airtrain, and I may as well have just driven like I usually do, the Avistar van drops me off right in front of the terminal.

There's no way I will pay anything for the Air Train to Howard Beach, if they will charge. The bus to the subway is free now, so how could they begin charging?

Charging for the Airtrain from Howard Beach is obnoxious!

You're kidding, right?

The benefits of AirTrain may be questionable for those coming from Manhattan, but this new rail link is a boon for those of us who are stuck out on Long Island. Travel times to JFK are less than those infernal airport shuttle services, and at one-fourth the price. Decent mileage runs will finally be possible! In fact, travel times with LIRR+AirTrain are competitive with driving one's own car to the airport; it takes less time to go from Jamaica to the central terminal area on AirTrain than it has traditionally taken to go from the long-term parking lot to any given terminal on the shuttle bus. Speaking of which...

I don't understand why so many people get hung up over the transfer at Jamaica when discussing the pros and cons of the AirTrain. As noted above, it takes less time to take AirTrain to Jamaica than it used to take using the shuttle bus to the long-term parking lot. The amount of schlepping is comparable to loading luggage on and off a bus and then either walking to one's car or doing the upstairs/downstairs routine at the Howard Beach station. "It's terrible - you have to change at Jamaica" is really a geographically induced fallacy caused by the fact that Jamaica happens to be farther from the terminals than the long-term parking lot is. Well, it may be farther in miles, but not in time any more. The only legitimate issue with the transfer is the narrow set of stairs leading to and from the LIRR platforms at Jamaica. (Those in the habit of traveling with more than they can carry have a legitimate beef.) Sure, it's not as nice as AMS where you can take an escalator from the arrivals hall to an NS train bound for anywhere in Holland, but it's a lot better than anything that was there before.

It's worth noting that the lack of a "one-seat ride" to Manhattan (if it can properly be called that; personally I don't think it's any worse than other airports where you have to use some sort of inter-terminal shuttle to get to the transportation) is primarily for political reasons. The age of the subway system, and its heavy-rail nature, aren't the real issues. Even lack of right-of-way isn't that big a problem. (There is a disused LIRR line running through Queens that would have provided much of what is needed.) The biggest obstacle to direct JFK-Midtown service was the fact that revenue from airport PFCs was needed to fund the project. (Hey, in New York, you take funding from wherever you can get it.) The Port Authority had to jump through many hoops to convince other authorities that the airport train would not be used for local, non-airport transit, and thus could be legitimately funded using PFC money. This is, I believe, the reason why there is no AirTrain route that calls at both Jamaica and Howard Beach. This is also the reason why AirTrain can't integrate with the subway - any such project would have required at least some work to be done on the subway system, and using a PFC-funded project to make improvements to non-airport facilities is a big no-no.

As for me, I hope to try AirTrain over the Christmas holiday, and I really can't wait to experience the better way to JFK. Instead of gleefully watching the stalled traffic below, however, I'll be reveling in the joy of not being on the Q10 bus.

What is disgusting is that they also charge $5 to take the EWR Airtrain. Now that is really sticking it to you.