New York Layover at JFK: The TWA Flight Center
Part of the full New York Layover: Grand Central From JFK
Eero Saarinen’s 1962 TWA Flight Center still stands inside John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, reopened as a hotel whose lounge, split-flap departures board and 1958 Constellation cocktail bar are all free to walk into between flights.
The TWA Flight Center reopened as a hotel in 2019
The TWA Flight Center is the terminal building alongside Terminal 5, opened in 1962 for Trans World Airlines: a concrete shell whose roof spreads out like a pair of wings over a curved glass front. It stopped handling flights in 2001 and sat empty for eighteen years. On 15 May 2019 it reopened as the TWA Hotel, the only hotel inside the airport’s boundaries, with two new towers built behind it so that the original building could be left as it was. Everything at ground level is open whether or not you have a room.
If your connection is long enough to want a bed or a swim rather than a bar, the rooftop pool above the ramp looks straight out over the runways and is heated to 95 degrees through the winter, and a room or a day pass has to be booked ahead rather than sorted out at the desk.
The split-flap departures board in the Sunken Lounge
A mechanical departures and arrivals board stands on a white concrete pedestal at the centre of the TWA Flight Center’s main hall, a few steps down from the floor around it, with a curved bench running along its base. It is the sound rather than the sight that people stop for: the flaps run through the whole board at once, a rattle that lasts a few seconds and then stops dead.
The lounge around it is carpeted in the red Saarinen specified for the building, and the two tubes leading off the hall are lined in the same colour. Those tubes are not decoration: they are how passengers walked to their aircraft in 1962, and one of them now runs through to JetBlue’s Terminal 5, which is why anyone flying from that terminal can reach all of this without going outside.
Connie, a 1958 Constellation parked out front as a bar
A Lockheed Constellation sits on the apron in front of the TWA Flight Center’s glass front, in Trans World Airlines livery, three tail fins and four propellers, built in 1958 and now fitted out inside as a cocktail lounge. The aircraft is the last thing most people expect to be able to walk into at an airport without a boarding pass.
The cabin is narrow by modern standards, which is the point of sitting in it, and the view out of the round windows is the terminal’s roofline. Seats go quickly in the evening when several long-haul departures are boarding at once.
Riding between JFK’s terminals costs nothing
The AirTrain covers eight miles of automated track around the airport, and the fare is only charged when you leave it at Jamaica or Howard Beach. Ride it between terminals as many times as you like and it costs nothing, at any hour, with trains every five to fifteen minutes.
That free loop is what makes this itinerary work from any terminal rather than just Terminal 5, and it is also what makes bag storage here worth thinking about first. This airport keeps no single left-luggage office: the desks are at Terminal 4, staffed around the clock, and Terminal 1, open 7am to 10pm, so a bag left in the wrong building costs an AirTrain ride each way to collect.
If the layover runs past five or six hours and you have somewhere to put the bag, the airport stops being the right answer and the Midtown route from Grand Central becomes the better use of the time: about an hour each way, against twenty minutes to the old terminal and back.
Frequently asked questions
What should I do during a layover near John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) in New York City?
Go to the TWA Hotel, which occupies Eero Saarinen's 1962 terminal building next to Terminal 5 and is the only hotel inside the airport's boundaries. Its ground floor is open to anyone: the Sunken Lounge with its split-flap departures board, the two red-carpeted tubes that used to funnel passengers to their gates, and a 1958 Lockheed Constellation parked outside and fitted out as a cocktail bar. None of that costs anything to walk through. The rooftop pool is the one part that is not free, and it needs a room or a day pass booked in advance. Getting there and back between terminals costs nothing either, because the AirTrain only charges when you leave the airport.
Can I reach the TWA Hotel without leaving the airport?
Yes, and from Terminal 5 you do not even go outdoors: two flight tubes connect the JetBlue terminal directly to the old TWA building, which is how passengers reached their aircraft when the building was a working terminal. From any other terminal, take the AirTrain to the Terminal 5 stop, which is free as long as you stay inside the airport and do not tap out at Jamaica or Howard Beach. You will clear security again on the way back to your gate, so treat the trip as landside and budget for the queue.
Where can I leave a bag at JFK between flights?
In two places, and neither of them is central. Baggage storage at this airport is run terminal by terminal rather than as one left-luggage office: Terminal 4's desk is in the arrivals hall and staffed 24 hours, while Terminal 1's runs 7am to 10pm. Both are landside. If you check a bag in one terminal and your flight goes from another, you are riding the AirTrain back for it, which is fine on a five-hour layover and tight on a two-hour one. Storing it in the city instead only makes sense if you are actually going into the city.
Is the rooftop pool open to people who are not staying at the hotel?
Only with a day pass bought in advance, not by walking up. The pool sits on the roof above the ramp with a straight view over the runways, and it is heated to 95 degrees through the winter, so it runs year round rather than seasonally. Everything else at ground level, the lounge, the tubes, the restaurants and the aircraft bar, needs no booking at all.
Does any of this work in the middle of the night?
Most of it. The AirTrain runs 24 hours a day with trains every five to fifteen minutes, and the old terminal's ground floor and the aircraft bar keep late hours because the hotel is serving passengers on red-eye schedules. The parts that stop are the baggage desk at Terminal 1, shut from 10pm, and the pool. Terminal 4's baggage storage stays open around the clock, which is the one to use if your connection runs overnight.