There Is Basically No Snow In New York — But, Absurdly, The Entire City Is Shut Down

[mystery-ak]

http://www.businessinsider.com/no-snow-new-york-shut-down-2015-1

There Is Basically No Snow In New York — But, Absurdly, The Entire City Is Shut Down

    Henry Blodget

    Jan. 27, 2015, 7:41 AM



Careful out there, New Yorkers. It's a little slippery.

I haven't seen official snowfall totals yet, but judging from a glance out the window, it looks as if New York City might have gotten about 6 inches Monday night.

Meanwhile, the entire city is shut down.

Schools, government, public transportation, private transportation, and — by virtue of the lack of transportation — most offices and businesses.

It's just absurd.

I've lived in New York for almost my whole life — 48 years and counting. I have seen the city weather many actually large snowstorms, including a 26-incher just a few years go. The city stayed open through all of them. The garbage-trucks-turned-snow-plows drove until the streets were clear enough for adventurous buses, trucks, and cars. The subways and buses ran. Airports remained mostly open. Homeowners shoveled their walks. Pedestrians navigated big snow piles and slush lakes. Car owners waited until they just couldn't wait any longer and then chipped their cars out of the massive ice-walls that had built up around them.

In short, the city slowed down for a little while. And, maybe, in extreme circumstances, schools shut down for a day or two. But the whole city never closed.

And this wasn't because massive snowstorms weren't forecast, by the way.

I can remember as a kid many times hearing excitement build at school about an impending blizzard that might blast the city and give us all an unplanned vacation day (and, at the same time, force parents with jobs and plans to scramble to figure out what to do with us). I can remember staying up late into the night, peering out my window into the snow, hoping enough would pile up that, early the next morning, just before I had to leave for school, the call would finally come.

But it rarely did.

Because snowstorms are hard to forecast. And reports of huge dumps are often wrong.

But by early evening Monday, with this storm already later and smaller than expected, this entire city had already been shut down.

I understand that one job of politicians is to "protect the people." I understand that they want to appear responsive and proactive, lest they later be accused of slacking on the job.

But there's a difference between serving the public by providing basic emergency services in a timely and responsive manner and becoming a nanny state.

And at least today, New York has become a nanny state.

[Bigun]

They are getting what they voted for IN SPADES!

[truth_seeker]

I lived in the Rocky Mountain states as a kid. I cannot remember anything approaching the hype which the media delivers, every time a turn of weather comes along.

"Worst drought of the century, worst rainstorm of the century, worst heat spell of the century, worst blizzard of the century," ad infinitum.

Seems to me the motivating factor may be government employee unions, and the employees themselves, pushing for more overtime. What better strategy than to shout fear and panic every few months, and to promise to provide the solutions?

And of course a complicit low information media, quick to see the 24 hour emergency beacons and related opportunity.

Maybe the Chamber of Commerce could assert itself, and say "what's with shutting down all the businesses, keeping our customers scared, etc.?"

Maybe parents could assert themselves, and tell the schools they don't want the kids to lose out on studies, unless a true emergency arrives.

[PzLdr]

There may be little or no snow in NYC, but out here on the North Fork of Long Island, we got 2' +. Last time I looked, we were in New York, too.

[truth_seeker]

There may be little or no snow in NYC, but out here on the North Fork of Long Island, we got 2' +. Last time I looked, we were in New York, too.

Okay, so is 2' + a once in a lifetime record breaking situation, to shut down all transportation, etc.?

[Right_in_Virginia]

There may be little or no snow in NYC, but out here on the North Fork of Long Island, we got 2' +. Last time I looked, we were in New York, too.

Yes you are.  But no where near the Big Apple.

[ABX]

My boss said he got about 6" in NYC Sunday night. He has lived there all his life and was expecting a big storm, not because of the media but because it is expected in NYC this time of year.

Yea, the media went nutso with the story, but they do that with every story these days.

76 here in East Texas today.

[rangerrebew]

So!  Scientists can't predict with any real degree of regularity what the weather will be in 6 hrs. but will have no problem telling us what the earth will be like in 50 years?  Those global warming "scientists" must be hiding some magical knowledge no one else knows about.