<p>So I’m doing a visit trip out to Philadelphia in the near future. I’ve also decided to try and visit both Pittsburgh and Philadelphia on the same trip. However, I didn’t reserve a flight out to Pittsburgh since I was planning on renting a car. Now, which option would make the most sense financially, driving from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh, flying, or taking Amtrak? </p>
<p>I’m going for about a week so driving would not be so bad at all for me.</p>
<p>I am from central PA, midway between both cities. I would drive across the state if it were me, the PA Turnpike goes from one to the other. IMO, the Pittsburgh airport is nicer than Philly</p>
<p>If time is not a major issue, then driving is the least expensive. It’s not a difficult drive on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. You most likely will need a car for your college visits. Weekly rentals (pickup and return at the same city) are relatively inexpensive. Short haul flights, with short term rentals are typically expensive and often time consuming.</p>
<p>My daughter goes to school in Pittsburgh, and we live in NYC, so we’ve done the drive often. She’s both flown and taken Amtrak, depending on the weather. All are fine. You’ll have to check all the options financially.</p>
<p>The airport in Pittsburgh is very nice and modern, but it’s quite a bit west of the actual city. There is a city bus that will take you in, and it’s only $2.75 (the college kids ride free with their ID cards, very convenient). That takes about 45 minutes to an hour. Amtrak is good too. It lets you off downtown, and you can catch a city bus up to Pitt and CMU.</p>
<p>The drive is straight through on the turnpike, very scenic, with four tunnels under the mountains. Very rural: farms, cows, horses. I enjoy it. You’ll pay tolls, but EZpass is accepted.</p>
<p>Parking can be difficult around Pitt and CMU, and the nearby hotels charge about $17 a day for the garage. But it’s unlimited in and out, so it’s not terrible. Just watch the signs when you’re out and about, and you’ll be fine.</p>
<p>I agree that the Pittsburgh airport is more user friendly than Philadelphia’s, but if you’re planning to rent a car, you’ll likely have to pay for a one-way rental and experience both airports. (I doubt you would want to cross the state twice; it’s not a short drive.) In Pittsburgh, you don’t necessarily need a car if you’re only visiting Pitt and CMU. Same in Philadelphia if you’re only visiting Penn (or other city schools like Drexel and Temple). However, in the Philadelphia area, there are liberal arts colleges like Swarthmore, Haverford, Bryn Mawr, etc. that you may want to visit. A car would be recommended in that case.</p>
<p>I’m actually planning on renting a car anyway. I’ll be visiting Villanova, which I assume is quite a drive. However, I’ll mainly be visiting Pitt and some of the different neighborhoods in Pittsburgh, so I guess I can leave the car at some place and try the public transportation within the city.</p>
<p>Now, do the rental companies allow one-way rentals in Pennsylvania? I know here in California one can drop his/her car off at any outlet of the same company within the state. I was also thinking of doing one way flight into Philadelphia and out of Pittsburgh so thank you for that suggestion!</p>
<p>One question I do have for the Turnpike though; do I have to pay every time I get on and off the toll way? or do I just pay for the entire trip up front and if I need to get off to take a break I can re-enter without paying again?</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Actually, Villanova is very accessible by public transportation from the Philadelphia airport. And there are lots and lots of planes between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, with not so high fares. If you were otherwise going to rent a car only to see Villanova, you don’t have to do that, or you could do it and return it to the Philly airport and fly to Pittsburgh, and rent a car there or not. One-way drop-off fees tend to be pretty substantial.</p></li>
<li><p>Driving between Philly and Pittsburgh takes about 6-1/2 hours, and can be stressful if the weather’s bad, especially the western half. My wife goes to Pittsburgh regularly on business, and always flies if she can.</p></li>
<li><p>You would pay tolls whenever you got off the turnpike, although EZPass would make that invisible, and most rental cars have that now. There are also (gross) rest stops on the turnpike, with gas, toilets, convenience stores, and various fast-food outlets.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>One-way car rentals might be expensive in Pa. Make sure you double-check before you do it.</p>
<p>Here is the link to bus service in Pittsburgh. The bus from Pitt/CMU to the airport is pretty nice - it runs express for a large part of the trip and takes a little less than an hour. Driving in Pittsburgh is bewildering - lots of inclines and one-way streets in the Oakland neighborhood.
