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Old Astoria (TLC zone 179) starts about 2,637 rides a day, 15th of the 67 Queens zones outside the airports. It sends more trips into Manhattan's congestion zone than most of Queens: 11.7% of app pickups and 35.2% of yellow taxi pickups paid the MTA Congestion Relief Zone fee. In the other direction, it is an evening destination, with drop-offs peaking late at night.
Trip numbers are TLC Help's totals of TLC trip records (yellow, green and Uber/Lyft), September 2025 to August 2026. Drop-offs are counted by the hour the trip started, so a 10 p.m. drop-off peak includes rides that began a little before 10. Curb sign details come from NYC DOT open data.
Old Astoria at a glance
Zone 179 touches four zones on TLC's map: Astoria (7), Astoria Park (8), Queensbridge/Ravenswood (193) and Steinway (223). TLC's lookup table calls it a "Boro Zone", which only groups data (taxi zones explained).
Out in the morning, back at night
Pickups and drop-offs have opposite shapes. Pickups peak at 8 a.m. on weekdays (about 188) and at 6 p.m. on Saturdays (about 198), the busiest pickup hour of the week. Drop-offs peak at 10 p.m. on weekdays, 11 p.m. on Saturdays (about 248) and midnight on Sundays. Between 8 p.m. and midnight the zone gets 25.2% of its weekly drop-offs but only 16.4% of its pickups.
Saturday is the busiest day for pickups (about 3,246), then Sunday (2,663) and an average weekday (2,511).
Month by month
Monthly pickups ran from 71,926 (September 2025) to 87,587 (December 2025). Yellow taxis did their best months in winter: 3,833 pickups in December and 3,870 in January.
Where trips go
Astoria is the top destination (16.2%), followed by Steinway (8.7%) and trips inside Old Astoria (7.8%). Long Island City/Hunters Point takes 5.1%, LaGuardia 3.5% and Queensbridge/Ravenswood 3.4%. No single Manhattan zone makes the top ten, so the trips into Manhattan are spread across many zones.
Riders coming in start from the same neighbors: Astoria (15.7% of drop-offs), Steinway (8.2%) and Long Island City/Hunters Point (5.7%). The same few western Queens zones both send riders here and receive them, in almost the same shares.
Fares and pay
The median app trip is 3.11 miles and 14.9 minutes: $17.36 fare and $14.46 driver pay (26th of 67). Pay per engaged hour is $60.37, 53rd, because trips are slow for their distance. (Engaged time is time with a passenger; your real hourly figure will be lower.)
The congestion fee is charged per trip and paid by the passenger. As of October 12, 2026 it is $1.50 on app trips and $0.75 on taxi and green cab trips (MTA). Check any trip with the congestion fee calculator.
Curb notes and pickup rules
- Taxi/FHV pick-up zone: DOT's current sign records show "Taxi/FHV 8AM-10PM All Days Pick-up/Drop-off Only" on 31st Street between Newtown Avenue and 30th Avenue (west side). This is a loading spot, not a waiting stand. Read the sign before you stop.
- Old Astoria has no relief stand of its own in DOT's data, but the Hoyt Avenue North stand in Steinway is right at its edge (under 0.1 mile) and the 12th Street stand in Queensbridge/Ravenswood is about 0.2 mile away; both take taxis and FHVs (relief stands guide).
- Old Astoria is in TLC's Hail Zone (Chapter 51). App and other FHV drivers may only take trips booked through their base (80-19(c)(1); who can pick up where).
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.
- Old Astoria: trip facts by sector — Key trip facts for taxi zone 179 (Old Astoria, Queens) 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.
- Old Astoria: when trips start, by hour — Average pickups per day in each hour in zone 179, 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.
- Old Astoria: pickups by month — Trips starting in taxi zone 179 (Old Astoria, Queens) each month, by sector.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026
- Old Astoria: where trips from here go — Top drop-off zones for trips starting in zone 179, 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 962,575 pickups. 'Outside NYC' = zone 265.
- Old Astoria: where trips to here come from — Top pickup zones for trips ending in zone 179, 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 1,016,389 drop-offs.
- Old Astoria: when trips arrive, by hour — Average drop-offs per day in each hour in zone 179, 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).
- Old Astoria: drop-offs by month — Trips ending in taxi zone 179 (Old Astoria, Queens) 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 Old Astoria for pickups?
TLC trip records show 962,575 pickups in zone 179 from September 2025 to August 2026, about 2,637 a day. That ranks 15th of the 67 Queens zones outside the airports.
How many trips from Old Astoria go into Manhattan's congestion zone?
11.7% of app pickups and 35.2% of yellow taxi pickups paid the MTA Congestion Relief Zone fee. For app trips that is 7th-highest in Queens outside the airports; the Queens middle is 3.1%.
Is there a taxi pick-up spot in Old Astoria?
NYC DOT's current sign records show a 'Taxi/FHV pick-up/drop-off only, 8AM-10PM all days' sign on 31st Street between Newtown Avenue and 30th Avenue (west side). Always read the sign on the street.
When do people arrive in Old Astoria?
Mostly in the evening. Drop-offs peak at 10 p.m. on weekdays, 11 p.m. on Saturdays and midnight on Sundays. A quarter of the week's drop-offs (25.2%) happen between 8 p.m. and midnight.
Sources
Last reviewed against the official sources on .
- NYC TLC Trip Record Data nyc.gov
- TLC Taxi Zone Lookup Table d37ci6vzurychx.cloudfront.net
- NYC Open Data: Parking Regulation Locations and Signs (DOT, nfid-uabd) data.cityofnewyork.us
- NYC Open Data: Taxi and FHV Relief Stands (DOT, vqu8-xef9) data.cityofnewyork.us
- TLC Rules Chapter 51: Definitions (PDF) nyc.gov
- MTA: Congestion Relief Zone taxi and FHV tolls mta.info
Spotted something out of date? Tell us and we'll check it against the official source.
TLC Help is not a law firm and is not affiliated with the NYC Taxi & Limousine Commission or OATH. Explanations on this site are general information, not legal advice. Legal representation is provided by independent attorneys and OATH-registered representatives in our network.