Getting There & Parking at Brooklyn Cruise Terminal
Everything you need to know about parking and getting to Brooklyn Cruise Terminal. Compare options, rates, and get pro tips from experienced cruisers.
6 transport options · researched from public reviews and official sources
Published by CruiseDayGuide · Updated August 17, 2026 · sources checked August 17, 2026
The short answer
$45.00 per night for up to 24 hours in the terminal's own outdoor lot, taxes included, with no reservation needed and no upcharge for an SUV.
Two rules catch people out: you must park before you drop your bags, and there is no in-and-out access once you have.
Brooklyn is the simplest parking decision of any port on this site, and that is not a compliment to Red Hook — it is a consequence of the geography. There is one lot, it belongs to the terminal, it costs $45.00 a night, and the off-site market that gives Galveston or Port Canaveral a real second option barely exists here. We went looking for one: no independent operator near the terminal publishes a rate on its own page, and Red Hook has very little commercial garage inventory to publish. So the useful version of this page is not a price comparison. It is the three things about this specific lot that change what your morning looks like — the order you do things in, whether you can come back to the car, and how full it will be when you arrive.
What it costs to leave a car, and what the alternatives cost instead
Only the first row is parking. The others are what you would spend to not park, which at this port is the real comparison — the terminal is a $4.50 ferry ride across the harbor from Lower Manhattan and has no subway of its own. Every figure is read from the operator's own page on 2026-08-17.
| Option | Cost | Seven nights | Reservation | The catch |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brooklyn Cruise Terminal lot | Cost$45.00 per night, up to 24 hours, taxes included | Seven nights$315 for seven nights | ReservationNot needed | The catchNo in-and-out access, and a space is not guaranteed |
| NYC Ferry, South Brooklyn route | Cost$4.50 one way; under 44 inches free with an adult | Seven nights$9.00 there and back, whatever the cruise length | ReservationNo | The catchEvery 45-50 minutes, and the last boat from Red Hook is 9:06 pm |
| B61 bus | Cost$3.00, with one free transfer within two hours | Seven nights$6.00 there and back | ReservationNo | The catchAbout four long blocks on foot at the end, per NYCEDC |
| Taxi from an airport | CostMetered — the $70 flat fare is Manhattan-only | Seven nightsTwo rides, whatever the cruise length | ReservationNo | The catchPlus a $2.00 airport access fee and the usual surcharges |
| The Lodge Red Hook, overnight | Cost$25.00 plus taxes per night for hotel guests | Seven nightsNot published for a cruise-length stay | ReservationWith the room | The catchTheir site says nothing about leaving a car while you sail |
| 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge, valet | Cost$90.00 for up to 24 hours, tax excluded | Seven nights$630 for seven nights | ReservationBookable ahead | The catchDouble the terminal, and oversized vehicles cost more again |
marks a row carrying at least one figure read on the operator’s own page during the source check. Seven-night totals are the published nightly rate multiplied out; neither NYCEDC nor any hotel here publishes a weekly cruise rate. The taxi row states no total on purpose — the TLC publishes rate components for a Brooklyn trip and no flat fare, so any total would be our estimate rather than a fare. Hotel figures are each read from that hotel's own site.
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Driving & Parking at the Terminal
Every route funnels through one exit. From Manhattan, take the Battery Tunnel (I-478 east) into Brooklyn, join the westbound BQE (I-278 west) and take Exit 26, Hamilton Avenue, onto the service road; stay left, make the left U-turn at Clinton Street/9th Street, follow the westbound service road to its end at Van Brunt Street, turn left, go two blocks, then right onto Bowne Street. From Long Island, the LIE to the westbound BQE and the same Exit 26. From New Jersey, the Turnpike to Exit 13, the Goethals and Verrazzano bridges, north on the Gowanus/BQE, off at Exit 26. The vehicle entrance is Bowne Street at Imlay Street and there is no other one.
Verified Aug 17, 2026 · Propark Mobility — Brooklyn Cruise Terminal Parking · See something outdated? Tell us
Park before you touch your bags. NYCEDC is explicit that drivers who need parking cannot drop luggage first and park afterwards without leaving the terminal and coming back in — park, then take the bags up to the second level for check-in. The lot is a revolving system: the arriving ship's passengers are usually off the property by 10 to 10:30 am, so NYCEDC's own advice is to aim for between 10 am and 2 pm if you want the best chance of a space. It is an outdoor lot with security on the south side of the entrance, facing the Statue of Liberty, and there is no in-and-out access once you have parked.
