There is a version of New York that most visitors never see, and it happens between the second week of January and the end of February. The Christmas crowds have gone, the summer ones have not arrived, hotel rates fall by half, and the city goes back to being a place where eight million people live rather than a stage set.
It is also cold, frequently grey, and occasionally miserable. Both things are true. If you can handle the weather, it is the best-value trip of the year and arguably the most interesting one.
What the cold is actually like
Daytime highs around 3 to 5°C in January and February, dropping below freezing at night. That is not extreme by northern European or Canadian standards, and it is not the temperature that catches people out — it is the wind.
The avenues run north–south between tall buildings and funnel wind straight down them. Walking twenty blocks up Sixth Avenue in a January north-westerly is a different proposition from the same walk in still air at the same temperature. Crosstown streets are noticeably more sheltered.
Snow falls a few times a season. A fresh snowfall in Central Park is one of the great sights in the city and lasts about a day before the streets turn to grey slush and the crossings become ankle-deep meltwater lakes. Waterproof boots, not fashionable ones.
What you get for it
Hotel rates. The single biggest saving. A Midtown room that costs three hundred dollars in October is frequently half that in the second half of January. This is not a trick or a bad-location discount; it is the same room in a genuinely quiet period.
Empty museums. The Met on a Tuesday in February is a different building from the Met in July — you can stand in front of a Vermeer on your own. MoMA, the Frick and the Guggenheim are all better in winter.
Restaurant tables. Places that require a month’s notice in October will seat you on the night. Restaurant Week in late January and early February puts set menus at a couple of hundred good restaurants at a fixed low price, and it is the single best way to eat above your budget in New York.
Broadway. January and February are the softest weeks of the theatre year. Lotteries are easier to win, TKTS has better stock, and rush tickets are actually available.
Observation decks without queues, and the air is at its clearest in winter — visibility from Top of the Rock on a cold, dry day is far better than on a humid August afternoon.
What is different
The ice rinks. Bryant Park’s Winter Village rink is free to skate if you bring your own skates, and it is the only free one in Manhattan. Rockefeller Center’s is small and expensive and famous. Prospect Park’s LeFrak Center and Wollman Rink in Central Park are both better skates.
Winter Village and Union Square Holiday Market run from late October or November into early January.
The High Line is genuinely good in winter. The planting was designed by Piet Oudolf to hold its structure through the cold, and the seed heads and grasses under frost look better than they do in flower, with a fraction of the crowd.
The waterfront — Brooklyn Bridge Park, the Staten Island Ferry, the Brooklyn Heights Promenade — is cold and clear and empty. The ferry in January, with the harbour half-frozen, is a serious experience. Dress for it; the wind on the deck is brutal.
Chinese New Year falls in late January or February and Manhattan’s Chinatown and Flushing both hold parades and firecracker ceremonies.
The indoor city
New York is well set up for weather. A winter day plan that works: a big museum in the morning, Grand Central and the New York Public Library at lunchtime, the underground concourses at Rockefeller Center or the Oculus to get between places without going outside, and a long dinner.
The Tenement Museum, the Intrepid — though the flight deck is exposed and freezing — the Natural History Museum and the Brooklyn Museum will all absorb a whole day.
What to wear
A proper insulated coat, not a fashion one. A hat, because the wind. Gloves. Waterproof boots with grip, because the crossings flood and refreeze. Layers, because every interior in New York is heated to about 24°C and you will be taking things off constantly.
The subway platforms are cold; the trains are hot. This is the reverse of summer and equally uncomfortable.
What to avoid
New Year’s Eve in Times Square, which means being penned into a barricaded block from early afternoon in the cold with no toilets and no re-entry.
The week before Christmas, when Midtown is at maximum crowding and maximum price.
Mid-March, which is the genuinely bad month — cold without being wintry, grey, wet, and with none of January’s compensations.