I kvetch a lot about snow days on this blog, because the North Dakotan girl in me is annoyed and appalled at how my little town in southeast Ohio shuts down as soon as a dozen snowflakes stick to the ground.
But this North Dakotan girl also knows the difference between a snow flurry and a blizzard. When the weather forecasters tell you that a foot and a half of snow is about to whomp your town, you locate your flashlights, make sure you’ve got food in the house, and then you hunker down.
“Hunkering down” ≠ getting in your car and driving.
And so I am amazed and appalled at how New Yorkers compounded their quandary by putting their cars on the streets where snowbanks could form all around them and block the plows. People! When Minneapolis got an equal dump of snow earlier this month, did you see the Minnesotans turning their city streets into impromptu parking lots?
I feel for the folks who are camping out at the airports and train stations. Their predicament was a stroke of rotten luck. But the motorists? Except for those few who were responding to an emergency, they were captured by hubris and willful stupidity, which they then inflicted on the whole city. It makes me think of this very cool puzzle/one-person game my kids got for Christmas,
… except that in real life, there’s negative fun and everyone loses.
Oh, and staying home in a blizzard isn’t a sign of the “wussification of America,” no matter what Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell’s thinks. Real men are smart enough to hunker down during the storm (again: not in their cars!!). They’ll have plenty of chances to prove their mettle when the digging out begins.
Patron cat of Kittywampus (1985-2001)
I may be misconstruing your post, and if that is so I apologize in advance. There isn’t enough parking for New Yorkers to get their cars off of the street. Some folks have to park on the street out of necessity. I remember an ice storm in which I could not dig my car out for 3 or 4 weeks.
As for driving, you’re right, they shouldn’t drive if they don’t have to. However, in their defense, I lived there for 26 years (I moved to SF this past August) and during that span there was only one storm that compared to this recent one. That was in 1996. I can understand how New Yorkers may have underestimated the severity of the weather. These days winter storms are a rarity in that part of the country.
Hi Keith! Yeah, I’ve lived in a city (Berlin) where street parking was virtually the only option. I’m not talking about street parking – I’m talking about the folks who tried to drive at a point where it was just foolhardy.
Maybe the next time a big storm hits New York, the city will need to post policemen to stop drivers and send them home!?
But the government’s response hasn’t been so great, either – see this article at Salon.
rush hour is an excellent game. good choice!