Where to Stay in Brooklyn

Staying in Brooklyn is the standard advice for a second trip to New York and increasingly a reasonable one for a first. Hotel rates are materially lower, the food is better, and you get to end the day somewhere people live rather than in an office district.

The catch is geography. Brooklyn’s subway lines almost all run north–south toward Manhattan and barely connect to each other, so the right neighbourhood depends on which lines serve it and where you are going.

Downtown Brooklyn and Brooklyn Heights

The practical choice. Downtown Brooklyn is a major transport interchange — the A, C, F, R, 2, 3, 4, 5, B, Q and N all pass through within a few blocks — and it is one or two stops from Lower Manhattan and about fifteen minutes from Midtown.

Rates are typically well below the equivalent Manhattan hotel and the room sizes are better.

Brooklyn Heights next door is America’s first designated historic district: brownstones from the 1820s on quiet leafy streets, with the Promenade cantilevered over the expressway giving the best framed view of Lower Manhattan anywhere. It is beautiful, it is residential, and the hotel supply is small.

Downside: Downtown Brooklyn itself is a somewhat charmless mix of office towers, a shopping street and new residential blocks. You are staying for the location.

DUMBO

The prettiest and the priciest. Cobbled streets, converted warehouses, Brooklyn Bridge Park on the doorstep, and the ferry to Manhattan.

Small, expensive and genuinely lovely. The F at York Street and the A/C at High Street both serve it, and the NYC Ferry from Wall Street is the nicer way across.

Williamsburg

The best food and nightlife, the worst fit for a Midtown itinerary.

One stop on the L from 14th Street, which is four minutes under the river — but the L only connects to 14th Street, so anything uptown means a change. The ferry from Wall Street or East 34th Street is the pleasanter route.

What you get: the best restaurant and bar density of any of these options, Domino Park with the skyline view, live music venues, and Smorgasburg on summer Saturdays.

What you give up: convenience for the Upper East and West Sides, and quiet — the main streets are loud from Thursday to Sunday.

Park Slope and Prospect Heights

The family option. Brownstone streets, Prospect Park on the edge, the Brooklyn Museum and Botanic Garden nearby, and a farmers’ market at Grand Army Plaza on Saturdays.

The 2/3 and B/Q get you to Midtown in about thirty-five minutes. Hotel supply is thin; most visitors here are in short-term lets, which are heavily restricted.

Calm, green and genuinely pleasant, and further out than the others.

Getting to Manhattan

Subway is the default and the journey times above are realistic outside rush hour.

NYC Ferry runs from DUMBO, Williamsburg, Greenpoint and Red Hook to Wall Street and Midtown, at slightly more than a subway fare. It is slower and much nicer.

Walking over the Brooklyn Bridge from DUMBO or Brooklyn Heights takes about half an hour into Lower Manhattan, and it is a genuinely good commute for the first two days.

Practical

Short-term lets under thirty days are largely illegal in New York City under Local Law 18 unless the host is registered and present. This bites hardest in Brooklyn, where the supply used to be. Listings do get removed after booking.

Weekend subway service changes more in Brooklyn than in Manhattan, because the outer sections are where the maintenance happens. Check an app before every weekend journey.

Late at night the subway from Manhattan runs all night but less frequently — waits of fifteen to twenty minutes after 1am are normal.