This week, in City, we are featuring our Ultimate Guide to the City. We want to help those of you who are new to New York (as well as those who have been basking in the sun and drinking margaritas for too long this summer) get (re)aquainted with the basics of living in New York. On Tuesday we will present Food and Getting Around, on Wednesday, Things to See, on Thursday, Online Resources, and on Friday, Nightlife.

If, on your first day of class, you tried to walk from Hayden to Silver and found yourself in Staten Island, perhaps it is time to touch up on navigating New York. The city is a tough place to traverse, but it’s probably not as hard as you think to get where you want to go without spending all your clubbing money on a cab.

General Geography

• New York has five boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, and the Bronx.
• Most of Manhattan is generally organized as a grid. It’s important to remember that avenues run north and south, and streets run east and west. Street numbers increase as you go north, and avenue numbers increase as you go west.
• Heading “uptown” means going north of where you are, and heading “downtown” means going south. They also mean the general northern and southern areas of Manhattan.

Subway

• Hopstop.com. Hopstop.com. Hopstop.com. This will be your best resource for figuring out the most efficient way to get anywhere in the city, whether by walking, taking the bus or taxi, or a combination of all of those. It even tells you, approximately, how much money you’d pay for a cab from Point A to B.
• The closest subway stations to Washington Square are West 4^th (6^th Avenue and West 4^th St) and Union Square, located in Union Square (around Broadway and 14^th St). Together, these stations cover most of the subway lines in the city.
• Unless you take the subway every day, it’s usually not worth it to buy an unlimited Metrocard. Do, however, buy a $20 or $40 card, as you’ll certainly use it up, and you get a bonus ride or two.
• Make sure you know if you’re going uptown or downtown.
• Express trains only go to certain stops – know if your stop is one of them. Local trains stop at every stop.
• You can get a free subway map at any station.

Bus

• For students, NYU has a free bus service that travels from far away dorms to campus and back. Unfortunately, the word is that it is not very consistent, and is often crowded. But hey, it’s free.
• There are a lot of public buses in the city that go both crosstown (east and west) and up and down the avenues. Generally, though, it’s more convenient to take the subway, and the fare costs the same ($2).

Taxi

•  Sometimes, it’s thunderstorming and you’re carrying 40 lbs of shopping bags in stilettos. Take a cab. They’re also pretty convenient, and not too expensive if you split the fare with friends. Remember to tip.

Leaving the City

• If you’re headed to Boston, Washington DC or Philadephia, you must take the Bolt Bus. If you buy the tickets early enough, you can get them as cheap as $1, and they don’t go for more than around $20 (one way). They also, miraculously, have more leg space than other buses, and most gloriously of all, have wireless internet.
• If you’re going somewhere else besides those three cities, or if you like to unnecessarily spend more money on worse things, there are a few other bus services available. The Peter Pan Bus is pretty good, and the Chinatown Bus is notoriously inexpensive (though still not as cheap as the Bolt Bus). Be warned, however – on the Chinatown Buses, you’re far greater chance of flipping over, catching fire, or running over old ladies.
• There are many services that go to and from JFK, LaGuardia, and Newark airports.