New York’s Airports Come In Last for Mass-Transit Accessibility

If you’ve ever endured the long ride to any of the area’s airports, all the while lugging your suitcase and anxiously wondering if you’d miss your flight, then this statistic probably comes as no surprise. According to a study by the Global Gateway Alliance, “John F. Kennedy and LaGuardia airports rank last and third-to-last, respectively, in mass-transit accessibility compared with 30 of the world’s busiest airports,” reports Crain’s. The analysis looked at total travel time for public transit users, mode of transportation and number of transfers and cost, scoring them from 0 to 100. And if Anthony Weiner is correct, the new LaGuardia AirTrain will only increase travel times–not good news those for us who prefer not to sit in insane taxi traffic or fork over $99 for a private helicopter ride.

The existing air train via cc

Spain’s Madrid-Barajas airport came in first, with a score of 95 out of 100. From the city’s center it takes only 16 minutes, with no transfers, to get to the airport. Amsterdam, Dubai, and Frankfurt tied for second place. On the other side of the spectrum, JFK tied with Denver for last place, both with only 30 points. It takes 47 minutes and at least one transfer to get to JFK. LaGuardia and Newark, tied for third-to-last place with Los Angeles International, Istanbul Atatürk, South Korea’s Incheon and Soekarno–Hatta in Jakarta, Indonesia, did slightly better with 40 points. LaGuardia is the only airport that requires a two-seat ride that includes a bus; it was also notoriously referred to by Vice President Joe Biden, as a “Third World facility.”

The study comes shortly after Governor Cuomo’s announced commitment to upgrading and modernizing the region’s airports, as well as his announcement last fall of a design competition for ideas to improve LaGuardia, JFK, the Hudson Valley’s Stewart International Airport, and Long Island’s Republic Airport. Joe Sitt, a real estate developer who created the Global Gateway Alliance to advocate for improvements to the area’s airports, said: “The billions being invested in modernizing our airports simply won’t pay off without 21st-century transit access to move passengers to and from these hubs, and that ultimately means a one-seat ride.”

You can see the full Global Gateway Alliance report here:

[Via Crain’s]

[Related: New LaGuardia AirTrain Will Actually Increase Travel Times, Anthony Weiner Weighs In]

[Related: This Map Shows the Holiday Craziness of NYC Airport Taxi Trips]