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I'm graduating college and starting work in New York in July, and am trying to narrow down my search process right now.
People are telling me to look for a rent multiplier of 40x to 50x - so with an income of 53k I'd be looking at paying $1000 - $1250 a month for rent. Is that about right? Ideally I would like to live with a roommate or two, although it seems like all the people I know moving to New York are on a different level of pay...
I'm going to be working in the Financial District. Based purely on Google Maps, it seems like the most reasonable neighborhoods to be looking would be somewhere in Brooklyn? I'm planning on heading over during Spring Break and getting a feel for the city and different neighborhoods; what might be good places to check out? I would be extremely happy if there was a chance of commuting to work via bicycle. While working downtown in Chicago I'd bike to and from work along the lake, and it was just splendid.
Less than 40 minutes. I take either the Manhattan or Williamsburg bridges. The community board recently decided to add more bike lanes, coming this summer, I believe.
Interesting. How is New York for cycling? Are there plenty of bike lanes, or more restricted to main conduits? Is cycling regularly a recipe for getting doored or are people generally respectful?
Added an article above specifically on Ridgewood adding bike lanes this summer to connect it to the already existing bike lanes in Brooklyn.
You have to be careful and trust no one, whether automobile, pedestrian or even fellow biker. In general, people are not respectful in NYC. You do have to keep an eye out for parked cars opening doors, potholes, etc...
I bike from Sunnyside Queens to the Financial District on decent weather days (I'm a fair weather biker) and it takes me roughly 45 minutes. I'm just starting out though so I know that by the end of this year I'll be able to cut my time down by a lot. The bridges are horrible for me.
There are "Bike lanes" all over the city. I put bike lanes in quotations because as it may be a bike lane, if you do a search online of NYC Bike lane video you'll find many results of blogs posting all of the disruptions that happen in the bike lane. Especially with the rollout of CitiBike, the acknowledgement that bikers are on the streets went up by about 1%, so you still have to ride like everyone is out to kill you. I used to ride a motorcycle in Michigan before I moved here and using that same mindset has worked well for me here.
If you do find a place in Queens, there is a path along the East River in Manhattan that you can take downtown which would give you the roughly the same commute that you had in Chicago. It isn't the fastest but it's the most 'scenic'.
For a budget of 1000-1250 a month I would definitely recommend getting into a roommate situation as you'll be able to have more money to spend on the fun things that young person like yourself would like to do instead of paying all your money on rent and utilities.
For a quicker commute there are lots of places in Brooklyn that you could look at that won't break the bank with roommates.
Thanks a lot for the biking information folks. That East River path looks pretty nice!
How well do they maintain the roads when the weather goes foul? I tend to give up on biking during the winter months just because the slush/ice on the side of the street is just a disaster. If you don't have a bike lane, do you usually ride the shoulder or take the center of the lane for safety?
I actually hate living alone, so I'm definitely going to try to get ahold of a roommate. Just gotta wait for more of my friends to get jobs...
EDIT: Also, what's the diversity in these neighborhoods like? I grew up in rural and suburban Illinois, and I would prefer not to go back to living in an ethnically homogenous area.
Last edited by ocamlmycaml; 03-17-2014 at 11:19 AM..
Also, what's the diversity in these neighborhoods like? I grew up in rural and suburban Illinois, and I would prefer not to go back to living in an ethnically homogenous area.
Ridgewood and Sunnyside are both very diverse.
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