By Elisabeth Greenberg

Few prospects are more appealing to a tri-state sheltered, suburban youth than spending one’s college years in the opposite environment: New York City. However, not all students can afford to live in Manhattan due to the high price tag that many city residences hold. Such students have found compromise of sorts, balancing a city education with living at home, even if it means enduring a long daily commute.

“Before I began my academic career in Baruch, I had only been to New York City a handful of times,” said Jung Min Park, 19, a Baruch College freshman who makes his way to school from Hicksville everyday.

“Coming to school in [the city] has been one of the best decisions made in my life,” he said.

For Park, a daily two hours of commuting is a small price to pay to attend college in Manhattan, and he’s not alone. Thousands of students commute to Baruch College on a daily basis, as well as other schools around the city.

“I wanted to be independent and what not so I decided on a school close to ballet in the city,” said Sara Dowd, 22, a Baruch College senior who spent her late teenage years as a professional ballerina in New York City.

“I actually ended up loving it eventually, so even after I retired from dancing, I stayed.”

Dowd currently resides in Astoria, Queens and enjoys a fairly smooth daily commute to school. However for the majority of her professional career, spanning over two years, she commuted on a daily basis from Holbrook, Long Island into Manhattan on the Long Island Railroad (LIRR).

“I hated the LIRR so much. Sometimes I would literally drive, because I had a car too,” she said.

According to Dowd, sometimes even the tiresome process of trying to find reasonably-priced parking in the city, if any at all, was more appealing than stepping foot on an LIRR train.

“I would drive myself to the train and there were days where I’d park and like look at the train and then be like ‘I can’t get on that thing,’ and then just turn around and not go to ballet that day.”

Operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the LIRR is North America’s busiest commuter railroad. According to its website, an average of 301,000 commuters riding 735 trains on a daily basis have awarded the LIRR such a status.

Simply put, “The LIRR gets you from point A to point B,” said Ramneet Sachdev, 23, who makes a daily commute from her home in Jericho, Long Island to class.

“Comfortable, above ground so you have phone service, quiet, usually always have a seat, bathrooms on trains,” said Sachdev. According to the New York University graduate student, the typical ride is long but decent.

Although operated by the MTA, the LIRR almost solely serves clientele headed to or from Long Island.

Sachdev associates many of the LIRR’s challenges with the fact that it is almost entirely above ground. Although she enjoys the cell phone service the ride affords her, LIRR routes seem to be hit particularly hard by natural forces, including Hurricane Sandy.

“Older trains often have signal problems that create delays. Also if one train gets derailed or hits a pedestrian or just runs late, the next few hours are guaranteed to be full of delays for that rail line or multiple if trains need to reroute,” she said.

Sachdev says that for a commuter student dealing with a strict class schedule, any minor hitch in daily travel can result in being extremely late to class.

Operating on a zone-based fare system, the unreliable ride can be a pricy one and recent MTA fare hikes did not provide student commuter wallets any comfort.

Sachdev, for example, pays $276 for her monthly pass. Since her stop lies in zone seven, dead center for the line, she estimates commuters farther down the line pay far more.

“You can assume some monthly passes are $400-plus for places like Stony Brook and more east locations,” said Sachdev. Such drain on one’s wallet is particularly burdensome when operating on a strict student budget.

Park lives in the same zone as Sachdev and affirms her price tag complaints, “It used to be $245 only a few months back, and I still found it to be ridiculous then,” he said.

Park and Sachdev share another fare criticism: no student discounts. The recent fare changes add an 8 to 9 percent hike onto what are already some fairly heftily priced tickets adding more wallet strain into the lives of penny-counting students. A zone 14 monthly pass now clocks in at $466.00.

“The New Jersey Transit offers student discounts, but the MTA doesn’t even budge,” said Park.

“High school students can get a monthly pass for about 40 percent cheaper but what high schooler actually commutes to Manhattan?” echoed Sachdev.

While the ride does not necessarily feel like it is worth hundreds of dollars a month, there are pros to the LIRR in comparison to other MTA subsidiaries.

“The environment is a lot safer than the subway. I’ve been on the LIRR at odd times like 3 a.m. – the LIRR never closes – and it’s fine,” said Sachdev.

“[And] the LIRR is loads cleaner than the subway.”

The LIRR has a unique alcohol policy from much of the rest of the MTA, allowing riders to drink on the train with the exception of on overnight weekend trains and platforms. While this concept may be appealing to the sporadic rider, regulars are not quite as enthused by the loose guidelines.

“I remember St. Patrick’s Day people were just literally throwing up in the aisles,” said Dowd. She is sympathetic to commuter drinkers however, “I think it’s just people hate the train and just want to drink it away sometimes, so they do that.”

Sachdev agrees that holidays are not ideal days on the train for the average commuter.

“Avoid the LIRR on St Patrick’s Day, Cinco de Mayo and on game days,” warned Sachdev. “MSG crowd are always annoying because people who take the train for hockey [or] basketball games aren’t usually commuters and don’t know commute etiquette.”

In comparison to alternative commute forms, many students appear to prefer the service offered by the LIRR.

“Driving can take me less time than the LIRR but usually I hit traffic [and] gas and parking are expensive,” said Sachdev, who also expressed irritation at the prospect of relying on others for a carpool. She has tried it in the past but her carpool buddy “never woke up in time.”

Park appreciates that on the train he is able to make use of his commute. “On the train, I am able to read and send emails, so I can be efficient with my time,” he said.

However, he notes, “I would gladly trade [for] a shorter commute.”

“I didn’t drive because driving in the city was really scary to me so I mean I couldn’t really parallel park all that well so it was just not an option,” said Dowd. She admits that she generally did not end up utilizing her commute as productively as she could have.

“If I had the energy I’d try to do school work but I think I’d mostly just listen to music and not really do a whole lot,” she said.

“Bratty Long Island kids get really annoying during winter and summer breaks,” said Sachdev, “but I’d rather be aboveground any day.”