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East Chelsea (TLC zone 68) is one of Manhattan's busiest zones and busy every day of the week. Its 3,701,471 pickups from September 2025 to August 2026 (about 10,141 a day) rank 5th of 69 Manhattan zones, and 3,635,551 trips ended here. Uber and Lyft had 68% of pickups and yellow taxis 31.6%. Sundays are nearly as busy as weekdays. The zone also has Lincoln Tunnel approaches and five DOT relief stands.
East Chelsea at a glance
Zone 68 is a long zone on TLC's map, running from about 14th Street up into the high 30s on the West Side. It touches seven zones: West Chelsea/Hudson Yards (246), Clinton East (48), Garment District (100), Penn Station/Madison Sq West (186), Flatiron (90), West Village (249) and Meatpacking/West Village West (158). Its TLC data tag is "Yellow Zone"; tags like this sort trip records and are not pickup rules.
When rides start and end: a seven-day zone
Daily volume hardly changes across the week: about 10,066 pickups on an average weekday, 10,861 on a Saturday and 9,795 on a Sunday. What changes is the timing.
- Weekdays: arrivals peak at 8 a.m. (about 600 drop-offs). Pickups peak at 6 p.m. (about 712), 7 p.m. and 9 p.m.
- Saturdays: pickups stay high from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m., peaking at 7 p.m. (about 697).
- Sundays: arrivals peak at 1 p.m. and 11 a.m., and more trips end here on a Sunday than on a weekday. Sunday pickups peak at 6 p.m. and 2 p.m., with another bump at midnight. About 18.6% of Sunday pickups happen between midnight and 5 a.m.
Month by month
October 2025 was the busiest month (334,735 pickups) and February 2026 the quietest (275,517). Summer 2026 stayed strong: July had 312,116 pickups.
Where trips go
The top destination is outside New York City (TLC zone 265, 6.1% of pickups). Then come nearby zones: West Chelsea/Hudson Yards (3.9%), Times Square (3.7%), Union Square (3.4%) and trips within East Chelsea itself (3.3%). LaGuardia is 9th (2.7%). Airports take 8.8% of app pickups and 1.4% of yellow pickups.
Fares and pay
Yellow trips from here are a little longer than in most Midtown zones: a median 1.82 miles, 15.3 minutes and $16.10 on the meter, with a 23.4% card tip rate. App trips: a median 2.83 miles, 20.7 minutes and a $28.64 fare. The median app driver pay is $20.36 per trip (before tips and tolls), the app tip rate is 6.4% and the average tip is $2.47.
Tunnel, congestion fee and hail lines
- Lincoln Tunnel: city street-centerline data places several tunnel entrance and exit roads in zone 68, around West 33rd–36th Streets and the Ninth and Tenth Avenue entrances, plus the Dyer Avenue underpass at 31st Street. Other ramps are in Clinton East and West Chelsea/Hudson Yards. Tolls and the crossing credit: Lincoln Tunnel.
- MTA Congestion Relief Zone: all of East Chelsea is below 60th Street, so its 10,141 daily pickups are inside the Congestion Relief Zone. 99.5% of app and 98.5% of yellow pickups were charged: $1.50 per app trip and $0.75 per taxi trip as of 2026-10-12.
- NYS congestion surcharge: trips that stay in New York State pay $2.50 (medallion taxi) or $2.75 (FHV) as of 2026-10-12. Trips that cross into New Jersey are not covered (tax department).
- Hail Exclusionary Zone: green cabs may not take hails below West 110th Street (Chapter 51); 184 green pickups were recorded here in a year. FHV street pickups: 80-19(c)(2).
Relief stands and taxi stands
DOT's relief-stand dataset (updated October 1, 2026) lists five relief stands with 20 spaces in zone 68. Two are open to taxis and FHVs (West 16th Street, 7 spaces, and West 20th Street, 4 spaces). Three are taxi-only. Current DOT sign records (October 11, 2026) also show taxi-stand signs on six segments: West 14th, West 15th, West 28th and West 31st Streets, Ninth Avenue (15th–16th Streets) and the east side of Tenth Avenue (17th–18th Streets).
For an FHV driver, only the West 16th and West 20th Street stands are usable; the other three are signed for taxis. One hour is the limit (DOT; 80-19(d)(7)). At the taxi-stand blocks, FHVs may not pick up (80-19(d)(2)). All stands: relief stand finder.
Nearby zones
Data on this page
Aggregates of public data. They describe trips and vehicles, never individual people.
