River Side Laundromat

When I lived in Ossining, I rented the apartment above this laundry facility. My former landlady and family own the building, and her son owns the laundromat. They are really wonderful people and my apartment was beautiful, updated and very clean. Same is true of the laundromat. If you rent and have no washer /​dryer in your unit (which is often the case in Westchester apartments), this location for me was the next best thing. And — better and cleaner than most on site laundry facilities in apartment complexes.
This place is pretty newly renovated and kept spotlessly clean. Instead of having to carry around a ton of quarters or hope the machine making change is working, they have machines where you are dispensed a laundry card, which you can load money on using cash or a credit or debit card.
All of the machines are new and kept in working order. All of the carts are clean and work fine. The place is spacious, quiet, safe and well lit. Air conditioned /​heated to be very comfortable any time of year. And I need to mention again — VERY clean.
There is always a staff member on hand, they work extremely hard and are so very helpful. I especially remember a very sweet lady, Gladys. When the place wasn’t busy, she would sometimes help me fold my clothes. Another time, she helped me carry my stuff upstairs.
There was also a great wash and fold service I ended up using instead of doing my own laundry. Very reasonably priced per pound, I’d drop off my dirty clothes on my way to work in the morning and pick everything up when I came home. My clothes looked beautiful and were perfectly folded in ways I simply lack the skill or the patience to ever, ever do. Worth every penny and what a great time saver /​lifesaver for me.

Nice, big, clean space with tons of machines. There are a few TVs to keep you occupied if you stay and didn’t bring reading material or a friend to pass the time. The smallest washers are $ 2.49, which in my opinion is steep because I used to pay $ 1.25 per load, but we’re not in Brooklyn anymore, Toto, so I guess I have to suck it up. I have no idea how much other laundromats in the area are charging. The smallest dryers are still pretty large and are 29 cents per 10 min. I needed about 40 min to dry a load that included several sets of bed sheets and a duvet cover, a small blanket, 3 weeks worth of dirty clothes (because that’s how lazy I had been), and many towels. The only other gripe I had was that the card machine was refusing to accept my bills, which were in good condition, so that was annoying because it would have been nice to use up my petty cash to do laundry. So maybe bring a debit/​credit card as backup in case the machine is moody and doesn’t feel like accepting bills.

Needing to do laundry at a laundromat is always somewhat of a pain and an inconvenience. At least if the facility you do it at is nice, it makes the whole thing a bit less onerous.
River Side Laundromat’s facility is nice enough that it prompted me to even write a review of it. I’ve used a number of different laundromats in my day, and even another in Ossining (Chilmark), and this is by far my favorite.
The facility is large and spacious. It’s clean and well-​lit, and has several security cameras. It looks either relatively new, or newly renovated (and tastefully so). I’ve only been going there a few months, so I don’t know which it is. There are a lot of machines available to use (about 2 dozen of each of the washers and dryers). The washers are available in 60, 30 and 20lb sizes, and the dryers come in two sizes, I believe 50 and 30lbs.
One of the best features is the lack of coin-​operation. River Side Laundromat uses a card system. You can get a free card, which you can charge through one of two machines in the building. You can charge the card with cash or credit/​debit card, with however much money you want. No more dragging bags of quarters around, or hoping that the bill changer isn’t out of order.
The machines run well. I was especially glad to find that the dryers are very efficient. I detest running a drying cycle, and having laundry come out quite damp, even after almost an hour, which has happened at other places before. Here, I use the largest machine, on the highest heat setting, and things are DRY after 30 minutes, excepting maybe very dense (or sandwiched) fabrics like very thick towels or blankets.
There’s always a staff member on site. When I’ve been, it’s always the same friendly lady. When I went to do laundry during one of the frequent snow storms this past winter season, it was empty at the laundromat besides her. She had nothing to do with nobody dropping off laundry, and even helped me fold all my laundry!
The prices are pretty reasonable. You pay $ 2.49 for the smallest washer, $ 5.49 for the 30lb, and $ 6.99 for the 60lb washers. I don’t know what the cheapest dryer costs, but the largest one is $ 0.49 per 10 minutes, and I’ve rarely needed to dry anything more than half an hour.
There are also several flat-​screen TV’s to watch while the clothes spin around if you didn’t bring your own entertainment with you. If the need strikes you, there is a restroom available on-​site, and there’s a vending machine for a quick snack. Parking is on the street, and usually if it’s not rush hour, you can park right in front of the building, or close to it. There’s also a municipal lot diagonally across the street.
As you spend money there, you accrue points, and after a certain amount of points, you get a bonus amount of money deposited onto your card. A frequent user incentive.
Anyway, highly recommended!