I’m headed to New York City (Manhattan) next week to perform security testing for a customer. I’ve never been to New York before, so I’m expecting quite the adventure.
Just glancing at Wikipedia, I’ve found some interesting comparisons between Oklahoma and New York City. For example, the state of Oklahoma has approximately 3.5 million people living here on 70,000 square miles of land. Manhattan has a little less than half that amount of people (1.6 million) living on 22 square miles of land. And apparently during the day, that number grows by another million people. Physically speaking, Manhattan is about the same size as the city I live in (Yukon, Oklahoma), which is 25 square miles. Of course Yukon only has a population of around 21,000 people, and New York City has 70,000 people … per square mile.
I’ve driven downtown in lots of big cities — Boston, Chicago, Washington D.C. — but I haven’t found a person yet who thinks driving in NYC is a good idea. In fact, I have had people I know from Boston, Chicago and Washington D.C. have all actively discouraged me from trying it. (I must admit, the $65/day parking fee at the Holiday Inn I’m staying at was a bit of a deterrance as well.)
And so, I’m taking a train.
Now, Oklahoma’s train service (the “Heartland Flyer”) only goes one way from Oklahoma City: south, to Ft. Worth, Texas. And the Amtrak train from Ft. Worth doesn’t go east or northeast to New York — it goes north, to Chicago. Getting to NYC from OKC by train looks like this:
Depart OKC: 8:25am (Monday)
Arrive Ft. Worth: 12:39pm (Monday)
Depart Ft. Worth: 2:20pm (Monday)
Arrive Chicago: 1:52pm (Tuesday)
Depart Chicago: 6:40pm (Tuesday)
Arrive Pittsburgh: 5:05am (Wednesday)
Depart Pittsburg: 7:20am (Wednesday)
Arrive NYC: 5:00pm (Wednesday)
Yeah … that’s not happening. The biggest bottleneck is the 28 hour trip to Chicago. It only takes 12 hours to drive there … and so that’s what I’m doing. Tomorrow (Saturday) I’ll be hitting the road, headed for Chicago. If I leave early enough, I’ll get there in time for a late dinner with family. I have all day Sunday to hang around and visit (read: eat) before catching a ride to the
downtown train station. From there, it’s a smoothe 21 hour ride from Chicago to NYC.
And, I bought a private room. It’s a small room with only two seats that convert into beds, but it has a big window and a place to sleep. I really don’t think the trip will be that bad. Twenty-one hours in front of my laptop is what I used to call, “Saturday”. I’ll have my iPhone for internet access, my Kindle for reading, my camera for shooting pictures and my laptop for everything else. To be honest, I’m quite looking forward to it.
I’ll be arriving in New York City around 6pm on Monday. I’m staying in SoHo, which appears to also be in Chinatown. It’s about 4/10 of a mile walk between where I’m staying and where I’m working, so it’s a good thing I started walking around the neighborhood again recently. Maybe I should do a few laps while carrying a laptop on my back. If everything goes well, I should have a few evenings free to go see New York City. I have a couple of friends who have graciously agreed to “show me the sights,” and I’m really looking forward to that.
All that’s left for me to do is load up the truck and head north in the morning. Thank goodness there’s not a blizzard or anything scheduled to arrive. Oh, wait …
I am sure you will find NYC interesting. I went last Oct for the first time. It is certainly different than the Midwest.
I’m a bit envious because New York City is still on my bucket list, but I’ll get there! Maybe by that time you can be my tour guide. I don’t think I can keep up with your uncle Kenny!