New York City didn’t take a direct hit from Sandy last night. Indeed, that happened some 150 miles to the south. Nonetheless, it was clear that the city was going to be impacted in a major way when water started flooding into the low lying areas around Battery Park and, eventually, into the subway tunnels. Now, it looks like it’s going to take an awful lot of work for a transportation system that nearly the entire city relies upon to get back up and running:
The New York City subway system, hit by unprecedented damage from the storm, will remain closed for “a good four or five days,” and schools will be closed again on Wednesday, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said Tuesday morning.
The mayor said, however, that he hoped some bus service would be restored by Tuesday afternoon, and that he hoped to announce full restoration of bus service by Wednesday.
As I noted yesterday, the primary reason for this is the impact that sea water has when it comes into contact with the switches and other sensitive electrical equipment that are omnipresent in the system. One wonders what the impact would’ve been if Sandy had struck further north.
