Planes, Trains and Automobiles in NYC. (Part I: PLANES)
I travel often to New York and the surrounding areas. After losing almost everything one of the first times I tried it (cell phone left in taxi, purse inadvertently left at pay phone and stolen, etc, etc) and episodes of crying because of the most horrific travel experience I’ve ever had, I’ve finally started to figure out mass transit as well as utilizing the taxi services. Not only that, but if you are a frequent traveler or are starting a job where you travel often (especially to New York), this may be helpful to you.
First and foremost, I set up a single user account with United. I really think the are probably the best for this kind of travel. They seem to cater more to business travel (smart move) than to anyone else. I used to go to www.kayak.com and find the cheapest fares with any carrier. The difficulties I ran into with that is it’s different with every airline. You sometimes get your tickets mailed to you, and many times it’s non refundable or a very weird time with stopovers all over the place. It becomes harrowing when you travel all the time. All my business travel is through United.. Because of that, I also set up a mileage plus account so I accumulate points toward potential free travel or upgrades. I have now qualified for a continuous discount on checking baggage (which they charge $15 per bag). I also get the luxury of checking in online at my own convenience, printing out the ticket and bypassing lines at the airport. This alone saves me so much time. And I’ve found for the most part, with United, I can find fairly competitive pricing. Because United also has been around so long, I definitely have a good trust factor with them being on time.
When you make reservations online, you also get to choose what seats you will sit in. From going out to your return, giving you the sweetness (if you do it early enough) of picking a window or aisle seat. (who would want a middle seat anyway?)
At the airport (Denver International being their main hub), they have created different lines for those checking in at the airport and those who already checked in. So, if you do check in online, you can do so 24 hours prior to the flight. You can also set up notifiers that will call your phone and send you an email for your reminders. I have missed flights before, so I have every possible reminder set up. This checking in online, can save you invaluable time and gives you more time to be relaxed and move at your own pace, not having to worry about the lines.
You get to see free movies when you are on the plane, which is nice and they actually have decent music stations that you can listen to. They do provide different snack sets of your choice, albeit none of them are that great since they need preservatives to keep fresh, however they now only take credit cards instead of only cash, which is wonderful, because everything I expense, I try to put on a credit card so I get a receipt.
The planes and staff themselves are pretty similar to most other planes, so can’t complain or promote them. There is never enough storage space (seems like they made them smaller? Or did I get bigger?), however, once you get enough miles, you qualify for more legroom space, an automated upgrade (if you go online and make sure you have it). I don’t know how many miles is required…its quite a few, because I’m close to 30k and haven’t yet qualified.
(Note: picking mid week or outside of Monday and weekend travel make it a lot less expensive. And carry antibacterial hand cleanser).
Next article, I’ll talk about mass transit: Taxis and finally, Trains.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
