According to answermba, New York is home to the two busiest stations in the U.S. One of these is the Grand Central Terminal, seen here.
Public transportation is by far the most important form of transportation for New Yorkers. About one in three public transit users and as much as two thirds of all rail travelers in the United States live in New York or its suburbs. This contrasts with the rest of the country, where about 90% of workers drive to work. In New York, the average commute time is the fastest of all major US cities at 39 minutes. Of the people who work in the city, 32% use the metro, 25% drive by car, 14% take the bus, 8% travel by train, 8% walk to work, 6% carpool, 1% uses a taxi, 0.4% goes by bicycle and 0.4% takes the ferry.
Public transport
Regional public transportation is provided by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. New York is also served by Amtrak, the national passenger rail operator in the United States that uses Pennsylvania Station. Amtrak offers connections to Boston, Philadelphia and Washington DC, among others. The rail network links the region’s suburbs to the city through 20 different rail links and 250 stations. Regional rail links converge at Grand Central Terminal and Pennsylvania Station.
New York’s bus and rail networks are the largest in North America.
The New York subway is the largest subway network in the world measured by the number of operational stations, at 468. It is the third largest when looking at the number of users (1.5 billion passenger journeys in 2006). Due to the importance of the subway network for many New Yorkers, it is operational 24 hours a day. This is in contrast to the nightly closure of many other metro systems. On some lines there are large differences at night with the frequency during the day. Many metro lines in the city are four- track, which means that both stop and express services can run on these routes.
Since 1817, the Staten Island Ferry has sailed between Staten Island and Lower Manhattan for a distance of 8.4 kilometers. This ferry service operates 24 hours a day all year round and carries 19 million passengers annually. The ferry is popular with tourists because it allows them to get a good view of the skyline of Lower Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty.
Road traffic
Taxis near the Murray Hill Tunnel
The Commissioners’ Plan of 1811 gave Manhattan the distinctive checkerboard pattern that largely determined the city’s physical development. There are twelve avenues that run parallel to the Hudson and 220 numbered streets (Streets) that run perpendicular to the river. Some road and street names, such as Broadway, Wall Street, and Madison Avenue, are used synonymously with the industries located there; these are the theatres, the financial institutions and the advertising institutions respectively.
There are 13,000 taxis in New York, also known as the Yellow Cab in New York. The well-known yellow color has made them icons of the city.
Due to the presence of a number of rivers such as the Hudson and the East River, the city is dependent on bridges and tunnels. Completed in 1883, the Brooklyn Bridge over the East River is one of the city’s most recognizable architectural structures. This bridge is 1,825 meters long and the largest span is 486 meters. This made it the longest span in the world until 1903. The Williamsburg Bridge and the Manhattan Bridge are two other bridges over the East River. The Queensboro Bridge is located between Queens and Manhattan. The boroughs of Staten Island and Brooklyn are connected by the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. TheConsidered one of the busiest bridges in the world, George Washington Bridge connects the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan with Fort Lee in New Jersey.
In addition to bridges, New York has a number of tunnels. Located under the Hudson River, the Lincoln Tunnel processes 120,000 vehicles daily, making it one of the busiest tunnels in the world. The Holland Tunnel, also under the Hudson, was the first mechanically ventilated tunnel. Two other tunnels that connect to Manhattan are the Queens Midtown Tunnel and the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel.
Aviation
John F. Kennedy International Airport is New York’s most famous airport
The city has three international airports: John F. Kennedy International, also known as JFK, Newark Liberty International, and LaGuardia. These three airports together handled 100 million passengers in 2005. JFK and Newark are connected to the regional rail network. Both airports also handle most international flights and the long domestic flights. LaGuardia mainly handles short domestic flights.
Shipping
The Port of New York has the advantage of a sheltered deep – water location with an open connection to the Atlantic Ocean. It is historically one of the most important ports in the United States. It is the third busiest port in North America. More than 25 million tons of goods and bulk are handled every year, including 4.5 million containers.
The port is also an important center for passenger ships. More than half a million people leave the New York Passenger Ship Terminal on the Hudson every year.
