Launch the Boats: Ferry Solution Floated to Beat $150 World Cup Train Fares
City Council Member Shaun Abreu is trying to bring to life a new ferry route during the World Cup from a dock in Harlem to Edgewater, NJ., as a way to beat the $150 train ticket that NJ Transit plans to charge.
| 24 Apr 2026 | 05:40
City Council Member Shaun Abreu is pushing a new ferry service from the UWS to New Jersey during the World Cup in a bid to offset the $150 train tickets being push by NJ Transit. He appears alongsid U.S. Representative Adriano Espaillat (left) and Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal (right). (
)
Fan traveling by train to the World Cup who will have to pay $150 for a round trip ticket to Met Life stadium for the eight World Cup matches scheduled to be held there. Regular commuters will be barred from using NJ Transit for four hours before the start of games. Auto travel to the stadium is banned. (
)
As soccer fans remain in uproar over inflated NJ Transit fare prices during the upcoming World Cup, with transportation to MetLife Stadium slated to cost a whopping $150, local politicians have proposed an alternative route by sea.
The docks are already in place at piers in West Harlem, but they are currently not in use for regular ferry service. “We can’t control what New Jersey does, but we can control what NY does,” said Upper West Side City Council member Shau Abreu, who is pushing the idea of starting the ferry service in time for the World Cup that starts in mid-June.
A typical New Jersey transit ticket costs $12.50, meaning that tournament attendees who take the train will effectively be paying over 1,000 percent more than usual, or more than eleven times as much.
Abreu—who serves as the Democratic Majority Leader on the City Counci—says that a workaround ferry ride would get commuters to MetLife in less than ten minutes and would have benefits to commuters long after the World Cup ends.
The ferry would take soccer fans from W. 125th St. to the New Jersey city of Edgewater, located directly across the Hudson River. Currently, the private ferry company NY Waterway has a route that connects W. 39th St. to Edgewater, which costs around $12 and often takes a bit more than 10 minutes.
The W. 125th Street pier has not been home to a regular commuter ferry since it was built for $20 million in 2009, and Abreu is pitching the plan as a means of cementing the route for years to come.
In order to make the proposal a feasible reality, Abreu says that the Economic Development Corporation—which operates the New York City Ferry—should apply for federal funds to bolster the route, with grant proposals to that end due on May 11. Abreu has also been in talks with NY Waterway about the proposal.
On Friday, April 24, Abreu was joined by Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal to discuss his drive to “launch the boats” from W. 125th Street.
“If we launch this boat in time for the World Cup, it’s gonna clear up a lot of congestion in West Harlem,” Hoylman-Sigal said, pointing at a parked ferry in a social media video.
“For fans, it would allow them to bypass bridges and tunnels. It would relieve congestion at the George Washington Bridge, for instance,” Abreu added.
The World Cup will be held from June 21 to July 19, and eight matches including the finals, will be held at MetLife Stadium, in East Rutherford, NJ. Due to sponsorship issues with FIFA, the governing body of the World Cup, the stadium will be rechristened as the New York New Jersey Stadium for the duration of the tournament.
Parking will not be available at the stadium, with spots at the nearby American Dream Mall going for $225. Limited seats on shuttle buses headed to the stadium will cost $80; there will be 40,000 train tickets per each match and 10,000 shuttle bus ones.
There’s also a catch for regular commuters who use NJ Transit since regular commuters will be barred from the trains for four hours before and after each match.
NJ Transit says that they anticipate $48 million in World Cup-related operating costs, and therefore say that must pass that burden onto tournament attendees in the form of the pricier tickets.
New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherill has since said that FIFA itself should pay for these fares, while New York Governor Kathy Hochul called the fees “awfully high.” New York Senator Chuck Schumer, meanwhile, echoed Sherill’s call to make FIFA pick up the tab.
“While NJ TRANSIT is stuck with a $48 million bill to safely get fans to and from games, FIFA is making $11 billion. I’m not going to stick New Jersey commuters with that tab for years to come,” Sherill wrote on social media.
“Charging more than eleven times the normal fare for a train ride is a ripoff, plain and simple. FIFA is making billions from this World Cup, and fans are being hit with a $150 ticket before they even walk through the gate,” Schumer said.
Despite the uproar, FIFA has so far rejected any suggestion that it should cover the hugely inflated transit that NJ Transit is charging. Fans in Boston are also being hit with sky high ticket prices of $80 while Dallas, Houston and Atlanta, which are among the other host cities, said there are no plans to hike transit fares for fans during World Cup matches in those cities. A ferry service to bring fans to World Cup games is being proposed in Seattle.
“FIFA is not aware of any other major event previously held at NYNJ Stadium, including other major sports, global concert tours, etc., where organizers were required to pay for fan transportation,” a spokesperson for the association told the press.