New York City Rediscovers Winter,And Not Everybody Is Happy About It

This screen grab of a New York City webcam on Friday 
looked peaceful enough, but some New Yorkers are 
not handling the toughest winter in recent memory
very well. It gets very cold again this weekend. 

Snow and winter cold that just won't go away is driving some New Yorkers batty. 

As many of us know, almost a foot snow and sleet fell on New York City back on January 25 and it has just sat there. Stubbornly. Daring for people to say mean things about it as it turns gray, yellow, slushy and gross. 

Mean things are also being said about the air temperatures, which has been consistently colder than it's been in yeats. 

And those mean things are being said. 

Egged on by the New York Post, a right wing, Murdoch owned publication, New Yorkers, mostly of MAGA ilk are enraged that snow is still narrowing sidewalks, making parking difficult and is just plain nasty to look at, now that it's been sitting around getting dirty for more than a week.

Trash bags are still out there too, as the sanitation department focused on clearing snow, so some trash pickups were delayed.

All that snow I'm sure is frustrating to New Yorkers. But it's mostly really about the Post and MAGA trying to do anything to take leftie Mayor Zohran Mamdani down a peg. Because he's - gasp! a democratic socialist. 

Hizzoner probably hasn't done a perfect job with this winter storm. No mayor would. But from my vantage point, he's done pretty well from what I can see. But what do I know? I'm just a hick from Vermont who has plenty of room to throw snow out of the way if I need to. 

The complaints seem to center on the fact that in past big storms the snow disappeared from the streets pretty quickly after big storms. 

Which is true. 

But the whiners don't seem to understand the concept of thawing. 

The temperature in New York has remained near or below freezing since the storm hit on January 25 and 26. Most past storms featured warmer, thawing weather right after the storm.

The complainers point to a 27 inch blizzard on January 23, 2016. That one was more than twice as deep as this year's snowfall, but it disappeared fairly quickly. It was above freezing in New York every day after that snowstorm. It was 47 degrees on January 27, 56 degrees on January 31 and a toasty 60 on February 1

Snow depth fell to just six inches within a week after the storm. By February 2, only a trace remained. 

It's not like everybody is complaining. A lot of New Yorkers just say fughetaboutit

On Threads, a New Yorker very reasonably wrote: "All these people talking about yellow snow and dirty snow. Garbage piled up. This is how it has always been after a snowstorm. For decades. It doesn't make it right. It just makes it true. Don't blame Mamdani. Don't blame the MTA. Understand that it takes time to remove snow in a city this size."

Other people got deliciously sarcastic on line:

"After TWO WEEKS there's STILL snow in Central Park, New York City! When will Mamdani get rid of it! Another epic fail!" 

The writer made clear this was indeed sarcasm, so other people mockingly piled on poor Mayor Mamdani. 

"Why hasn't Mamdani made the temperature go above 40 degrees yet?"

"And when will that monster finally put the leaves back on the trees?"

"Socialism brings snow. Why do you think Russia has so much snow?"

"Snow never existed before he was mayor. He cast a spell to create this thing called snow."

"Wasn't he to blame for the blizzard of '96?"

Mamdani was four years old when the blizzard of 1996, so it of course makes perfect sense that this notorious storm was his fault. 

CLEANUP CONTINUES

 New York has alternate side parking rules in which people need to park on one side of the street some days, and other side on different days. This allows for street cleaning.

The city suspended the rules after the big snowstorm on January 25-26. But the suspension ends on Super Bowl Sunday - this weekend -  and quite a few cars are buried under snow and ice. Those buried cars will need to be moved by then, or there will be towing and serious expenses for those car owners. 

It was fairly mild by this winters standards in New York Thursday and Friday which softened the ice encasing the cars a little. That was everybody's last chance to dig out their vehicles. With another intense blast of Arctic cold surging into New York, the ice around those cars is no doubt hard as concrete again. Good luck getting rid of that.   

I'm sure there will be plenty more whining when the expensive parking tickets and towing hit on Monday. 

NO FERRIES

Ferry service on the Hudson and East Rivers have been suspended for a week and that's not going to change anytime soon.  So much ice has built up around Manhattan island that it's too unsafe for ferries to operate.

The ice diminished around Manhattan this week, but it's still there. And those frigid conditions forecast for the weekend mean that you're not going to take the famous Staten Island Ferry or any other ferries for awhile yet if you're around New York. 

At least New York is in for a minor break, anyway. After this cold snap clears out, daytime temperatures most of this week will be in the 30s. 

New York Mayor Gets High Marks For Handling Snowstorm; Politicians In History, Not So Much

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, right
seen shoveling snow during this week's winter
storm. Many mayors have gotten in trouble
through inept handling of such storms, but
Mamdani got high marks in how he managed
his first big winter storm as mayor. 

 New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani hasn't been in office for quite a month yet. And he's already faced down a problem that has quickly ended or at least trashed the careers of many big city mayors: A winter storm. 

