Washington Dulles Intl. and Newark Intl. just before X-Mas

[thraxes]

Me and a few friends will be doing a quick trip up the US east coast and we are going to be doing a quick stop at NYC on Sunday the 19th. We are flying very early (7:50 AM) from Washington Dulles International to Newark Intl. and will be heading back on the same day at 8:40 PM. As it is a Sunday and the flights I have booked leave rather early in the morning or in the later evening and don't go near JFK, I was hoping to avoid most of the chaos. We will not be taking luggage since it is just a day-trip and we will check in for the return flight as soon as we land in Newark.

How much time do you reckon we will need to be at the respective airports before flights? Will one hour be enough? - Probably not but one can hope.

 

[Mayfriday0529]

If you go to Newark airport, where are you going to stay? traffic is hell, it took me 3 hours to get to Newark once and several other times 2 hours on stop and go traffic coming from long island and going through staten island.

 

[thraxes]

It's justa a day trip to NYC, we will be using the trains to get to Midtown Manhattan and don't forget - it is on a Sunday and traffic is way better then than during the week.

 

[blackdogdeek]

you should check the buses to the port authority as well. i think olympia has a shuttle for $10(that might be each way). i only suggest this because i've heard the air train is a pain is the ass.

what airline are you taking? i flew ewr to iad a few weeks ago for $227 round trip on independence air.

the times you indicate shouldn't have a lot of traffic, especially since you'll be headed outbound, i would think. i would still shoot to get there around 1.5 hrs ahead just in case.

 

[thraxes]

Yeah, the bus is also under consideration but we wanted to leave the final decision until we got some local intelligence of the traffic situation on the Sunday morning/evening before x-mas...

I got 4 tickets Dulles - Newark - Dulles for 100$ a head, also on Indy-Air... pretty sweet deal if you ask me, one of the reasons why we took it.

 

[Mayfriday0529]

Originally posted by: thraxes
It's justa a day trip to NYC, we will be using the trains to get to Midtown Manhattan and don't forget - it is on a Sunday and traffic is way better then than during the week.

taking a guess it will probably take you about 45 minutes to get from NYC by train to newark given that you want to be at the airport at least an hour before a domestic flight i saw give yourself two hours.

 

[thraxes]

Jnetty: That is 100% our planned schedule, I just wanted to know how busy the airport in general will be (security) and if the road traffic is OK enough to use the Port Authority Bus instead of the trains (would be cheaper).

According to the Bus schedule it takes 50 minutes to get from EWR to Penn Station via Bus.

 

[Mayfriday0529]

security will be like Washington National airport, i never been to Dulles so i can compare it to National.
Traffic really depends on the time since you leaving on sunday and at night i would not expect very much traffic around the airport. although getting out of the city by bus, there wil always be traffic, specially during holiday season.