Alfred Pommer's New York City Cultural Walking Tours

Pommer offers public and private walking tours exploring many downtown neighborhoods, focusing on landmarks, history, architecture, and various themes. Some tours include a walk through historical old New York City, an Irish heritage tour, and a tour of famous synagogues and settlement houses on the Lower East side.

http://www.nycwalk.com
Phone: (212) 979-2388
Hours: Private tours by appointment, public tours on Sundays at 2 p.m.
Cost: Private tours, $50/hour for individuals or groups; public tours, $15 per person for a three-hour tour

Arthur Marks' Singing Walking Tours

Marks leads tours in song through downtown neighborhoods and has been at it for 35 years. Check out his food tour of Chinatown, his anecdotal tour of Greenwich Village, or his architectural tour of Tribeca.

Phone: (212) 673-0477

Big Apple Greeter Walking Tours

This service is designed to help visitors to New York who don't know anyone in the city. Big Apple Greeters will provide visitors with their very own enthusiastic New Yorker, who will spend two to four hours with visitors personally pointing out local haunts and teaching them to use the subway. Soon enough, newcomers will be ready to set off on their own.

Phone: (212) 669-8159
Cost: Greeters' services come free of charge, but you are advised to schedule at least three weeks in advance.

Big Onion Walking Tours

Tours focused on certain neighborhoods or various themes lead you through the city's most famous streets. If you're a war buff, you might check out the "New York in War & Peace" tour. And if you're hungry, how about the "Multi-Ethnic Eating Tour-From Naples to Bialystock to Beijing?"

http://www.bigonion.com
Phone: (212) 439-1090
Tour schedules and prices are available on the Big Onion website.

Beyond Times Square Lower Manhattan Tours

These privately led tours can be arranged to fit your schedule, move at your pace, and devote special attention to your interests. Beyond Times Square guides will lead you through Lower Manhattan's past and present, taking you to the World Trade Center site, St. Paul's Chapel, Battery Park, and Trinity Church while recounting the history of the area's early Native American, Dutch, and English inhabitants.

http://www.beyondtimessquare.com/lowermanhattan.htm
Phone: (212) 564-1001 or (800) 999-8160
Email: info@btsq.com
Cost: Per-person rates range from $25 to $75 depending on the number of people in your party. For a full list of rates, visit the Beyond Times Square website.

ChinatownNYC.com Walking Tours

On this tour, Jami Gong, a licensed guide and thirty-year resident of Chinatown, will tell personal stories, relate local legend, and draw on historical anecdotes dating back to the 17th century.

http://www.chinatownnyc.com/walking.html
Hours: Wednesdays at 9 a.m., by appointment only.
Email: Jami@chinatownNYC.com (Individuals can register by email.)
Cost: $15 to $40 per person depending on the package

Discover New York Walking Tours

These tours, sponsored by the Municipal Art Society, are led by architectural and urban historians and explore famous neighborhoods including Little Italy, the Financial District, and the Lower East Side.

http://www.mas.org/viewcategory.php?category=19
Phone: (212) 439-1049, for tour schedules and meeting places;
(212) 935 3960, to make reservations
Cost: Weekday walking tours $12, $10 for MAS members; weekend walking and bus tours $15, $12 for MAS members

Ellis Island Tour with Tom Bernardin

Re-trace the immigrant experience at Ellis Island by joining author and publisher (The Ellis Island Immigrant Cookbook) and former Ellis Island National Park Service ranger Tom Bernardin for a guided tour. Both groups and individuals are welcome.

Phone: (212) 229-0202
Hours: Contact Bernardin directly to schedule tour times.
Cost: $20 per person, $250 minimum. Individuals can register at http://www.zerve.com/EllisIsland/Ellis. Groups, contact Bernardin directly or email ellisbook@aol.com.

I'll Take Manhattan Walking Tours

Tours lasting from two to three hours are conducted by licensed guide Anthony Grifa and focus on the history, culture, architecture, and landmarks of several neighborhoods including Chinatown, Soho, and Tribeca.

http://www.newyorkcitywalks.com
Phone: (732) 270-5559
Hours: Consult website for days and times.
Cost: $15 per person

The Lower East Side Conservancy

Resident-guided Lower East Side tours inform youths, adults on area's Jewish history and current life. Access to Bialystoker along with other synagogues and landmarks highlight this tour.

http://www.nycjewishtours.org
Phone: (212) 374-4100
Hours: Monday-Thursday 9:30 am 5:30pm Friday 9:30 am - 3:00 pm.
Cost: View website for tour details

New York City Vacation Packages Historical Walking Tour of Lower Manhattan

Each weekend morning at 9:00 a.m., New York City Vacation Packages runs a walking tour of Historic Lower Manhattan. Participants meet in a convenient mid-town location and travel together by subway to the start of the tour in Battery Park. This three-hour tour heads up Broadway with detours on Wall Street and the World Trade Center site before ending in City Hall Park.

http://www.nycvp.com/ground_zero1.html
Phone: (888) 692-8701

Hours: 9 a.m., every Saturday and Sunday. To make reservations, call or consult the NYC Vacation Packages website.
Cost: $19 per personhildren under 12, $12.

Private Walking Tours by Michelle and James Nevius

Providing personalized attention at affordable rates to fit your schedule and pace, historians and licensed New York sightseeing guides Michelle and James Nevius lead two tours focused specifically on the downtown area.

The first focuses on the "Best of Lower Manhattan," including stops at spots of historical and present-day significance such as Wall Street, Trinity Church, St. Paul’s Chapel, and the old Custom House, as well as notable residential neighborhoods and parks. The second focuses on the rich history of the Five Points district, at the center of Martin Scorcese's film, the Gangs of New York, and Jacob Riis's book, How the Other Half Lives. Both make use of vintage drawings and historical photographs to help provide a visual image of the past along the way.

http://www.walknyc.com
Phone: (877) 572-9719
Cost: $15 per person (with a $60 minimum for two, three, or four people)

Talking Street™ Cell-Phone Walking Tour of Lower Manhattan & World Trade Center Site

For tour takers looking to explore downtown at their own pace, this Alliance for Downtown New York-sponsored cell phone walking tour includes both historic and modern-day accounts of downtown, including information about the rise of the skyscraper, the stock market crash of 1929, and the World Trade Center site, among other things. Hosted by celebrity tour guide Sigourney Weaver, the two-hour tour stops at 16 downtown locations and is complete with historic audio excerpts, interviews, dramatic readings, original music, and more. For more information, please visit the Alliance for Downtown New York website or www.talkingstreet.com.

http://www.downtownny.com/default.aspx?sid=48
Phone: (212) 586-TOUR (8687)
Cost: $5.95 (plus any applicable regular service charges from your cell-phone provider)

Timeline Touring

From tenements and pushcarts, to condominiums and stockbrokers: the Lower East Side spans over a century of Jewish life in New York City. With an expert guide and a few hours, you can travel back in time to the streets your parents, grandparents, or great-grandparents walked as immigrants at the turn of the century.

http://www.timelinetouring.com
Phone: 1-800-758-0098/718-339-2302
Cost: View website for tour details

Wall Street Walking Tour

This free 90-minute guided tour, presented by the Alliance for Downtown New York, explores the history and architecture of our first national capital and the center of world finance.

Tours begin at the front steps of the U.S. Customs House, 1 Bowling Green.
Phone: (212) 606-4064
Hours: Every Thursday and Saturday at 12 p.m.
Cost: Free