NYC Ferry from Manhattan or Brooklyn
The South Brooklyn route stops at the Red Hook/Atlantic Basin landing at Ferris Street and Clinton Wharf, a short walk from the terminal — the only public transport that puts you within sight of the ship. Weekdays it runs East 34th Street, Corlears Hook, Wall Street/Pier 11, Atlantic Avenue/Brooklyn Bridge Park Pier 6, Red Hook and Governors Island, about 40 minutes end to end. Weekends the South Brooklyn Extension continues to Sunset Park and Bay Ridge, about 61 minutes.
Check the timetable against your boarding window rather than the other way round — from Red Hook toward Manhattan the first weekday boat is 6:40 am and the last is 9:06 pm, with roughly 45 to 50 minutes between them, so a missed boat is most of an hour. NYC Ferry calls the stop Red Hook, never Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, which is worth knowing before you scroll past it.
Subway and the B61 bus
There is no subway in Red Hook — MTA's own station list has nothing on the peninsula, and every rail route ends with a bus or a walk. The B61 is the bus that actually serves the terminal, running Park Slope to Downtown Brooklyn via Van Brunt Street, around the clock, and stopping at Van Brunt Street and Pioneer Street. From Downtown Brooklyn, pick it up on Atlantic Avenue at Court Street; the F and G at Smith/9th Street and Carroll Street are the nearest subway stops on the other side.
Ignore any direction — including NYCEDC's own page — that routes you onto the B77 bus. That route does not exist: MTA's schedule page for it returns a 404, and it appears nowhere in MTA's current Brooklyn bus list or its live schedule feed. Take the B61. From the bus stop NYCEDC describes the walk as approximately four long blocks to the terminal entrance at Pioneer and Conover Streets; of the nearby subway stops only Borough Hall is ADA-accessible, and the F/G stations are not.
From John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)
JFK is about 15 miles from Red Hook and a 30-50 min drive, most often down the Belt Parkway around the bottom of Brooklyn or up over the Gowanus. The Belt is scenic and completely unforgiving at rush hour; the Gowanus is neither. Of the three airports this is the one with a real rail option toward Brooklyn: the Long Island Rail Road runs from Jamaica into Atlantic Terminal in Downtown Brooklyn, which is the closest any train gets to the terminal, and AirTrain also connects to the E, J and Z at Sutphin Boulevard and the A at Howard Beach. One trap on the subway route: Lefferts Boulevard-bound A trains do not serve the airport.
If you are taking the train, take the LIRR rather than the subway: Atlantic Terminal is a short cab or B61 ride from Red Hook, while the subway routes strand you further north with the same last mile still to cover. NYCEDC publishes an undated cab estimate of roughly $45 to $60 — treat it as a budget rather than a fare, since the TLC's meter is what will actually be charged.
From LaGuardia Airport (LGA)
LGA is the closest of the three at about 12 miles, and the least well connected: it is the only major New York airport with no rail link of any kind. The drive is 30-50 min because it crosses either the whole of Brooklyn or the length of Queens on the BQE. The public options are the free Q70 LaGuardia Link bus to the subway at Jackson Heights or Woodside, or the M60 Select Bus Service across northern Manhattan — both of which leave you a long way from Red Hook, on the wrong side of a city with no subway to the terminal. Note also that LaGuardia is the one New York airport where the terminals are far enough apart to matter on arrival: Terminal B and Terminal C have separate roadways and separate pickup levels, so an app-hailed car and a yellow cab are met in different places. Confirm which terminal your flight lands at before you book anything door to door.
This is the airport where a cab is most clearly worth it, because the public alternative is the weakest of the three and the metered distance the shortest — you are paying for the fewest miles and saving the most transfers. NYCEDC's undated estimate of roughly $28 to $38 is hard to reconcile with the current meter plus the LaGuardia surcharge, so budget above it rather than at it.
From Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR)
EWR is about 16 miles away and a 35-60 min drive, and it is the awkward one for this terminal: every route crosses either the Verrazzano or a Hudson tunnel, and both are at the mercy of the hour. AirTrain Newark links the terminals to the NJ Transit station, and NJ Transit runs to Penn Station in Manhattan — which is the wrong side of the harbor from Red Hook, leaving a full crosstown-and-across-the-river journey still to do. There is a live service change worth knowing about: AirTrain Newark is currently being replaced by shuttle buses on weekdays from 5 am to 3 pm. Newark is also the only one of the three where you pay tolls in both directions on a cab fare, because the driver's return crossing is charged to you — a detail that does not apply at JFK or LaGuardia and that makes the headline meter misleading.
