Commuter Spotlight
Kathy Zucker: Mother, CEO & Lifelong City Dweller
As a third-generation Brooklynite, moving to New Jersey required a huge psychological adjustment. I might have to cram into crowded subways and endure tropical radiator heat in the dead of winter, but hey, I was living in New York City, the place of dreams!
That dream came crashing to the ground when my husband and I started thinking about having a family. Suddenly, all those stairs and astronomical rents didn’t seem so attractive. We visited Hoboken to attend a friend’s birthday party and were blown away by the PATH train; how could I have lived my entire life in New York and not known about this bright, clean, spacious mass transit option?
After I became a parent, I truly fell in love with the incredible access and convenience of living in Hoboken, recently ranked America’s #1 Public Transportation City by Forbes magazine. Five Hudson County towns made the top-ten list and guess what? All of them are served by New York Waterway ferries.
The ferry was a huge part of our family’s decision to stay in Hoboken and raise our children here. We bought a home next to the Light Rail, which delivers us steps from the Hoboken ferry terminal in Lackawanna station. My husband has a 35-minute door-to-door commute that is unaffected by the weather. Hurricanes, snowstorms and torrential rain do not impact his commute; he is often the only one in the office on bad weather days.
To a frantic, sleep-deprived new mother, having your husband home in time to take over bath and bedtime is a godsend. Having that extra time has enabled me to branch out over the years and launch three companies; I do most of my work in the evenings after my husband returns home.
As the kids have grown older, the ferry has become an increasingly large part of their consciousness. When we walk by the waterfront, they point out “Daddy’s boat” and tell bystanders about how they take it to visit Daddy at work and play at the “beach playgrounds” (Imagination Playground by Pier 11 and Battery Park City Playground by the World Financial Center).
Kids under 6 ride free on the ferry, so it’s a phenomenal way to tap the incredible cultural offerings in New York City before heading back to our spacious home in Hoboken.
Kathy Zucker, serial entrepreneur and mother of two toddlers, writes about juggling career and family in an urban setting. See what Kathy is up to at her blog and on Twitter.
