Nor'easter Pounds New York - Schools Closed as a Snow Day

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As of this writing, snow has returned and is coming down really hard, well, by local standard, fat flakes are swirling due to the wind.  I've just arrived back home from my early venture outdoors, my school has decided to close after all.  

This piece will be revised as updates are posted and photos are added to it. 

See New York weather.   New Yorkers, call 311 for local updates.

Earlier this morning, I could hear and see the snowplows rumbling along on my street since 6:30 AM.  Visibility is low for a view of the Hudson River.

“We’re comfortable that today’s a day for a snow day,” Joel I. Klein, the City Schools Chancellor, said earlier during a morning interview with WCBS-TV

This is the first time since 2004  that the City public schools are closed across five boroughs due to a major snowstorm.

The majority of private schools with the exception of Catholic schools, rarely closes for inclement weather, or even in crisis such as 9/11/01.

Central Park has recorded seven inches as I'm sure all the kids and adults will have a great time playing in the snow as schools are closed for a rare snow day.  The Morningside Park was also blanketed by snow earlier this morning. 

New York City's parks are the children's and adults' playgrounds whenever there is a snowstorm.  The kids in my neighborhood were heading out toward the local park with their colorful flyers and shovels. 

John F. Kennedy, La Guardia, and Newark International airports remain open, although several hundred flights have already been canceled.  The trains and buses are running, but very slow.  As for the pedestrians, I can vouch that it isn't exactly fun.

As of last night, the city was braced once again for hopefully, the last snowstorm of the season when Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said at a news conference on all local television channels, "It's the first of March, which you know is the month that we say comes in like a lion and out like a lamb. And while it is too soon to be counting sheep, it’s pretty clear that the lions are getting ready to roar, if you like that.”

According to officials of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, there are plenty of salt and sand because so far, New York only has a total of 19 inches of snow for this winter.

The Port Authority had planned to dispatch more than 300 pieces of heavy snow equipment, including melters and plows at the airports, and approximately 60 for bridges and tunnels, including 28 for the George Washington Bridge alone.

According to Mayor Bloomberg, the City Department of Sanitation snowplow drivers will have traveled 6,000 miles by the time they finished clearing all the streets of New York, including all the boroughs.

Related article:

Rachel Nixon: Flight Delays, Cancellations in US Snowstorm; List of Airports