Aggregated by TLC Help from TLC trip records, Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 (pickup date; TLC publishes trip files about two months after the month ends and may revise them). 'App' = high-volume for-hire services (Uber, Lyft). Taxi records with a negative fare (reversals) are excluded. Averages, medians and rates use 'clean' trips only: 1 minute to 4 hours, more than 0 and under 150 miles, fare above $0 and under $1,000. 'Fare' is the metered fare_amount for taxis and base_passenger_fare for app trips — before tolls, tips, taxes and surcharges — so it is not what the passenger paid in total. App driver_pay is TLC's 'total driver pay (not including tolls or tips and net of commission, surcharges, or taxes)'. Tips are separate. 'Per engaged hour' divides pay by passenger time only (pickup to drop-off). It leaves out time driving to pickups and waiting for requests, so real hourly earnings are lower; it is not the TLC minimum-pay formula. Monthly cells with 1–9 trips are shown as blank (null). Pairs with fewer than 10 trips are not listed.
- East Chelsea: trip facts by sector — Key trip facts for taxi zone 68 (East Chelsea, Manhattan) by sector, 12 months.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Taxi tips: tip_amount records credit-card tips only (cash tips are not recorded), so taxi tip rates use credit-card trips (payment_type 1). App tips are the tips field on every trip. Tip rate = tips ÷ fare. Medians and rates need at least 250 trips in the cell (else blank); counts of 1–9 are blank. Pickup-side stats (fare, pay, tips) describe trips that START here.
- East Chelsea: when trips start, by hour — Average pickups per day in each hour in zone 68, on weekdays, Saturdays and Sundays (all sectors).NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Average over all such days in the window, holidays included.
- East Chelsea: pickups by month — Trips starting in taxi zone 68 (East Chelsea, Manhattan) each month, by sector.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026
- East Chelsea: where trips from here go — Top drop-off zones for trips starting in zone 68, as a share of all its pickups (12 months, all sectors).NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Out of 3,701,471 pickups. 'Outside NYC' = zone 265.
- East Chelsea: where trips to here come from — Top pickup zones for trips ending in zone 68, as a share of all its drop-offs (12 months, all sectors).NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Out of 3,635,551 drop-offs.
- East Chelsea: when trips arrive, by hour — Average drop-offs per day in each hour in zone 68, on weekdays, Saturdays and Sundays (all sectors; hour of pickup).NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Hour is the trip's pickup hour (TLC records both, but a trip is binned by when it started).
- East Chelsea: drop-offs by month — Trips ending in taxi zone 68 (East Chelsea, Manhattan) each month, by sector.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026
- All 263 taxi zones: trips and key facts (map-ready) — One row per TLC taxi zone (LocationID 1–263) with pickups, drop-offs, sector mix, app driver pay, fares and tip rates — the source for zone maps, hubs and the zone explorer.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Medians/rates need ≥250 trips (else null). labels are LocationIDs as strings; zones[] has names, boroughs, service_zone (from taxi_zone_lookup.csv), suggested slugs and neighbouring zone ids (shared boundary, from taxi_zones.zip).
Frequently asked questions
How busy is East Chelsea?
Very busy. In the 12 months to August 2026, 3,701,471 trips started in zone 68 (about 10,141 a day), 5th of 69 Manhattan zones and 7th of 263 citywide. Almost as many trips ended there (3,635,551).
Is East Chelsea busy on Sundays?
Yes. An average Sunday has about 9,795 pickups, close to a weekday (10,066). More trips end here on an average Sunday (about 10,127) than on a weekday (about 9,701), with Sunday arrivals peaking around 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Where can drivers take a break in East Chelsea?
DOT lists five relief stands in zone 68 with 20 spaces: on Ninth Avenue (19th–20th and 29th–30th Streets), West 16th Street, West 20th Street and West 37th Street. Two of them (West 16th and West 20th) are open to FHVs; the others are taxi-only. You may park for up to one hour.
Is the Lincoln Tunnel in East Chelsea?
Partly. City street-centerline data puts several Lincoln Tunnel entrance and exit roads, around 33rd–36th Streets and the Ninth and Tenth Avenue entrances, in zone 68.
Sources
Last reviewed against the official sources on .
- NYC TLC Trip Record Data nyc.gov
- TLC Taxi Zone Lookup Table d37ci6vzurychx.cloudfront.net
- MTA: Congestion Relief Zone taxi and FHV tolls mta.info
- TLC Rules Chapter 80: Rules Applicable to All Drivers (PDF) nyc.gov
- TLC Rules Chapter 51: Definitions (PDF) nyc.gov
- NYS Department of Taxation and Finance: Congestion surcharge tax.ny.gov
- NYC Open Data: Street Centerline (CSCL, inkn-q76z) data.cityofnewyork.us
- NYC DOT: Taxi and FHV Relief Stands nyc.gov
- NYC Open Data: Taxi and FHV Relief Stands (DOT, vqu8-xef9) data.cityofnewyork.us
- NYC Open Data: Parking Regulation Locations and Signs (DOT, nfid-uabd) data.cityofnewyork.us
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