<a href=“http://www.portauthority.org/paac/[/url]”>http://www.portauthority.org/paac/</a></p>
<p>One-way rentals in the parts of the East coast I a familiar with are much more expensive than returning to the same location–and if you are under 25 you should also expect to be hit with a surcharge for being a young driver. (Not sure if they will even rent to people under 21.) I doubt PA is any different but check. That said, I think driving probably moos economical choice under most conditions. and certainly gives you the most flexibility of schedule.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t advise anyone to take Amtrak across Pennsylvania. I lived near Philly and took it a few times to get to/from Pittsburgh and the shortest it ever took was ~8 hours. You’d be much better off booking a flight ahead of time on Southwest and flying in to Pittsburgh, then taking the 28X to either Downtown or Oakland, depending on where you’d like to stay.</p>
<p>If you want to drive from Philly to Pittsburgh it’s a really easy ride. There’s rest stops every 50 miles or so, the gas isn’t really overpriced, and the drive is nice if it’s not your twentieth time doing it. If you’re from CA it’ll take about the same amount of time as LA to SF.</p>
<p>I’ve looked at one way rentals from Pittsburgh to outside of Philly and it was significantly more expensive, but I was also only looking at renting it for two or three days, so I imagine it impacted the price significantly.</p>
<p>Philadelphia to Pittsburgh airfares are usually $70-$120, plus or minus. It compares pretty favorably with renting a car for one person, especially if the one person is underage and can’t rent a car. Even for two people, renting a car isn’t that much cheaper, although that may depend on what kind of public transportation you use. Getting from the Philadelphia airport to Villanova on the train would cost about $12 @ each way and take 60-90 mins (including lots of chances to view awful neighborhoods from the train, along with glimpses of Center City Philadelphia). Using a limo service would cost about $30 @ or more each way and take about 30 mins, most of them on suburban superhighway.</p>
<p>And, yes, Amtrak would be a mistake. It works very well in the Boston-Washington Northeast Corridor, but it works a lot less well when you start going perpendicular to that axis. Philadelphia - Harrisburg service is OK, but prone to random delays, and Harrisburg - Pittsburgh is worse.</p>
<p>Thank you all for the comments and suggestions!</p>
<p>I guess Amtrak is out, and yikes! it is well over 8 hours…</p>
<p>It’s down to either renting or flying. I definitely prefer flying especially if it takes the same amount of time to drive from L.A. to San Fran; just wondering how reliable public transit is in both cities in case I want to do some city exploring, especially in Pittsburgh.</p>
<p>There’s tons of public transit in Pittsburgh depending on where you want to go. If you want to go from downtown to Oakland or Squirrel Hill then you’ve got no problem. If you want to get into some of the more outlying areas or suburbs you’ll be much better off with a car. Just try to plan out where you want to go and try to figure out which busses you can take prior to going there, since it can be a bit confusing if you just walk to a bus stop and try to figure it out (not nearly as easy to understand as most subway systems).</p>
<p>Actually, looking on Google Maps the ride from Philly to Pittsburgh is supposed to only be about five hours. I guess it takes a bit longer for me since I’m about 45 minutes away from the turnpike at home. Just be sure to pay attention to speed limits; it’s 55 mph for a pretty long portion of the turnpike.</p>
<p>No, most of the turnpike is 65.</p>
<p>Pittsburgh has very extensive bus service throughout and some subway/commuter rail service downtown and to suburbs but outside the university area.</p>
<p>Philadelphia has a very extensive subway/trolley system in the city and good commuter rail. The subways/trolleys in the city are sometimes old and smelly but they go everywhere. There are buses too. Once you’re in the Center City area, Philadelphia is also very walkable.</p>
<p>Cabs are plentiful and relative to NY inexpensive in both cities.</p>
<p>You might decide that renting a car in both cities makes sense just to conserve time if not too expensive. Pittsburgh is easy to get lost in but a car comes in handy to get from neighborhood to neighborhood. Philadelphia has extremely narrow streets in certain areas in Center City and the historic neighborhoods, bad highway traffic and difficult parking (worse than Pittsburgh). A car can be handy if you’re staying in the City and visiting multiple campuses in the suburbs but driving there isn’t fun.</p>
<p>I’d drive if I were you. It’s an easy drive and there are frequent service centers at which to stop. They have the typical fast food fare but also include Starbucks and a variety of other types of refreshment. I happened to do part of that drive last week and was impressed with the new/refurbished centers. The part of the turnpike I was on had a speed limit of 65. Each exit has a toll booth so you will pay the toll that is required at that particular exit. When you get back on and continue your trip, you’d pay the toll from that stop until you exit. As others have said, many rental cars have EZpass these days so it’s very easy.</p>
<p>If you drive be careful about using the EZpass in a rental car - make sure you read how they charge it. I read it really quickly while entering the lane and thought it was a one time charge but in fact it was a daily charge - way more than paying the tolls individually. Cant remember which company I was using…</p>
<p>And you can stop in Altoona and see Horseshoe Curve.</p>
<p>Wow, thanks again for all the informative comments. </p>
<p>Just to summarize all the suggestions: If I were to only stay within Center City area in Philadelphia, a car would be unnecessary to check out the tourist sights and historical district stuff correct? What about Pittsburgh, if I want to venture outside of Downtown/Oakland area to say maybe the South Side or Mt. Washington area, would a car be needed at that point or would public transit be enough?</p>
<p>Also, for all you savvy travelers that live/fly there often, what are some of the more affordable airlines you would recommend, besides Southwest, to fly in/out of either cities? all I know is US Airways has a big presence at both airports. </p>
<p>Any further help would be appreciated!</p>