New York, NY – After facing blistering criticism over their response to the December 2010 blizzard, the city’s sanitation commissioner said that the department has beefed up its snow response ahead of this winter.
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Speaking at a City Council hearing, Sanitation Commissioner John J. Doherty said the department has installed GPS and salt spreaders on sanitation trucks, retrained workers, mapped snow plow routes and increased snow drills in advance of winter.
“Let me assure you that the department is a dynamic agency that responds quickly and learns positively from past experiences,” he said Wednesday.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the city were criticized for not calling a snow emergency during the December 26 blizzard that crippled the city. Citing the mayor’s response to Tropical Storm Irene, Doherty said Bloomberg’s emergency response to the August storm showed that “the mayor is on the top of his game.”
Doherty stopped short of saying how long it would take the department to remove snow, but said workers had been instructed to give precise information about whether a whole or partial route had been cleared to avoid confusion.
He also cited improved coordination with the MTA to avoid having buses get stuck in the snow as they did last year.
Kelly McKinney, OEM’s deputy commissioner for planning and preparedness, added that this year the agency would issue a hazardous travel advisory, as a way to warn people without declaring a weather emergency.
Council Member Peter Vallone Jr., chair of the safety committee, said New Yorkers were “in peril” last year and that the goal of the hearing was to ensure improvements to last year’s blizzard response.
“The administration has learned from its mistakes and has worked hard to make improvements,” Vallone said in a statement. “I’m satisfied that the plans that are in place will ensure that our streets are plowed and New Yorkers will remain safe during any future blizzards.”
During a hearing in January, Doherty acknowledged his department’s reputation had been compromised by its response.
“We know our reputation as the world’s best snow fighters has been called into question,” he said, “and we must work to prove we deserve this distinction.”
They learned nothing, none of this stops the workers from rasing their plows or faking breakdowns in middle of the roads. What they should of done is put all the union guys and drivers in jail, then maybe “we” would learn our lesson donut doesn’t happ again, all the article shows is that they have no idea what went wrong
They installed equipment on garbage trucks!? This is nothing neither new nor encouraging. All I hear is blah blah blah, pat on back, blah blah blah.
They need to ditch the plows and really invest in upgrading their equipment. I mean c’mon, how many times you have dug out your car only to have snow piled unto it all over again and again by an aging plow.
Good news! Long-range weather forecasters are calling for a mild winter here in the Northeast (which includes NYC)!!
The Commissioner’s statements are meaningless; seeing is believing! This is tantamount to the airlines promising that passengers would not suffer excessive delays on the tarmac. This past October, at Bradley Field, we saw that hollow promises mean nothing. There should be some contingency plan for private contractors to come in with their plows and do the job, if the City is unable or unwilling to do it. In the city where I live, a large blizzard paralyzed the city, and the city snow blows were either non-existent, or out of commission. However, private contractors came in and cleared the streets. Whenever the government gets involved in these sort of activities, problems inevitably follow.
Reluctantly, I too have zero faith in the empty words!
Let’s assume there were already GPS’ last winter, how would that help the trucks that got themselves stuck? They can fake it again with GPS too! This year they will be very busy plowing because Bloomberg has egg on his face but you can be sure they will continue to play hardball in other ways. I can just see them not picking up garbage or recycling for several days with the claim that the snow removal is using up their resources.