The weekday AirTrain shuttle-bus replacement runs 5 am to 3 pm, which is exactly the window a morning cruise arrival would use, so treat the rail option as slower than the timetable suggests. If you are flying into Newark for a Brooklyn sailing, come in the night before — of the three airports this is the one where a same-day arrival has the least slack. NYCEDC's undated cab estimate is roughly $80 to $100.
Park first, then drop your bags — not the other way round
This is the single most useful thing on the page, and it is easy to get wrong because every instinct says otherwise. At most cruise terminals you pull into the drop-off lane, hand your suitcases to a porter, and go park an empty car.
NYCEDC does not let you do that here. Its own embarkation page states that passengers arriving by private car should first park and then drop luggage on the second level for check-in, and that passengers requiring parking cannot drop bags and then park without exiting the terminal. Combined with the lot's no-in-and-out rule, doing it in the wrong order means leaving the property and queueing to come back in.
Where this comes from
NYCEDC, Embarking & Disembarking, read 2026-08-17: "Passengers arriving by private car should first park, and then drop off luggage on the second level for check-in."
What the lot costs and what the rate includes
One rate, one duration band, and unusually few asterisks for New York.
- $45.00 per night for up to 24 hours, effective April 01 2023, for cruise passengers only.
- Taxes are included in that figure — it is not a pre-tax rate.
- No reservation is needed. A booking widget exists behind NYCEDC's "Make a reservation" button, but neither NYCEDC nor the operator publishes a fee for using it, so we do not quote one.
- No upcharge for sport utility vehicles, and the operator’s parking page we read on 2026-08-17 states no height restriction — worth confirming with the operator directly if you drive something tall, since the lot is open-air and the page may simply not mention one.
- No in-and-out access once you have parked.
- Payment on arrival: cash, Visa, MasterCard or American Express. Keep the ticket with you during the cruise.
- Accessible parking is available at the same rate as standard parking.
- RVs, buses and larger vehicles park on the main level near the Security Main gate.
Where this comes from
Rate, effective date, tax treatment, reservation policy, SUV rule and payment methods from NYCEDC's Brooklyn Cruise Terminal Directions & Parking page; the height and in-and-out rules from Propark Mobility's own facility page. Both read 2026-08-17. The rate is re-checked automatically against the operator's page.
When to arrive, and why the lot empties as the morning goes on
NYCEDC describes the lot as a revolving system rather than a fixed-capacity one, and it is candid that a space is not guaranteed for every passenger — it depends on how many ships are in and how many of their passengers drove.
7-8 am — the ship arrives
By 9 am — lot open, porters on
9:30 am — baggage processing opens
10-10:30 am — the lot frees up
11:30 am-12:30 pm — boarding generally begins
- Aim for the 10 am to 2 pm window NYCEDC itself recommends
- Park, then take the bags to the second level
- Keep the parking ticket with you rather than in the glovebox
- Do not read the FAQ's "not before 11 am" line as advice to drivers — it is addressed to buses arriving with a group
- Do not plan on returning to the car for a forgotten bag; there is no in-and-out
- Do not assume a space is reserved for you, because NYCEDC says plainly that it is not
Where this comes from
Arrival timings, the revolving-lot description and the bus-group caveat are all from NYCEDC's Cruise NYC FAQ and Directions & Parking pages, read 2026-08-17.
Is there anywhere cheaper to park near the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal?
Not that we can stand behind. We looked for an off-site operator publishing its own rate within a reasonable distance of Red Hook and did not find one — the booking partner that resells this lot lists it at the same $45, and Red Hook has very little commercial garage inventory of its own.
The hotels are worth knowing about for a different reason: several publish parking rates well above the terminal's, so a night-before stay is not automatically the cheaper way to leave a car. The Lodge Red Hook is the exception at $25.00 plus tax a night — but its own site says nothing about leaving a car while you sail, so ask before you count on it.
- There was a Weehawken park-and-ride shuttle pilot, and it is over: NYCEDC's own page describes four dates in March 2025 only.
- 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge publishes $90.00 for up to 24 hours, valet only — double the terminal.
- Aloft and the Sheraton in Downtown Brooklyn both publish $75.00 daily at off-site valet, and the Sheraton states there is no in-and-out privilege.
- The Lodge Red Hook publishes $25.00 plus taxes per night, the cheapest figure anywhere near the pier — with no published cruise-parking policy attached to it.
Where this comes from
Hotel figures are each read from that hotel's own site on 2026-08-17 and are linked from our Brooklyn hotels page. We publish no third-party lot rate for this port because no operator near the terminal publishes one.
What the $45 actually buys, and why that matters in Red Hook
It is worth being concrete about this, because $45 a night is not cheap and Red Hook is the kind of neighborhood where a reader will look at the street outside and wonder whether they really need to pay it.
