Flight Planning for the Hudson River SFRA

[KE5BM]

Good Day!

Today, I started looking into the Hudson River SFRA. I live close enough to NYC to justify a sight-seeing flight with the family in the fall (once the air clears and cools some). I did all the requisite training and have familiarized myself to the point I feel comfortable making the trip. However, there's one question I have that I've not found an answer to. If I file a VFR flight plan to go from my home airport, fly the Hudson River Exclusion and then return, how would I notate that leg of the trip? Write it in the remarks block of the form? Is there some sort of notation in the route block?

 

[Skip Miller]

Just a note of caution. My advice is: decide in advance who is going to be the PIC for the flight, and who are the sightseers. The Hudson River route is not that difficult, but it is a very rich visual environment!

-Skip

 

[KE5BM]

Good advice, Skip! For what it's worth, I've been to NYC enough times that the trip is definitely not for me. From what I've seen through YouTube videos of other pilots taking the same trip, it's definitely not a place for ground-gazing from the left seat.

 

[midlifeflyer]

I'm not sure what you are asking. Sure it would be fine to file a VFR flight plan and put the Hudson corridor in the remarks so the search and rescue folks will know where to look if you go down and nobody sees it. You can also put waypoints in the route. But are you expecting it to do something else?

 

[mandm]

I’ve been to NYC many times before and yet, the Hudson flight tour was iconic and memorable, at a similar level of my first solo! It really reminds you the beauty of GA and what flying is all about.

Personally, I wouldn’t file a flight plan, I would do flight following to Teterboro and upon arrival tell the controllers that you’d like to fly up and down the Hudson (give an entry and exit point such as enter at the GWB southbound towards the VZ and 180 northbound up to the GWB landing at Teterboro or returning to XYZ airport and direction) before reaching your destination (make sure you have enough fuel), or land and fuel up then go on the tour. Fuel is reasonable at Teterboro but the airport is busy. I was cleared into the Bravo airspace with traffic alerts (tons of helicopters that you cannot see anyway), one way was at an altitude and the other way was at another altitude (I made a post about it and included photos IIRC was 1500’ and 2000’). I wasn’t low enough to see the Statue of Liberty, but I kind of feel like I lucked out going this route versus the lower altitude SATR. When in the Bravo, you also don’t have to worry about the mandatory reporting points of the SATR and the views were absolutely amazing.

 

[KE5BM]

I'm not sure what you are asking. Sure it would be fine to file a VFR flight plan and put the Hudson corridor in the remarks so the search and rescue folks will know where to look if you go down and nobody sees it. You can also put waypoints in the route. But are you expecting it to do something else?

I'm not expecting the flight plan to do anything other than what it's designed to do. Rather, I just wanted to know if there was a way to notate flying a corridor if one was inclined to file a plan. It sounds like it's not appropriate for the trip I've laid out. One of the members who flies NYC sent me a chat with some very detailed advice and basically said the same. He recommended using a couple IFR waypoints at the top and bottom of the corridor. I considered using the reporting points as flight plan waypoints but the lat/long entries would make the path block incredibly long.

Personally, I wouldn’t file a flight plan, I would do flight following to Teterboro...

You answered my follow up question since I've never heard of someone ask for flight following without a destination. I'm sure it's happened, just not while I've been listening to Boston Approach. Thanks for the tip, Mike!

 

[midlifeflyer]

You answered my follow up question since I've never heard of someone ask for flight following without a destination. I'm sure it's happened, just not while I've been listening to Boston Approach. Thanks for the tip, Mike!

If you are coming from the Cape and planning to enter the corridor from the north, it's easy enough to ask for flight following to say, HPN TEB or whatever else is near your entry point. Once you are talking to NY Approach, tell them you are going to go direct to Tappan Zee for the Hudson corridor. If you are going to do the Skyline Class B route, tell them that and they will coordinate with La Guardia Tower.

What you will discover is that the process is much easier than you imagine. Here's mine last summer. Opposite direction but It's really as easy as it sounds.