This year, there has been a stark increase in harsh winter weather, with NYC facing its first major snowstorm since 2016 on January 25. There were varying levels of snow throughout the city. With 11.4 inches of snow in Manhattan, while just across the East River in Brooklyn, people measured 11 to 14 inches of snowfall, accumulating from 7:00AM on January 25th through 8:30AM on January 26th.
When people found out about the storm, they rushed to get food and supplies to prepare by Saturday. Many grocery stores were barren after people cleared out due to fear of getting snowed in. The snow started on Sunday the 25th around 7:00am, quickly accumulating, and switched to hail periodically. While high school students already had the day off for professional development, middle and elementary schoolers had a partial snow day. They didn’t have to go into their schools, but rather attended Zoom classes and did work online, similarly to how students did during the COVID pandemic. While this was helpful, giving the city an extra day to plow roads and outdoor train lines for many students and staff members, one day remote was not enough. Bus stops were covered in snow that had been plowed off the roads, making it hard and in some cases impossible to get on and off the buses. Many train stations had snow drift on the stairs, making them dangerous to enter as the stairs were slippery. Additionally the snow caused track switches to freeze so trains could not move from one track to another, and ice formed on train wheels making them dangerous to operate and furthering delays.
Many people were unable to get to school and work on Tuesday, the 27th, including MTA employees, more causing the delays. Students and staff from BHSA live in all five boroughs and had varying degrees of difficulty getting to school with the snow blanketing the city. One student I spoke with, Sikris Jimenez, who lives all the way in Jamaica, Queens –13 miles from school –was unable to make it to the building on Tuesday. She told The West Wing, “The trains took a lot of time, there were many accidents, and there was lots of traffic, so my parents didn’t think it was safe.”
Clearly, NYC needs to be doing more to clear the snow because it is unjust that students have to miss school simply because they’re unable to leave their neighborhoods. When asked about what she thinks NYC could do better, Sikris told me they need to clear more snow off the sidewalk because it was slippery and it was dangerous. She said, “I was constantly seeing emergency vehicles because so many people got hurt in the snow,” implying that the snow and ice were not only inconvenient, but also dangerous to many New Yorkers. On the days she was able to come to school and face the snow delays, it added an extra 30 to 45 minutes to her already hour-plus long commute.
Mayor Mamdani told reporters on Thursday, January 29 that 23 million pounds of snow had been melted in the eight melting sites across NYC. However, some New Yorkers weren’t noticing a difference. Even students who live significantly closer to school are struggling with extra-long commutes. Another student, Morgan Holder, told me that while his commute is usually 30 minutes, because of the bus and train delays, it was 45 to 50 minutes on the 27th. Many students, including Morgan, feel like the city isn’t doing enough to clear the snow, and he told me, “The city can improve and clean up more with salting. I think rather than focusing on unimportant stuff like changing MTA cards, they should focus on salting the city because it can cause slip hazards and the black ice is really dangerous.”
On Tuesday January 27 the first day of school back after the storm, students were held in the auditorium for the first 5 to 10 minutes of first period because many staff members had arrived at school late due to snow delays. Delays affect people all around the city (not just students and teachers, of course) . They are especially troubling for school staff because students rely on them to be there every day as a safe space to learn.
Overall, the snow had a major impact and is still impacting New Yorkers from every borough.