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Princess Airport Transfer from Red Hook to La Guardia


Sophie's Mom1
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We are cruising on the Regal (first time on Princess) in September. We have a return flight booked for 12 noon....to Toronto, so I'm assuming we have to be at the airport 3 hours ahead. The ship docks at 6 am but I'm reading some horror stories about late arrivals, heavy traffic etc. We will try to get off with the earliest group disembarking and carry our own luggage. Would we be better off taking a taxi, car service or the Princess transfer from Brooklyn to La Guardia? Is a 12 pm flight pushing it?

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The Princess flight guidelines for New York City are:

 

Disembarking Passengers

For voyages arriving in New York City at 5:00 and/or 7:15 am, the earliest flight departures are as follows:

  • LaGuardia: 1:15 pm for international flights, 12:15 pm for domestic flights
  • John F. Kennedy: 2:15 pm for international flights, 1:15 pm for domestic flights
  • Newark: 2:15 pm for international flights, 1:15 pm for domestic flights

http://www.princess.com/learn/faq_answer/pre_cruise/travel.jsp

 

Because your flight is 75 minutes earlier than what they recommend Princess will most likely not sell you their transfer. But by walking off the ship with your luggage you will be ready to leave at least an hour before the transfer would have so you should still make your flight. Most car services in NYC require you to call them when your are ready, though their response is generally quicker than the length of the taxi queue. But if one of the first off a taxi should still be fine.

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Speaking in part as a retired airline employee, flights from the U.S. to Canada are more like domestic flights than international flights. I don't know of any airline wanting you to check-in three hours in advance for a U.S. to Canada flight - an hour will be fine on most airlines.

 

Princess guidelines are somewhat of a worst case guideline. Last year, we were on a Princess Brooklyn arrival (on a Thursday, far worse than your Saturday. As we had originally planned to fly from EWR and changed to LGA for our employee standby travel just a couple of days before the end of the cruise, they put us in the last LGA shuttle group - I think it was about 10:00 that the bus left the pier. Despite that, we were at LGA (I think well within and hour), checked in, time for a visit to the club (yes, as employees we pay full price for club membership), and out to the gate in plenty of time for a 12:30 flight. Had we been in an earlier shuttle group, we would have had a couple of hours to kill.

 

Lie to Princess about your flight. Find a 12:15 domestic flight and put that down as your flight. They have no way of checking (they ask for the reservation record locator but I just leave it blank since I don't have it at the time I enter the information as for employee standby travel, there is no reason to create the standby listing any earlier than a couple of days in advance). All those reports of mass congestion at LGA are from when construction had just started. Things have been worked out and I have heard no recent reports of there being major problems.

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Try calling Dial 7 Car Service. Having experience with traffic in that route, you can ask them what is the latest time they need to pick you up in Red Hook to be able to make it to your flight at LGA. You can then check if you can make it out the terminal building for their specified time.

 

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I phoned Dial 7 car service and yes, it sounds like our best option. The cost is a bit less than the Princess transfer but more importantly, we can regulate the timing. They told me to reserve ahead with our details, then phone them once we are off the ship. They will arrive within 30 minutes and it's approximately a one hour ride to La Guardia depending on construction etc. Reviews look good so it sounds like we will arrive at the airport in plenty of time. That's good advice...we shouldn't consider a U.S. to Canada flight as being international.

Thank you all very much for your recommendations, you've been very helpful!

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LaGuardia is in the middle of a multi million dollar upgrade so I too have heard the stories of people abandoning cabs and walking down the side of the off ramp area. There is a thread on CC about the traffic and upgrade process at LaGuardia. But since you have your flight already booked it might be better to do as the others suggested and carry off own luggage or do a taxi/uber. You can lie to princess (as we did for our upcoming cruise) but it depends on how comfortable you feel. Ours is only a 15 min difference...and on another flight from LAX to Canada we were told by the airport that we needed to be there 3 hours in advance as it was international......I always air on the side of caution and do as TSA and airport ask as you just never know how long it will take to get through normal security. We have been through LaGuardia and it was a madhouse the day we were there and there was no construction going on.

