One day in New York is not a holiday, it is a raid. The mistake almost everyone makes is trying to compress a three-day list into it, which produces a day of queueing, subway platforms and disappointment. The alternative is to accept that you will see roughly one-tenth of the famous things and spend the day actually looking at them.
Here is what fits, in a single walkable line, plus what to do if your day is bounded by a flight.
The one-line route
Everything below is within a strip you can walk end to end. There is one subway ride in it.
8:00 — Grand Central Terminal. Start with the commuter rush. The main concourse at eight in the morning is one of the great sights in America and it is free. Find the backwards zodiac ceiling, the dirty patch left uncleaned in the corner, and the whispering gallery on the ramp down to the Oyster Bar. Twenty minutes.
8:30 — the Chrysler Building. Five minutes east on 42nd. Walk into the lobby, look at the ceiling mural and the inlaid lift doors, and then walk back west a couple of blocks and look at the crown from a distance, which is the only place it works from.
9:00 — New York Public Library and Bryant Park. Free, both. Go up to the Rose Reading Room and sit down in it for five minutes; almost nobody realises they can. Coffee in the park.
10:00 — Fifth Avenue north. Rockefeller Center via the Channel Gardens, St Patrick’s Cathedral opposite, and the shop windows between.
10:45 — Top of the Rock. Book the first or second slot of the day. One observation deck is the correct number for one day, and this is the one, because the Empire State Building is in the view rather than under your feet. An hour including the queue.
12:15 — Central Park. Enter at Grand Army Plaza, 59th and Fifth. Walk the Pond, the Mall, and down the steps to Bethesda Terrace — look at the tiled ceiling under the arcade. Come out at 72nd Street. An hour and a half at a stroll.
14:00 — lunch. Anywhere on the Upper West Side around Columbus Avenue, or back down to Hell’s Kitchen if you want the better food.
15:00 — subway downtown. Take the 1 train from 66th Street to Rector Street, or the A/C to Fulton. About twenty-five minutes.
15:45 — 9/11 Memorial plaza. The plaza is free and takes half an hour. The museum takes two to three hours, and on a single day you do not have them. Choose the plaza and the Oculus next door.
16:45 — Wall Street and Trinity Church. Twenty minutes on foot: the Stock Exchange façade, Federal Hall, Hamilton’s grave in the churchyard, the Charging Bull at Bowling Green.
17:30 — Staten Island Ferry. Free, twenty-five minutes each way, past the Statue of Liberty, with the Lower Manhattan skyline pulling away behind you. If your timing lands near sunset, this becomes the best hour of the day. Stand on the right going out and the left coming back.
19:00 — dinner. Chinatown is a fifteen-minute walk or one stop on the subway, and it is the cheapest good food in Manhattan.
21:00 — Times Square, briefly. Twenty minutes after dark, on your way to wherever you are sleeping. It is worth seeing once and it is not worth more than that.
What you are giving up, and why
Museums. The Met needs two and a half hours minimum, MoMA needs two, and either would take a third of your day. On one day, skip them without guilt.
The Statue of Liberty. The ferry, the security queue and the two islands are four to five hours. The Staten Island Ferry gives you a real view of her for nothing in fifty minutes.
Brooklyn. Genuinely worth a day. It is not worth a rushed ninety minutes.
A second observation deck. They all show you the same city.
If your day is a layover
From JFK, allow ninety minutes each way door to door. AirTrain to Jamaica, then the LIRR to Penn Station, which is the fast option, or the E train from Sutphin Boulevard, which is slower and cheaper. Anything under an eight-hour layover is not worth leaving the airport for.
From LaGuardia, the Q70 bus to Jackson Heights and the E/F/M/R train gets you to Midtown in about forty-five minutes and is the quickest airport run in the city.
From Newark, AirTrain to Newark Liberty station and NJ Transit to Penn Station, about forty-five minutes.
Store your bags — there are staffed left-luggage services around Penn Station and Grand Central, and most hotels will hold luggage before check-in and after check-out without being asked twice.
Immigration on arrival is the wild card. If you are entering the United States on this trip, budget two hours from wheels down to being on a train, and more at JFK in the evening.
Practical
Tap in with a contactless card or phone; there is no ticket to buy.
Book the observation deck before you fly. It is the only reservation this day needs.
Ten miles of walking is a normal day here and this route is about that. If your shoes are new, choose a different pair.