Transportation
New York City is home to the two busiest rail stations in the US, including Grand Central Terminal, which is seen here.
Main article: Transportation in New York City
Unlike any other major city in the United States, public transit is the most popular way to get around. 54.6% of New Yorkers commuted to work in 2005 using mass transit.[158] About one in every three users of mass transit in the United States and two-thirds of the nation's rail riders live in New York and its suburbs.[159][160] This is in contrast to the rest of the country, where about 90% of commuters drive automobiles to their workplace.[161] New York is the only city in the United States where more than half of all households do not own a car[not in citation given] (in Manhattan, more than 75% of residents do not own a car;[not in citation given] nationally, the percentage is 8%).[161] According to the US Census Bureau, New York City residents spend an average of 38.4 minutes per day getting to work, the longest commute time in the nation among large cities.[162]
New York City is served by Amtrak, which uses Pennsylvania Station. Amtrak provides connections to Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C.
Brooklyn Bridge
The New York City Subway is the largest rapid transit system in the world when measured by the number of stations in operation, with 468. It is the third-largest when measured by annual ridership (1.5 billion passenger trips in 2006).[159] New York's subway is also notable because nearly all of the system remains open 24 hours per day, in contrast to the overnight shutdown common to systems in most cities, including London, Paris, Washington, Madrid and Tokyo. The transportation system in New York City is extensive and complex. It includes the longest suspension bridge in North America,[163] the world's first mechanically ventilated vehicular tunnel,[164] more than 12,000 yellow cabs,[165] an aerial tramway that transports commuters between Roosevelt Island and Manhattan, and a ferry system connecting Manhattan to various locales within and outside the city. The busiest ferry in the United States is the Staten Island Ferry, which annually carries over 19 million passengers on the 5.2-mile (8.4 km) run between Staten Island and Lower Manhattan. The "PATH" train (short for Port Authority Trans-Hudson) is a subway system going under the Hudson River, linking the New York City subway to points in northeast New Jersey.
New York City's public bus fleet and commuter rail network are the largest in North America.[159] The rail network, which connects the suburbs in the tri-state region to the city, has more than 250 stations and 20 rail lines.[159][166] The commuter rail system converges at Grand Central Terminal and Pennsylvania Station.
The TWA Flight Center Building at John F. Kennedy International Airport
New York City is the top international air passenger gateway to the United States.[167] The area is served by three major airports, John F. Kennedy International, Newark Liberty International and LaGuardia, with plans for a fourth airport, Stewart International Airport near Newburgh, NY, to be taken over and enlarged by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (which administers the other three airports), as a "reliever" airport to help cope with increasing passenger volume. 100 million travelers used the three airports in 2005 and the city's airspace is the busiest in the nation.[168] Outbound international travel from JFK and Newark accounted for about a quarter of all U.S. travelers who went overseas in 2004.[169]
The New York City Subway is the world's largest mass transit system by number of stations and length of track.
New York's high rate of public transit use, 120,000 daily cyclists[170] and many pedestrian commuters makes it the most energy-efficient major city in the United States.[46] Walk and bicycle modes of travel account for 21% of all modes for trips in the city; nationally the rate for metro regions is about 8%.[171]
To complement New York's vast mass transit network, the city also has an extensive web of expressways and parkways, that link New York City to northern New Jersey, Westchester County, Long Island, and southwest Connecticut through various bridges and tunnels. Because these highways serve millions of suburban residents who commute into New York, it is quite common for motorists to be stranded for hours in traffic jams that are a daily occurrence, particularly during rush hour. The George Washington Bridge is considered one of the world's busiest bridges in terms of vehicle traffic.[172]
Despite New York's reliance on public transit, roads are a defining feature of the city. Manhattan's street grid plan greatly influenced the city's physical development. Several of the city's streets and avenues, like Broadway, Wall Street and Madison Avenue are also used as shorthand in the American vernacular for national industries located there: the theater, finance, and advertising organizations, respectively.