The answer is mostly about security and about where the lot sits. NYCEDC describes it as an outdoor lot with security, on the south side of the terminal entrance overlooking the Statue of Liberty — inside the terminal's own footprint, not a block away. You are not walking your luggage anywhere after you park, and you are not leaving a car with a week's worth of dust on a New York City street subject to alternate-side rules.
The alternative most people imagine — street parking in Red Hook — is one we will not recommend. Alternate-side regulations apply, there is no supervision, and a car left for a seven-night sailing is a car nobody is watching for seven nights. The saving is real and so is the risk, and a cruise is the wrong week to find out which one wins.
- The lot is at the terminal, not a shuttle ride away — no transfer to plan and no shuttle to miss.
- NYCEDC describes it as an outdoor lot with security.
- Accessible parking is available, and NYCEDC states the rates are the same as standard parking.
- RVs, buses and larger vehicles have their own space on the main level near the Security Main gate.
- There is no height restriction, per the operator — which most city garages cannot say.
Where this comes from
The lot's location, its security and the accessible-parking rate are from NYCEDC's Directions & Parking page and Cruise NYC FAQ; the height rule is from Propark Mobility's facility page. All read 2026-08-17. The judgement about street parking is ours.
Driving in: the one exit every route uses
Red Hook has a single practical road approach, and all three of NYCEDC's published routes converge on it: the BQE at Exit 26, Hamilton Avenue, then Van Brunt Street, then right onto Bowne Street. If your navigation is telling you something else on the last mile, it is probably routing you to the walk-in entrance at Pioneer and Conover, which is not where you want a car full of suitcases.
From Manhattan and points north
From Long Island and points east
From New Jersey and points south
The last two blocks
Where this comes from
All three routes are quoted from NYCEDC's Brooklyn Cruise Terminal Directions & Parking page, read 2026-08-17.
Getting the car back at the end of the cruise
The return is easier than the departure, and the one thing to get right is the ticket. NYCEDC asks you to keep your parking ticket with you during the cruise rather than leaving it in the car, and payment is taken on arrival rather than on the way out — so the transaction is already done by the time you disembark.
The rhythm of the morning works in your favor here too. NYCEDC's description of the lot as a revolving system is written from the arriving passenger's point of view: ships arrive between 7 and 8 am and the previous voyage's drivers are usually clear of the property by 10 to 10:30 am. If you are the one disembarking, that is you, and that window is roughly how long customs and baggage will take.
- Keep the parking ticket in your wallet, not in the glovebox of a car you cannot reach
- Expect to be off the property inside a couple of hours of the ship docking
- Do not expect to settle up on the way out — the fee is paid on arrival
- Do not plan a tight morning flight around a disembarkation; customs is the variable, not the car
Where this comes from
The ticket rule, the pay-on-arrival policy and the 7-8 am arrival and 10-10:30 am clearance timings are all stated by NYCEDC on its Directions & Parking page, read 2026-08-17.
If you are not driving: what arriving without a car costs
Every dollar on this page is worth comparing against the alternative, because at this terminal the alternative is unusually cheap and unusually awkward at the same time.
The cheap part is the water. NYC Ferry's South Brooklyn route stops at Red Hook, a short walk from the pier, and charges $4.50 one way — the only public transport that gets you close to the terminal door, and about a seventh of one night's parking. The B61 bus is $3.00 with a free transfer inside two hours, but it leaves you about four long blocks away on foot, which NYCEDC states plainly.
The awkward part is everything upstream of that. Red Hook has no subway station, so a rail journey into Brooklyn ends with the bus or a cab regardless of where it started. And if you are flying in, there is no flat fare to Brooklyn from any of the three airports — a fact that surprises people who know the JFK number.
- NYC Ferry, Red Hook landing: $4.50 one way, and children under 44 inches ride free with an adult.
- B61 bus: $3.00 for most riders, with one free transfer within two hours. Reduced fares are half the regular fare.
- From JFK: the metered fare. The Taxi & Limousine Commission's $70.00 flat fare covers JFK to Manhattan only, so Brooklyn is metered, plus a $2.00 airport access fee.
- From LaGuardia: the metered fare plus a $5.00 LaGuardia surcharge and the same $2.00 access fee. No flat fare exists from LaGuardia to anywhere.
- From Newark: the metered fare plus a $20.00 Newark surcharge, and the driver's return tolls are charged to you as well.
- By rail from JFK: AirTrain is $8.75 on top of your onward fare, making the subway route about $11.75 or the LIRR into Atlantic Terminal $14 to $16.
