Subways and buses started to roll again in some sections of New York City on Thursday, promising a morning commute at least slightly more fluid than Wednesday’s gridlock brought on byHurricane Sandy.
Subway service had been scheduled to begin at 6 a.m., but a half-hour earlier than scheduled — and not a moment too soon — New York City’s subway system lurched into motion. Service was scheduled to resume on 14 of the city’s 23 subway lines, but several critical lines — the No. 3 and 7 trains and the B, C, E, G and Q trains — remained dark. Many trains will have large gaps in their routes, including the No. 4 train, which will have no service between 42nd Street in Manhattan and Borough Hall in Brooklyn because of flooding in its tunnel beneath the East River and power problems.
Service between the two boroughs is by shuttle bus, with departures from the transportation hub at the Barclays Center and from Hewes Street on the border of Williamsburg and Bedford-Stuyvesant in Brooklyn.
Vehicle traffic was exceptionally heavy as drivers tried to make it into Manhattan before 6 a.m., when the city has required at least three people in every vehicle entering Manhattan over most major bridges, like the Robert F. Kennedy, Manhattan, Brooklyn and Williamsburg Bridges. By 6:30, traffic had cleared up in some areas, but much of the region’s arterial system remained a parking lot as of 7 a.m., with police checkpoints set up in many places to enforce the high-occupancy vehicle rule, except at the George Washington Bridge.
The effects of the storm will take time to unwind throughout the transit system, with commutes that could still take hours, half-mile lines at suburban gas stations and city buses stuffed beyond capacity.
The storm damage had a synergy of its own. Efforts to pump floodwaters from subway and automobile tunnels were slowed by electrical shortages. Hastily arranged car pools became bogged down on highways and city streets clogged with other commuters. Many gas stations, without power to operate their pumps, could not open for business, eerily evoking the fuel crisis of the 1970s.
Only bicycles seemed to be rolling, though treacherously on Thursday in the still-dark caverns of Lower Manhattan.
The delays were “the equivalent of a subway strike with several of our major tunnels closed,” said Samuel I. Schwartz, a former city traffic commissioner known as Gridlock Sam, who said he could recall only one instance — when there was a powerful storm during a transit strike in 1980 — when traffic had been as bad.
On Wednesday, city buses, the only piece of the mass transit network operating in earnest, often bypassed waiting commuters, unable to take on more passengers. Those who did make it on board often got off well before their stop, reasoning that they could walk faster.
“Maybe when it turns green, people will start moving,” Abraham Riesman, 26, said as he rode an M10 bus stopped at a red light along Central Park West. Then the light turned.
“Nope.”
Eric Bourne, 27, waited 30 minutes for the M4 bus at 138th Street and Broadway before he realized there was a path of less resistance: walking to his job at Parsons Dance in Times Square, where he is a modern dancer. Woe was to the less fit.
Parking garages filled early, with lines of cars in front of some gates before they opened near dawn. Diego Trilleras, the manager at a Manhattan Parking Group garage at East 56th Street, said he had not seen such a business boom since before the economic downturn. Some customers, he said, would probably have to wait an hour to get their cars out again. “They understand,” he said hopefully.
With no underground route from Queens to Manhattan and car traffic stalled, some crossed the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge on bike or foot. One Twitter user described cycling over the bridge as “escaping zombie apocalypse.”
Others attempted cab sharing, the delicate art of piling into a yellow taxi with strangers. Some cabs declined. At a red light at 86th Street and Broadway, one man approached several cabs that already had passengers at a red light, and the drivers refused to open their doors. Finally, one cabby rolled down his window. There were three passengers already in the back, but the man persuaded the driver to let him sit in the passenger seat, before the car began staggering downtown.
Subway service had been scheduled to begin at 6 a.m., but a half-hour earlier than scheduled — and not a moment too soon — New York City’s subway system lurched into motion. Service was scheduled to resume on 14 of the city’s 23 subway lines, but several critical lines — the No. 3 and 7 trains and the B, C, E, G and Q trains — remained dark. Many trains will have large gaps in their routes, including the No. 4 train, which will have no service between 42nd Street in Manhattan and Borough Hall in Brooklyn because of flooding in its tunnel beneath the East River and power problems.
Service between the two boroughs is by shuttle bus, with departures from the transportation hub at the Barclays Center and from Hewes Street on the border of Williamsburg and Bedford-Stuyvesant in Brooklyn.
Vehicle traffic was exceptionally heavy as drivers tried to make it into Manhattan before 6 a.m., when the city has required at least three people in every vehicle entering Manhattan over most major bridges, like the Robert F. Kennedy, Manhattan, Brooklyn and Williamsburg Bridges. By 6:30, traffic had cleared up in some areas, but much of the region’s arterial system remained a parking lot as of 7 a.m., with police checkpoints set up in many places to enforce the high-occupancy vehicle rule, except at the George Washington Bridge.
The effects of the storm will take time to unwind throughout the transit system, with commutes that could still take hours, half-mile lines at suburban gas stations and city buses stuffed beyond capacity.
The storm damage had a synergy of its own. Efforts to pump floodwaters from subway and automobile tunnels were slowed by electrical shortages. Hastily arranged car pools became bogged down on highways and city streets clogged with other commuters. Many gas stations, without power to operate their pumps, could not open for business, eerily evoking the fuel crisis of the 1970s.
Only bicycles seemed to be rolling, though treacherously on Thursday in the still-dark caverns of Lower Manhattan.
The delays were “the equivalent of a subway strike with several of our major tunnels closed,” said Samuel I. Schwartz, a former city traffic commissioner known as Gridlock Sam, who said he could recall only one instance — when there was a powerful storm during a transit strike in 1980 — when traffic had been as bad.
On Wednesday, city buses, the only piece of the mass transit network operating in earnest, often bypassed waiting commuters, unable to take on more passengers. Those who did make it on board often got off well before their stop, reasoning that they could walk faster.
“Maybe when it turns green, people will start moving,” Abraham Riesman, 26, said as he rode an M10 bus stopped at a red light along Central Park West. Then the light turned.
“Nope.”
Eric Bourne, 27, waited 30 minutes for the M4 bus at 138th Street and Broadway before he realized there was a path of less resistance: walking to his job at Parsons Dance in Times Square, where he is a modern dancer. Woe was to the less fit.
Parking garages filled early, with lines of cars in front of some gates before they opened near dawn. Diego Trilleras, the manager at a Manhattan Parking Group garage at East 56th Street, said he had not seen such a business boom since before the economic downturn. Some customers, he said, would probably have to wait an hour to get their cars out again. “They understand,” he said hopefully.
With no underground route from Queens to Manhattan and car traffic stalled, some crossed the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge on bike or foot. One Twitter user described cycling over the bridge as “escaping zombie apocalypse.”
Others attempted cab sharing, the delicate art of piling into a yellow taxi with strangers. Some cabs declined. At a red light at 86th Street and Broadway, one man approached several cabs that already had passengers at a red light, and the drivers refused to open their doors. Finally, one cabby rolled down his window. There were three passengers already in the back, but the man persuaded the driver to let him sit in the passenger seat, before the car began staggering downtown.