New York public transit took another huge step forward tonight with M train service returning and 7 trains rolling out shortly.
M trains are running now, hooking up Jamaica, Queens and 34th Street Herald Sqaure in Manhattan, Gov. Cuomo announced tonight.
The vitally important 7 will be back at midnight, connecting Main Street Flushing with 74th Street in Jackson Heights, according to. Cuomo.
A crucial MetroNorth line is also goign to restart tomorrow, Hudson Line trains between Croton-Harmon and Grand Central Terminal.
On the Long Island Railroad, the Babylon and Huntington lines will resume hourly service to Penn Station tomorrow, according to Cuomo.
Also, tunnels that take 4, 5 and 6 trains under the East River are clean and dry. Those trains could all be running within two hours of ConEd flipping the switch.
“As soon as we get power … we can’t do it without electricity,” MTA chairman Joe Lhota said. “We need that third rail lit.”
As trains slowly went forward, precious food and water also rolled toward New York neighborhoods, hit hardest by Hurricane Sandy.
Needy New Yorkers picked up supplies this afternoon, and again tomorrow from 7 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m..
City and state officials are rolling out locations as they can plan them in the worst hit areas.
The food locations named so far include Coney Island, West 25th Street and Surf Avenue, Staten Island, at Mill Road and New Dorp Lane, the East Village, 10th Street between Avenues C and D, the Lower East Side, Catherine Street between Monroe and Cherry Streets (Smith Houses), Chinatown, Grand and Clinton Streets (water only) and one on Bower and Division Street.
“Today we’re also taking new steps to prevent further suffering from Sandy as the days go on,” Mayor Bloomberg said.
Storm victims will be able to grab up to three prepared meals and five bottles of water at a time.
`“We are over the next few days going to have to work out some procedures to make sure people can get food,” Bloomberg said. “Our focus right now is taking care of the immediate needs of everyone.”
Gov. Cuomo activated the National Guard to deliver one million meals and bottled water to people stranded without power – particularly downtown Manhattan and Brooklyn.
The meals are provided by the federal government, Cuomo said.
“This is about people. This is about family. This is about New Yorkers helping New Yorkers,” Cuomo said.
The massive meals on wheels program will particularly concentrate on the public housing projects on the Lower East Side and Red Hook, as well as high-rises populated by senior citizens stranded without elevator service.
“We have seniors stuck on the 18th floor, the 20th floor, the 24th floor. These are real issues,” Cuomo said.
Accompanied by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Rep. Nydia Velasquez who represent ràvaged downtown, Cuomo announced the program at the 69th. Regiment Armory.
The armory was a staging area where cases of bottled water and rationed meals were loaded onto Humvees and trailers for distribution.
By midday today, 534,000 New York power customers will still in the dark today — down from 634,000 exactly 24 hours earlier, according to Bloomberg.
There were 228,000 ConEd customers in the dark in Manhattan, Bloomberg said, 40 percent of them under 34th Street. The Rockaways were most hard hit, with 43,000 customers without power there, according to Bloomberg.
Small progress could be seen in some of Manhattan’s hard-hit neighborhoods.
Office buildings on Madison Avenue, between 30th and 34th Streets, had lights on today. Crowds of New Yorkers piled into that neighborhood’s Dean & DeLuca to get a precious cup of hot Joe.
Bloomberg said he hopes to have traffic lights restored all over Lower Manhattan by the end of the weekend.
Much of Lower Manhattan is also without any cell service or Internet access, and Bloomberg said AT&T will also bring pods — trucks with satellite and wifi connections from top of truck — to impacted neighborhoods today.
AT&T customers can get phone service and also charge your phones at these locales, which will be set up near food distribution centers.
“He [AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson] assured me that they’re doing everything to get normal service back up and running,” Bloomberg said.
Today also marked the first post-Sandy commute by New York City straphangers as limited subway service was restored.
The state and city also restricted almost all cars with less than three passengers from entering Manhattan.
The HOV requirements on Manhattan-bound bridges and tunnels went into effect at 6 a.m. and will go to midnight. The same requirements will be enforced from 6 a.m to midnight tomorrow.
But Bloomberg said he hopes Friday will be the final day of HOV restrictions.
