This thread has covered the consequences of the of preparations foor Sandy. Will edit the existing post now to give the resulting new plans for future storms. These plans will be posted on this original post as plans become known hopefully froom the agenceys themselves.
Have not located NJT’s plan but here is Bergan record summary.
adding the article of what NYC TA did before & after
Um, you’re providing links to something inside your web email. That’s not going to work for anyone but you.
sorry here is latest AMTRAK BULLETIN – guess all MARC & VRE will be cancelled ??
CSX shutting down north of richmond and east of brunswick md.
NJ TRANSIT SHUT DOWN NOTICE
http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2012/10/road_rail_and_air_travel_shutt.html#incart_m-rpt-2>
NYC transit shuts down at 7;00 PM sunday night subways included
MARC SHUTS DOWN RAIL AND BUS
http://mta.maryland.gov/advisories/hurricane-sandy-customer-advisory
septa will be shut down by 0100 mondday morning
http://www.septa.org/realtime/status/system-status.shtml
here is announcement of all NY MTA services
shore line east shut down monday since AMTRAK OPERATES THE SERVICE
http://www.shorelineeast.com/index.php
MBTA ( BOSTON ) operating normally (?) monday except no boat service.
Danny was in 1997. It’s too late to prepare.
Thats what I get for having a relative named danny. Corrected title
I have never ever seen such advance suspension of services anywhere…and this is not only one metropolitan area but all areas from Boston south through Richmond! There is at least a 24 hour advance suspension in all these places for subway, commuter rail, rapid transit, even bus services. Is this too extreme? Could today have been a regular business day with the suspensions beginning at say 10PM or even 12M (nothing allowed to run as long as schedule terminated no later than 12M)? Is this overreacting or just good preparedness?
Not being part of the preparedness teams, it is difficult to say whether they are overreacting.
The large electric utility that I worked for had a storm center, which was staffed when a major storm was headed our way. Some said that we tended to overreact to a pending storm, but prior experience told us that if we did not get on top of it, there were plenty of lawyers who would subsequently make us wish that we had.
a flooded Hoboken terminal
https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/396286_470606992961728_1852508693_n.jpg
empty NYC train stations
Thanks for the pictures, Streak. I especially enjoyed the ones of an empty Grand Central Terminal. Several years ago I remember a noreaster that put water in Hoboken Terminal up to the public telephones.
The Balto-Wash Metro area has had rain since about 5 PM on Sunday afternoon with intensity increasing as time wears on. It is now 5 PM Monday - rain has been at a steady heavy intensity of probably 1/4 to 1/2 inch per hour - winds have been blowing since early morning - sufficient to hear it roar through the trees. How many trees will withstand the wind force for how long with the continuing softening ground is the question.
Getting trains to the Metro area in the morning would have been no problem - emptying the Metro are in the afternoon may be a totally different story.
Blue Streak, as I remember, the stairs down to the PATH Hudson Tubes was right there at Hoboken. I would hate to think of seawater cascading down the stairs unabated.
It has happened before…
It is not extreme. Takes time to secure equipment, try to waterproof or move to high ground critical stuff. They don’t just park the trains in a yard and hope for the best.
If the Battery got 12 foot surge…and Hoboken the Square Mile City is underwater and isolated, I wonder if NJT moved everything out of the yards and hauled it out to the hinterlands and hills along the old EL rights of way and yards…From what I can see, anywhere on the Newark division was (is) underwater but Hoboken Division has places to stash above water lines…of course, it also has trees and debris. On the east shore of the Hudson, both the LIRR and MNRR are so close to water and water courses, there is almost no place to hide except maybe up the Harlem, Danbury, and New Canan branches. SEPTA also suffers from a lot of water level or low level lines…
All of the tracks at Hoboken Terminal are reported to be under water along with large parts of the whole city. The below link includes a picture of the Hoboken PATH station with water pouring out of elevator doors at the turnstiles:
http://blogs.wsj.com/metropolis/2012/10/29/hoboken-in-dissaray-calls-for-national-guard-help/
Interesting tidbid. I read that the signal system cabinets on NJT at Hoboken got flooded and all the electronics need to be replaced (Ouch $$$). I’ve also read where Conrail pulled the electronics from the Port Reading Secondary signal system on Monday because of concerns about flooding. (smart!)
I haven’t heard that…but it does sound reasonable…I did hear that Public Service Electric did shut down power plants ahead of the storm because when working any water or other strikes could damage the equipment in use which cause them to take longer to come back afterward. They are drying out the equipment now. BUt I wonder if lines were not under power, how their monitoring system could work…I suppose knowing there are so many trees down, a monitoring system is superfluous anyway.
If you click on the below link, scroll to the yellow cabs and click on the right thumbnail you will see a distant view of Hoboken Terminal.
http://www.nj.com/hobokennow/index.ssf/2012/10/hoboken_fire_department_kept_b.html
No doubt you are familiar with it, Henry. For those who are not the waiting room is in the green (copper clad) building just to the right of the clock tower. The main entrance is in the center of the building you see. Further to the right and next to the large posts is the wall of the train sheds with 17 or 18 tracks in back of it. Off to the left are ferry slips. (Hoboken Terminal is actually a ferry terminal that accommodates a rail terminal). The concourse at the head of the tracks is not visible because of the strange large post in the front. I have read reports that the water was about 5 feet high in the concourse but here it looks more like about 2 feet high.
PS. The Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad built the Hoboken Terminal in 1907 mainly for its Morris and Essex Line. In the 60’s the DL&W merged with the Erie Railroad to become the Erie Lackawana and the Erie’s Main Line and Bergen County line (which runs up to Port Jervis) began to use the terminal. These lines along with the Montclair Boonton line and the Pascak Valley Line still use Hoboken Terminal. Some Morris and Essex and Montclair Boonton trains also run into New York Penn Station.
Web sites www.NJTransit.com and www.MNRR.com, www.LIRR.com and www.MTA.com all have bits of information. Basically, SEPTA operations went back at noon Tuesday, but the NYC area is in bad shape. NJT reports the bridges hit on the NJCL and washouts on the NJCL and Atlantic City lines; trees across the tracks and wires down (catenary presumably) all over; power to the computer system that “operates the railroad” along with back up power, etc. have all been flooded making things difficult to ascertain. Other than the specifics on the Coast and Atlantic City lines and the loss of the operations computers, very they are revealing very little…including the snake bit Port Jervis line and the Pascack Valley line they operate for MNRR. MNRR is showing pictures on its site of the flooding at Harmon and elsewhere on the Hudson LIne, several locations on the Harlem Line and the New Cannan branch, as well as pics of the LIRR’s Oyster Bay branch tree across the track, some washouts, and the flooding of West Side Yard…just west of NYP…in Manhattan. Subways and PATH all suffering from salt water covering the track and third rail power and needs to be “cleaned” before even thinking of running power through much less a train. MNRR did run a diesel powered inspection train on the Harlem but I got that from posted pictures on Facebook.
As an aside…as far as the computer being flooded and all power and back up power non existant. Few people knew this, but the DL&W RR had a back up dispatchers office at Denville, NJ station with two desks and complete phone and telegraph connections so that if anything ever happened in Hoboken, the were still able to operate everything from Denville. It was a double desk, back to back, so that the dispatchers would have faced each other and was located in the ticket office to the M&E track side. Telephones, earphones, telegraph keys, and the code dialers were all there! EL pulled i