Results tagged “hurricanefrances”

While this morning's commute seems better, most mass transit riders are still confused, frustrated and even betrayed by the subway system and other rail service coming to a stand still during the Wednesday morning rush hour. The MTA admitted that the service was not acceptable on many accounts, from the flooding to the fact that the MTA's website was overwhelmed. Then there's also the fact that the MTA was urging people not to take the subways and opt for a bus instead, only for buses to be (A) few and far between and (B) crowded as anything.

Today's morning subway and bus commute should be a lot smoother (unless you need to stop at Grand Central) than yesterday's messy commute. There were a number of subway disruptions and diversions due to flooding from the rain, which left many straphangers frustrated. But why did pouring rain stop the subway? Well, here's what the MTA says:

NYC Transit utilized portable pumps and pump trains to help clear 600 feet of 2-foot-deep water across all four tracks on the Queens Boulevard line near 65th Street in Queens today. As a result, service was restored on the E, F and R lines just before rush hour, although commuters should expect some delays.

Love it! The MTA's board says free newspapers are what caused subway flooding in 2004. Which contradicts an April report from the MTA's inspector general, who found that the agency was at fault for severe flooding that shut down much subway service on a September day (September 8, 2004 - when Hurricane Frances came to town and wreaked transit havoc). The April report noted the MTA's "historic neglect" of valves, difficulties Transit Authority first responders had in arriving to the scene, lack of TA command centers, and trash and muck clogging drains. MTA board member Barry Feinstein, however, said, "These hand-distributed free newspapers have been and continue to be a major cause of clogging the drains."

Because it looks to be a truly glorious day today, Gothamist would like to take a few moments to comment about last night's sudden torrential rain. Rain is good - it washes away dog poop on the sidewalk, leaving it fresh and clean to be soiled all over again. But it's not good at some subway stations, when it becomes like a water park ride. Reader Sacha sent us the photograph at top of Penn Station that illustrates the issue. At Columbus Circle's uptown 1 platform, we'd say that 40-50% of platform was huge puddles and pouring rain so everyone was crowded in other places - we took the photograph below at rush hour! It's unclear whether the MTA can do anything besides try to continue its usual maintenance (which they didn't during the 2004 Hurricane Frances subway flooding) and, yes, the MTA's hydraulics are already very overworked, but we're dreamers that there would be some other drainage option.

- TA divisions didn't set up command centers to aid communications with crews, to track problems and to monitor progress.Our favorite is how Transit Authority first responders are supposed to use the subway - classic!

How was your commute? Did you wear the galoshes? Gothamist on whether subways have drains and the wet and cranky commute last September. And just think - there would be so much pretty (but soon gross and slushy) snow if it were just, like, 15 degrees colder.

- September 11, three years later: What the city did and Go Bags are still a big deal to the city

Don't let the 7-3 score (box score) fool you, it might have been somewhat close (for the Mets), but they only had three hits and had two errors. Quality baseball from players. Tom Glavine pitched five innings, giving up four runs and eight hits in the loss.

Hurricane news seems to be all we have been talking about but with good reason. Florida is digging out again from its latest unwelcome visitor, Hurricane Frances. It wasn't quite as strong as Charlie, but its enormous mass covered pretty much the entire state and moved so slowly dumping an enormous amount of rain over 20 inches in some areas. The weakened tropical storm (now depression) Frances looks to be headed up towards western Pennsylvania over the next couple of days where it is expected to peter out and bring some clouds and showers to the area but nothing all that significant.

Tonight, the Mets take on the Florida Marlins, who have won seven consecutive, in Miami. With any luck on the part of the Mets, the game will be rained out by the remnants of Hurricane Frances. Better yet, maybe they can finally scrape out a win.

Frances can not only move, it can remove. Hurricane Frances continues to slowly make her way toward Florida this morning. The hurricane has weakened a bit but is still a dangerous storm.

- And there's still a war going on in Iraq

Our weather: nice.

Partly cloudy, warm and humid. The chance of showers and thundershowers will grow through the weekend as a week cold front approaches. If you go out for a walk on Sunday you'll be most comfortable in the muggy conditions wearing light-colored, loose-fitting clothes. Sweat evaporates much faster from microfiber polyester than from cotton. The evaporation will keep you cooler so break out the high tech clothes.