John Lindsay, Michael Bloomberg, and Bill DeBlasio all caught heat, so to speak, for their handling of New York City snowstorms. Mayors of other cities have flailed in the snow, too.     

This weekend's storm dumped nearly a foot of snow and sleet on the Big Apple 

It looks like the brand new mayor of the Big Apple survived his first test. 

Mamdani is a master of communication, judging for a video he released to social media on Saturday, the day before the storm. 

There he was in a sanitation department garage, with all the garbage trucks all retrofitted to become snow trucks. The video was professional produced, complete with optimistic background music, and skillful editing. 

The city deployed 2,000 workers on 12 hours shifts. The city sent out 700 salt spreaders and over 2,000 plows 

Mamdani also made sure he was seen in public monitoring the storm, even helping people shovel out on occasion. He held press conferences to provide updates. He made sure he was the public face of the New York storm, and messaged that he was on top of it. 

Stateandcityny.com tells us

"From the early hours of Sunday morning to well into the evening, Mamdani traversed the city, shoveling snow, greeting and thanking sanitation workers, posing for photo ops, providing updates via television interviews and hosting a news conference."

The New York Times headline was "Mamdani Clears Early Hurdles as Storm Bears Down On New York."

Even Republicans admitted Mamdami did a good job. "The city did well. There was an abnormal amount of snow and the markets opened up the trains are running, ad the DSNY is rocking and rolling," former Republic City Council Member Joe Borelli said. 

It wasn't perfect. The storm was even colder than most that hit New York City. Temperatures were in the teens to around 20 during the storm, with gusty winds. That made things especially dangerous, especially for people who are unhoused. 

About 170 people were taken off the streets and into shelter prior to and during the storm. However, seven people in New York City died, some of whom had been in homeless shelters in the past. However, it wasn't immediately clear whether the deaths were caused by the cold weather. 

Another less serious issue that had some New Yorkers disliking Mamdani's actions during the storm. They were school children. Instead of canceling school on Monday, the mayor said there would be remote learning from home. 

He said kids could throw snowballs at him if they wanted. 

Another criticism Mamdani received: He was not wearing a hat like he should have in such weather.

So no playing in the snow. But, then again, the snow is still on the ground and will be for quite awhile, as more frigid weather is in the New York City forecast. 

MAYORS SINK IN SNOW

Other mayors saw their careers set back or even destroyed by how they dealt with a winter storm. 

John Lindsay dealt with a February, 1969 storm that was supposed to be mostly rain, but turned into 15 inches of snow. An unprepared and disorganized Lindsay administration couldn't even get major highways open, the subways running and schools open for two days. The storm killed 42 New Yorkers. 

Lindsay lost the next Republican mayoral primary, but ran as a third party candidate and barely won. 

In 2010 Mayor Michael Bloomberg got in trouble for being in Bermuda during a big New York blizzard.  He also blithely said, "This city is going on. It's a day lie every other day," and suggested people go out and shop or enjoy a broadway show. 

This as highways were blocked, subways barely worked and more than 20 inches of snow piled into drifts several feet tall. 

Bloomberg did better with subsequent storms, though. And he wasn't the only politician who got in trouble for going to warming climes when the Arctic invaded the United States.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) is still getting ribbed for fleeing to Cancun when a deadly winter storm and freeze hit Texas in 2021. During the storm last weekend, Cruz was seen on a flight bound for Laguna Beach. Cruz said it was a work trip and he's be back in time for the storm. No word if that can to pass. Cruz was also away in Greece when horrific floods hit Texas last July. 

Anyway, back to mayors. 

Sometimes, they can't win. A record deep snowstorm was predicted for New York in January, 2015. Mayor Bill de Blasio said the city was bracing for a snowstorm "the likes of which we have never seen before." 

Instead the deep snow stayed on Long Island, and New York City got a measly six inches of new snow, and de Blasio was criticized for hyping things up too much.  He responded by humorously reading aloud for reporters a mocking Onion story with the headline "NYC Mayor: Reconcile Yourselves With Your Good, For All Will Perish In The Tempest."

Other cities have certainly seen mayors lose to snowstorms too. In January, 1979, Chicago Mayor Michael Bilandic botched the effort to clear streets after a 20-inch blizzard. Because of that, he later that month lost the Democratic primary election for mayor to Jane Byrne, who went to to become the first female mayor of major American city. 

Last winter, St. Louis officials came under fierce criticism after a January 5 snow and ice storm left the city's streets resembling skating rinks through the month. City leaders got some redemption with their competent handling of the aftermath of a large, deadly tornado that cut right through St. Louis. 

After this week's far-ranging snowstorm, some mayors are taking the kind of heat they wish could melt the snow instead. Residents of Providence, Rhode Island, Paterson, New Jersey and even to some extent Buffalo, New York are complaining about a slow cleanup.