“We’re all in this together. We are desperately trying to help everybody. We’re trying to prioritize. The first thing is safety, inconvenience is down the list,” Bloomberg said.
“Monday, hopefully, we won’t need any of those restrictions.”
The wild commuter day was a mess all over New York this morning.
There was a major traffic snafu at the George Washington, where commuters had been promised an exemption from emergency HOV requirements.
There was supposed to be an HOV exemption at the George Washington Bridge, because many of those motorists use that span to head north toward Connecticut, and away from Manhattan.
But cops set up an HOV check point where GWB drivers connected to the West Side Highway.
It took a call from Gov. Cuomo to get that wrongly placed checkpoint removed, according to WCBS.
Mayor Bloomberg confirmed the foul-up but made no apologies for the city and state’s on-the-fly work.
“If we had some people in the wrong places, it was the first day getting it going,” Bloomberg snapped. “You have to bear with us.”
City parks are expected to be reopened at 8 a.m. Saturday and public schools back in session on Monday, according to City Hall.
“We have a lot of work to do to get ready, after these kids have been out of schools for a week,” Bloomberg said.
The mayor said he also believes polling stations — many at public schools — around the city should be up and running on Tuesday.
“A lot of them are in schools,” he said. “Now our hope is that we have electricity back for most of those schools but there are some where there were transformers in the basement that were damaged and they will not and the Board of Elections is going have to find alternative locations.”
Commuter chaos broke out in Brooklyn and near the George Washington Bridge this morning, as subways roared back into Manhattan for the first time since Hurricane Sandy.
Limited subway and train service allowed Bronx, Queens, Long Island and Westchester County workers to enter Manhattan, but their jam-packed journey was nothing compared to the hours-long struggles commuters faced at other entry points.
With no power or subway service in Lower Manhattan, Brooklyn residents had to rely on buses to get into the city. Thousands of frustrated Brooklynites circled the brand-new Barclays Center and waited hours to board Manhattan-bound busses.
With such huge crowds, some bus operators picked up passengers at the back of lines, just to get some people rolling — to the anger of commuters in the front of line.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Coast Guard opened the Port of New York and New Jersey today on a restricted basis to get gasoline and fuel to the areas hit hardest by Superstorm Sandy.
The limited opening of the Port of New York and New Jersey to allow for fuel deliveries is aimed at stemming the widespread shortages and massive lines at gas stations in the two states, and in Connecticut, said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-NY.
The action comes as residents of both states stood in tense lines at gas stations awaiting fuel for home generators in areas without power, and for their cars and trucks frequently stuck in fuel-wasting traffic snarls. New Jersey state police were sent Wednesday to gas stations on major turnpikes.
“With mass transit still hobbled and power still out in many parts of the New York City, Westchester and Long Island, gasoline is critical to the health and well-being of those impacted by the storm, so many of who are now dependent on generators,” Schumer said.
“The port is open, the backlogged barges can begin to dock and gas and will begin to flow into New York again.”
The Coast Guard said the port is now open to all tug and barge traffic carrying petroleum products. The Hudson River, used by oil barges to get to the Port of Albany for distribution throughout the Northeast, is also open. Shipments will also be made to Long Island Sound, also hit hard by Sandy.
Schumer said he spoke with the Coast Guard on Wednesday, and the Coast Guard began the reopening process shortly after noon Thursday.
The Coast Guard had shut down the port as a precaution against the superstorm.
One of the busiest ports in the world, the Port of New York and New Jersey receives 900,000 barrels of petroleum on most days.
Schumer said none of the piers in the Port are open yet, so fuel is being unloaded to tugs and barges that will then transport the product. The first anchorage opened at 7 a.m. and the second at noon.
Meanwhile, experts are reviewing plans to secure the arm of a crane that’s been dangling off a luxury high-rise in midtown Manhattan.
City officials said Thursday that inspections of the crane have been completed.
Meanwhile, the city has lifted its pre-storm ban on all outdoor construction work.
Buildings Department chief spokesman Tony Sclafani has said that a strong wind gust during superstorm Sandy likely was a major factor in the crane accident on Monday night.
Experts also have been examining how the crane was positioned.
Engineers climbed the 74-story building in the midst of the storm to inspect the crane.
Neighboring buildings were evacuated, including a hotel with 900 guests.