In reply to my previous post, Park Avenue South and then Park Avenue proper is the least unpleasant option. It’s only two lanes below 42nd, which is probably the biggest determinant of comfort. I go left at 42nd and up Vanderbilt Avenue, then right at 46th and back onto Park. This section is wider, but there’s so many cars pulling up to the curve and turning that nobody really has an opportunity to pick up a lot of speed like on a wider, staggered-light street. They should put a bike line along the median and get rid of one lane of traffic. I also rode all the way cross town to the Hudson path on a different trip; this was slow and unpleasant and added 5-10 minutes to my ride, which is a big percentage increase.
I have an excellent downtown route. Yesterday I made it to 25th & Lex from my house on the Upper West Side in 19 minutes, stopping only a handful of times. I go down Columbus Avenue to 77th Street, where I make a left and get into the park. I then take 7th Avenue south through Times Square (shitty, but I want to stay near Broadway. It’s really not so bad: it takes maybe 3 minutes to get through) — it would be awesome to go from 59th to Times Square on Broadway instead, but note that you’ll have to avoid the pedestrian plaza by getting on 7th at 46th or 45th. At 42nd, I go left and get back on Broadway. Then at Herald’s Square, I go down the extended sidewalk on 6th, cross 34th on the east side of the street and then ride in the gutter against 6th avenue traffic to get back on Broadway. Then it’s smooth sailing again down to 26th, where I make a left, go to Lex, make a right, and done!
The beautiful part of this route is that at no point are you really being overtaken by cars. The Columbus Avenue section is downhill, so I can keep a pretty good pace. The 7th Avenue section has proven quite empty (since 7th starts below the park!), so most of the time I have the road all to myself. Broadway is shunned like the plague these days and has a separated bike line – you have to be more wary of pedestrians walking wherever they damn well please.