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We were on the Regal last October and used the Princess transfer to LGA. Being a native NYer, was concerned about delays as well. It did seem to take forever to get off the ship, wait for our bus to fill up and the drivers were chatting outside appearing to not be in a hurry -- made us crazy!!! Anyway, if I had a flight in your time frame, I too would look into a car service. Few things more stressful than cutting it close to make a flight. Not the way to end your cruise!

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...and on another flight from LAX to Canada we were told by the airport that we needed to be there 3 hours in advance as it was international

 

I'll put my retired airline employee hat on again and say if you really mean you were told by the airport as opposed to told by the airline, then its' meaningless. Airport authorities love to say stuff like that but it's meaningless as here in the U.S., airports don't set airline policies nor do they have any staff to enforce any of the stuff they say. But usually being government bodies, they want to feel important to they say all this stuff that's completely meaningless and is at best, for this situation the worst of the recommended times of all carriers. The airport is just the landlord. If you were going to some other business, do you listen to the business's staff or the landlord (building owner)?

 

 

One reason foreign carriers say things like three hours* is to spread the workload. They don't want to staff to process the entire passenger load of their one flight a day at (to them) a small foreign station in 30 minutes so they tell you to arrive 3 hours early so they can spread the workload over two hours. They think it's better to have you wait in line than adequately staff. If you show up three hours before departure, you're likely to be in line for 90 minutes to two hours and you think "yup, needed to be there three hours early". And if you show up 75 minutes before departure, the line has largely been worked off and you wait is five to 15 minutes.

 

 

For the airline I used to work for, with the exception of some very specific overseas destinations, there is very little difference between how domestic and international departures are handled other than document checks. The TSA process will be the same - TSA pays no attention to what your destination is. And once you're past TSA, all that's left to do is board.

 

 

* A recent flight had typical media saying, for some reason, airport officials recommend arrive three hours early (even for domestic). I had a 6:00am flight and can assure you there would be no one there to check you-in at 3:00am. I left home at my usual 4:00am, parked off-site, and still had plenty of time to get breakfast in the club before going to the gate (no checked bags and TSA Pre-Check).

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I'll put my retired airline employee hat on again and say if you really mean you were told by the airport as opposed to told by the airline, then its' meaningless. Airport authorities love to say stuff like that but it's meaningless as here in the U.S., airports don't set airline policies nor do they have any staff to enforce any of the stuff they say. But usually being government bodies, they want to feel important to they say all this stuff that's completely meaningless and is at best, for this situation the worst of the recommended times of all carriers. The airport is just the landlord. If you were going to some other business, do you listen to the business's staff or the landlord (building owner)?

 

 

One reason foreign carriers say things like three hours* is to spread the workload. They don't want to staff to process the entire passenger load of their one flight a day at (to them) a small foreign station in 30 minutes so they tell you to arrive 3 hours early so they can spread the workload over two hours. They think it's better to have you wait in line than adequately staff. If you show up three hours before departure, you're likely to be in line for 90 minutes to two hours and you think "yup, needed to be there three hours early". And if you show up 75 minutes before departure, the line has largely been worked off and you wait is five to 15 minutes.

 

 

For the airline I used to work for, with the exception of some very specific overseas destinations, there is very little difference between how domestic and international departures are handled other than document checks. The TSA process will be the same - TSA pays no attention to what your destination is. And once you're past TSA, all that's left to do is board.

 

 

* A recent flight had typical media saying, for some reason, airport officials recommend arrive three hours early (even for domestic). I had a 6:00am flight and can assure you there would be no one there to check you-in at 3:00am. I left home at my usual 4:00am, parked off-site, and still had plenty of time to get breakfast in the club before going to the gate (no checked bags and TSA Pre-Check).

 

Ok sorry I was not more specific I meant I called Air Canada desk located at LAX and they told me we need to be there 3 hours ahead of time. Plus I have had domestic flights where I fly through TSA others where it seems everyone is at lunch...I personally don't want to stress on vacay if I don't have to...I would rather cool my heels at the gate reading and eating a snack vs worried while standing in line if I will make my flight cause I cut it too close...but everyone is different.

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