Meriden to West Hartford is about 20 minutes but the train to NYC is 2 hours. Anything north of New Haven is good for WHTFD but sucks for NY. South is the opposite. I use to live in Orange CA and work in LA. It was horrible. 5 hours round trip and it was only about 40 miles away. Just turned down 2 jobs in NY paying in the 250k range. I'm too old for that headache. Good luck, it's a tough decision.