Rush-hour commute via GWB (Tenafly, Edgewater: schools, living, bus)

[Margandella]

My husband and I are planning to relocate our family to a place with great schools. Tenafly is one of those options, but am concerned about my commute time to and from work. I would need to drive to the Bronx around 8am and come back after 5. GWB is infamous for its traffic, but how long does it really take to cross the bridge during rush hour? Is it better to take the lower or upper level?

I would probably take side streets to get as close to the bridge as possible and then side streets in the Bronx and hope that would save me some time.

[curlyloca]

The GWB is my ultimate nightmare. I used to commute to LI and the GWB took up most of my time. I would try to leave early, during rush hour, after 10. There's no secret formula. It just has to do with luck. Good luck to you! Make sure you have a great playlist on the iPod!

[ALackOfCreativity]

Originally Posted by curlyloca

There's no secret formula. It just has to do with luck.

Not at all. This is true if you're coming in from the west (dunno how approaching from south works since I've never had a reason to do so), but, take local roads or the palisades and you've just dodged the vast bulk of the traffic before the span most of the time. Still an element of luck, but, certain approaches are far better than others.

edit: to more concretely answer your question OP, getting to the bridge from Tenafly, or any of the other towns in northeast Bergen county, is fairly quick. How traffic would be once in the Bronx is outside of my knowledge base. I've done that trip, but, not during normal commuting hours.

edit 2: For upper/lower, figure out which is marginally better considering your destination and then listen to the radio and adjust accordingly. I generally prefer upper but this might be force of habit as much as anything else.

edit 3: If you can afford a Westchester town (you get less bang for your buck in terms of schools there) and your work is near a metro north stop in the bronx, do it, the metro north system is really, really nice.

[babo111]

Originally Posted by Margandella

My husband and I are planning to relocate our family to a place with great schools. Tenafly is one of those options, but am concerned about my commute time to and from work. I would need to drive to the Bronx around 8am and come back after 5. GWB is infamous for its traffic, but how long does it really take to cross the bridge during rush hour? Is it better to take the lower or upper level?

I would probably take side streets to get as close to the bridge as possible and then side streets in the Bronx and hope that would save me some time.

It's going to suck, guaranteed regardless of upper or lower level. I used to work in Parsippany and lived in Edgewater for 3+ years so I was doing plenty of reverse commute so while I personally saw so many days where traffic just was horrible. Also I've done that commute for very brief time (going into NYC by car during rush hour) so all my comments are from personal daily experience.

First biggest issue is actually getting onto the bridge sometimes and second biggest issue is once you get to other side. Cross Bronx is also notorious for morning commute. If possible, flexhour could save you huge chunk of traffic.

Sometimes traffic is completely hit or miss. There will be random days when there is no traffic what so ever....one of the worst days is during long holiday weekends and when yankee game traffic really backs up.

That said, living close to GW bridge so you can have short drive to get on the bridge and satellite radio like sirius/xm for nyc traffic can save you ton of time. For example, when nyc traffic on sirius says GW traffic is 2 hour + cuz of accident or what not. You can take alternate route if possible. If not...well at least you won't be surprised or maybe even take a detour for couple hours doing errands before coming home.

Good luck.

[Margandella]

Figuring out how long my work commute would take is one of the most important factors in deciding whether we want to move to NJ or not. I used to spend 2.5 hours every day driving to & from my old job on LI and I promised to myself I would keep my commute time at 45 min or less.
According to Traffic.com, I should be at work within 20-25 minutes (!!!) Even I know that's unrealistic.

I can't be too flexible with my work hours because I will need to drop off and pick up my kids from school few times a week.
Cross Bronx is out of the question. I can see cars and trucks barely moving when I pass it every day. I count on figuring out my way through side streets.

Bobo111, do you remember how long on average it took you to just cross the river from NJ to NYC?

[babo111]

Originally Posted by Margandella

Bobo111, do you remember how long on average it took you to just cross the river from NJ to NYC?

If I had to pick a number, I'd go with 20min as average estimate just to cross the bridge. Reason is sometimes it'll be very quick and take you like 5m to cross, sometimes when cross island, is jammed, or accident it'll take like 30-40m.

Is public transportation out of question for where you work? I think if you take one of the gypsy bus across, you can get dropped right across the bridge nearby A station.

[Margandella]

Thank you for all responses.
Babo111, I work close to Whitestone. I could probably take a city bus from the GWB station, but I think it would take me much longer to get to work that way.
It seems that my average commute would be around 1 hour... Not sure if it's worth moving to NJ.