... I mean, no. It's more that it is weird that there is no train to the airport (it looks like you can take ~3 trains from Manhattan). New York is likely the only really big city in the developed world where this is the case.
In Ireland, everyone thinks it's pretty ridiculous that there's no train to Dublin Airport (all going well, it will finally have one in 2036 or so, after _many_ false starts). Dublin's a city of about 1.5 million people. It's pretty incomprehensible that a city ten times the size wouldn't have one.
There is (since 2023) a train that connects directly from Grand Central to JFK AirTrain.
Airtrain opened in 2003 [1]. It connected to the subway system and, through Jamaica, Penn Station. The novel bit in 2023 was also linking into Grand Central.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AirTrain_JFK
Huh. Google Maps was not showing me that.
EDIT: Oh, wait, misread, I thought you meant a direct train from Grand Central to the airport.
> a direct train from Grand Central to the airport
It’s a single, low-bullshit transfer. Frankfurt Airport also requires a connection for terminals 2 and 3 [1].
[1] https://www.frankfurt-airport.com/en/transport-and-parking/t...