- MetroCards can no longer be bought or refilled as of January 1 2026, so an OMNY-capable card or phone is now the fare medium.
Where this comes from
Ferry fares from NYC Ferry's Ticketing Info page, bus and AirTrain fares from MTA's fares and airport guides, and every taxi rule from the NYC Taxi & Limousine Commission's own rate of fare — all read 2026-08-17. We publish no dollar total for any airport cab because the TLC publishes rate components for a Brooklyn trip rather than a fare, and a total of ours would be an estimate wearing a fare's clothes.
What we could not verify, and are not going to guess at
Four things about parking at this terminal are genuinely unpublished, and we would rather list them than fill the gaps with plausible numbers.
- The lot's closing time. NYCEDC publishes an opening — the lot is open and porters are on by 9 am — but no closing hour for Brooklyn. The "8 am to 7 pm" in its FAQ is explicitly about the Manhattan garages.
- The booking fee, if any, on the reservation widget behind NYCEDC's "Make a reservation" button. Neither NYCEDC nor the operator publishes one, and the widget is JavaScript-only.
- The cancellation policy on a reserved space. The operator’s parking page we read on 2026-08-17 does not state one — ask when you reserve.
- Any genuinely independent off-site lot near the terminal with a published rate. We looked and found none — Red Hook has very little commercial garage inventory, and the reseller that lists the terminal lot lists it at the same $45.
- Whether the reservation widget holds a space at busy times or simply sells the same first-come access. NYCEDC's own text says reservations are not needed and that a space is not guaranteed, which leaves the question genuinely open.
Where this comes from
These are absences we checked for on 2026-08-17, not lookups we skipped. If you find one of them published, the feedback link on this page reaches us.
Parking questions cruisers ask about Brooklyn Cruise Terminal
How much is parking at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal?
$45.00 per night for up to 24 hours, taxes included — a cruise-passenger rate effective April 01 2023 per NYCEDC, and confirmed on the lot operator's own page as read 2026-08-17. No reservation is needed, there is no upcharge for an SUV, and you pay on arrival by cash or Visa, MasterCard or American Express.
Do I need to reserve parking at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal?
No. NYCEDC states that reservations are not needed and that taxes are included in the rate. A reservation widget does exist behind its "Make a reservation" button, but neither NYCEDC nor the operator publishes a booking fee for it, so we cannot tell you what reserving costs. NYCEDC does warn that a space is not guaranteed for every passenger, which is the argument for arriving inside its recommended 10 am to 2 pm window rather than reserving.
Can I drop my bags first and then park?
No, and this is the rule most likely to cost you time. NYCEDC states that passengers arriving by private car should first park and then drop luggage on the second level for check-in, and that passengers requiring parking cannot drop bags and then park without exiting the terminal. The lot also allows no in-and-out access. Park first.
Is there a height limit at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal lot?
The operator's own facility page states there is no height restriction at this facility, which makes it unusually friendly to tall vehicles for a New York City port. NYCEDC separately says RVs, buses and larger vehicles park on the main level near the Security Main gate.
Is there cheaper parking near the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal?
We could not find any we would publish. No independent operator near the terminal states a rate on its own page, and Red Hook has very little commercial garage inventory. The reseller that books this lot lists the same $45. Several nearby hotels publish parking at $75 to $90 a night, well above the terminal. If leaving the car at home is an option, the NYC Ferry costs $4.50 and the B61 bus $3.00.
How much would a week of parking at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal cost?
$315 for seven nights at the published $45.00 nightly rate. NYCEDC publishes no discounted weekly or cruise-length rate, so the figure is simply the nightly rate multiplied out. For comparison, the same seven nights of valet at 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge would be $630 at its published $90.00 for up to 24 hours.
Plan the rest of your cruise day
Where these facts come from
- NYCEDC — Brooklyn Cruise Terminal Directions & Parking — checked 2026-08-17
- NYCEDC — Cruise NYC Frequently Asked Questions — checked 2026-08-17
- NYCEDC — Embarking & Disembarking — checked 2026-08-17
- Propark Mobility — Brooklyn Cruise Terminal Parking — checked 2026-08-17
- NYC Ferry — Ticketing Info — checked 2026-08-17
- NYC Ferry — South Brooklyn route — checked 2026-08-17
- MTA — Subway and bus fares — checked 2026-08-17
- NYC Taxi & Limousine Commission — Taxi Fare — checked 2026-08-17
Published parking rates, shuttle hours, and hotel package terms change without notice. We date every fact we take from an operator so you can tell how fresh it is, and we leave a figure out entirely rather than repeat one we could not read at the source. Reconfirm anything time-sensitive before you travel.
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