Northeast Starts to Shake Off Storm

In cities and towns across the Northeast and other regions Sunday, residents began shrugging off the crippling effects of the first major blizzard in five years to sweep through the region.

After touring snow-covered Philadelphia, Mayor John Street lifted an order that had allowed only emergency vehicles into the downtown area, which crews continued plowing and salting Sunday.

Severe cold still gripped Arkansas, hit by a crippling ice storm a week ago at Christmas that knocked out power there and in neighboring states. A utility company worker was killed Saturday in Texarkana, on the Texas border, while trying to restore electricity, officials reported Sunday.

The three major airports around New York City--all of which were shut down by snow for most of Saturday--each had at least two runways cleared by evening, although LaGuardia was using only one runway because of high wind, said Allen Morrison, spokesman for the Port Authority for New York and New Jersey. There also were a significant number of canceled flights, he said.

“It will probably take another day to get back to normal,” said Bob McHugh, a spokesman for Continental Airlines, which has a hub at the Newark, N.J., airport.

About 700 people stayed overnight at the Continental terminal, McHugh said. Morrison said his agency provided 200 cots and 500 blankets to stranded passengers at LaGuardia’s main terminal.

Jennifer Roe, 27, a high school math teacher from Houston who was home in New York for the holidays, was considering renting a car Sunday and driving back to Texas. She had tried--and failed--to secure a standby seat on about half a dozen planes out of Newark International Airport.

“I have a job, and people depend on me,” Roe said after she heard there might not be room for her on a flight until Wednesday--the day students are scheduled to return to school in her district.

Saturday’s storm dumped as much as 25 inches of snow in the northern New Jersey town of Randolph; more than half a foot had accumulated in parts of eastern Pennsylvania; parts of western Connecticut had 15 inches; and state police in western Massachusetts reported near whiteout conditions Saturday afternoon.

In New York’s Central Park, 12 inches had accumulated--a record for the date--before the snowfall eased and began turning to slush.

By Sunday morning, bus service in and out of Manhattan’s Port Authority had resumed, and New Jersey Transit trains to Manhattan were running again. Buses were back on their routes throughout the state by 5 a.m., New Jersey Transit spokeswoman Penny Bassett Hackett said.

Cleanup crews continued a snow removal marathon. In Manhattan, city workers did the job with 1,600 snowplows and 352 salt spreaders. Crews in New Jersey set about clearing the state’s highways with about 700 plows, Department of Transportation spokesman John Dougarian said. At the peak of the storm, more than twice that number were on the state’s major roads.

“We’re moving mountains of snow around,” said Lanny Rider, manager of airport operations at LaGuardia. “And as soon as we build a big pile, we have to do something with that pile.”

National Guard troops were rallied to help in New York. There were 95 guard personnel deployed around the state Sunday afternoon, said Joe Conway, a spokesman for Gov. George Pataki. Extra crews from the Department of Transportation, Department of Environmental Conservation and Parks Department also were mobilized.

“In classic New Yorker fashion, the people of our state pulled together in a heroic cooperative effort to overcome this major winter storm,” Pataki said.

The region’s last big storm was Jan. 7, 1996, when 19 inches of snow fell on New York City. Last winter, the city got a mere 13 inches for the entire season.

While tourists reveled in the winter wonderland Saturday night, city officials were bulldozing snow out of Times Square in preparation for the New Year’s Eve celebration. Side streets were closed so snowplows could create snowdrifts 12 feet high in the middle of the street. Massive front-end loaders then piled the snow onto specialized snow-melting trucks, which sent the resulting water into city sewers.