We will be taking my fav train, the Crescent to NY city from NOL again in January.
We would like to go to:
Cooperstown
and Washington DC
Any suggestions on the best way to get there from NY city? Thanks!
Posted by JFB (Member # 2520) on :
DC is a stop on the Crescent. Unless you're on a fixed schedule, just get off the train there and continue your journey to NY on a regional train when you're done touring. Call Amtrak Recervations to arrange the cheapest/easiest way of doing so.
Cooperstown, I'm afraid, can only be accessed conveniently by car. Bus is possible, but Greyhound shows very limited service from NYC. Perhaps a train/bus combo from Albany would work better.
Hope this helps. As a native of your destination (bite my tongue--I'm from Brooklyn, not NYC), I'll be happy to answer any further questions you may have.
Has driving and bus instructions on how to get there (other that the immortal "Practice Practice Practice").
And JFB - I appreciated your clarification and tongue bite. I was born in Brooklyn, lived there as a kid - Bensonhurst/Borough Park/Bay Ridge; father played semi pro in the boroughs with the likes of Hank Greenburg. I still am a Dodger fan deep in my heart even though they left...
Subways left their mark, I think, as I have loved trains ever since. Remember the straw seats....
Posted by 20th Century (Member # 2196) on :
I was also born and raised in Gravesend, Brooklyn. Yes,those straw seats were someting else. Sometimes in winter you can feel the heat from the radiator under the seat. Cooperstown is wonderful. The best way to get there is to drive. You can take a train to Utica,NY or Albany and drive from there. Utica is closer to Cooperstown.
Posted by Pojon (Member # 3080) on :
Dear IRA and any others--amazing! I am also from Brooklyn's East New York, Brownsville, Bensonhurst and Bay Ridge and tthank God I have lived in Florida for many years and also in Canada. Do you remember those straw seats on the BMT cars in Brooklyn and the open-ended cars that ran on the Fulton Street Line on Pitkin Avenue in East New York? Do you remember the Atlantic Avenue (elevated) station where you could look down at a big steel rolling complete with sparks flying, etc. That belonged to a cousin of mine, Samuel Klevens and we were always proud to look at this magnificent place while waiting to change trains in the 1940's.
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Posted by Pojon (Member # 3080) on :
Dear IRA and any others--amazing! I am also from Brooklyn's East New York, Brownsville, Bensonhurst and Bay Ridge and tthank God I have lived in Florida for many years and also in Canada. Do you remember those straw seats on the BMT cars in Brooklyn and the open-ended cars that ran on the Fulton Street Line on Pitkin Avenue in East New York? Do you remember the Atlantic Avenue (elevated) station where you could look down at a big steel rolling mill complete with sparks flying, etc. That belonged to a cousin of mine, Samuel Klevens and we were always proud to look at this magnificent place while waiting to change trains in the 1940's.
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Posted by Ira Slotkin (Member # 81) on :
Pojon and 20th:
Yes, we Brooklyn boys are out here!! I have a card that says I belong to The Society for the Prevention of Disparaging Remarks About Brooklyn. I was born in 1950 so my memories don't go back quite so far as yours Pojon. But I heard the stories from my folks. And have plenty of my own especially trains to Coney Island to go to the beach and Steeplechase Park, Nathan's Hot Dogs. Riding between the cars. They are doing a major renovation of the Coney Island station. Will be huge, extra tracks and platforms. Used to take the National Limited from St Louis in to NYC in the sixties.
Try and take my son (almost seven) in every year on the train from here in Denver. His complaint about the subway is that we don't have a room with a bed.
And thanks to trains and rent control my uncle lives in the same apartment building @ 19th Ave and 68th he has been in for more thsan fifty years. No car, 85 and still getting around the city by train. I dearly wish more of the country and the cities had established such an elaborate mass transit system.
I recall hearing there is a new book out about the building of some of the NY subway system, and some of it's deepest tunnels and stations in particular. One being some 180 feet below ground. Might be in Harlem. Book calls attention to the many who worked tunneling and died in the effort. Unsung workers of the world.
Strayed a ways from your original post, yummykaz. Say hi to Cooperstown for me. Maybe even have an egg cream....
Ira
Posted by sojourner (Member # 3134) on :
Cooperstown is not so close to NYC as you may think, but it is a nice little town. However, if you are going off season, check to see that everything you are interested in seeing is open. It would be quickest to go there by rental car, about a 4-hour drive; however, rental cars in NYC can be very expensive. If you want to go by bus, Cooperstown is a small town, so buses that go there are locals. I believe the bus line you want is Adirondack Trailways, a.k.a. Pine Hills Trailways, 1-800-858-8555. Their bus from New York City is about 5 hrs 20-30 minutes. I don't see much point in going to Albany and then catching a bus because the train trip will take you over 2 hrs and the shortest bus ride is still 3 hours; plus you would have to taxi across the river from the train station (in Rensselaer) to the bus terminal (in downtown Albany). However, it is a prety trip along the Hudson.
Re the Crescent--if you don't get your tickets on line, you should be able to have the Amtrak agent split your ticket, with the reserved portion as far as Washington and the unreserved portion between DC and NYC (or anywhere on the Empire State Line up to Albany), for no extra charge. This gives you a free stopover in Washington, becuase you can use the unreserved portion whenever you like (pretty much no matter what the date says on it, unless you get some kind of special discount with blackout dates). I mean, you will tell the agent you are taking a train from DC to NYC within 24 hours of your arrival in DC on the Crescent, but you won't have to do that, because your ticket will be unreserved. At least, that has always been my experienced with the Northeast Corridor unreserved trains.
Posted by Pojon (Member # 3080) on :
Dear IRA and all the Brooklyn boys, It's a pleasure to know that you all are out there! Makes me feel warm to read your story of riding to Coney Island (Steeplechase, Nathan's, hot dogs, etc., the boardwalk)! All good memories! If only, as you say, there were such great interconnected extensive trasportation systems like New York's! I even remember (I was born in 1941) the elevated trains on the Third Avenue Elevated lines in Manhattan and the construction of the "wonder of the world" route over causeways to Rockaway Beach over Jamaica Bay from Lefferts Blvd. in Queens as an extension of the IND 8th Avenue subway. Remember riding that route--I used to stand in the front car looking out of the window as the trains raced across the bridges over the Bay to Rockaway. Remember the Far Rockaway extension? Those were the days. NOW I live in a county in norhtern Florida with NO public transportation but lots of nice rural scenery!
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Posted by Ira Slotkin (Member # 81) on :
And I smile back!!! I too recall riding in that front doorway. Watching the trainman through the window of his compartment. Racing along. What a thrill. And watching out the back door of the National Limited as well.
I dare say that many Brooklynites of that era (at least from my extended and immediate families) are in FL - Century Village etc etc. Might make for an interesting gathering to get together and tell subway stories - seeing celebrities ands wierdos. Just as it is today.
A rail initiative just passed here in CO so we are looking at some inter urban rail as well as additional light rail here by 2014.
Alas my youngest will be 16 then and not have much opportunity for that formative "training", if you will.