Public Transportation Shut Down in New York as East Coast Inches Closer to Apocalypse
Hurricane Sandy is currently enjoying a nice leisurely Sunday off the coast of South Carolina as she prepares for her jaunt up the coast en route to the finest cities the East Coast has to offer (and, yes, I mean Atlantic City). Current projections show that Sandy should be touching down in South Jersey around 2 a.m. Tuesday morning — she is expected to cross the state into Pennsylvania before heading north through western New York into Canada, where she will presumably stay if Mitt Romney has defeated Barack Obama.
In response, New York governor Andrew Cuomo is being safe (like, really safe) instead of sorry, and has decided to shut down the MTA beginning at 7 p.m. tonight. There's been no word when public transportation will open again, but Joseph J. Lhota, the chairman of the MTA, said that some transit systems should be back in order 12 hours after the storm ends. Those with cars will be rejoicing right up until they spend 24-48 hours in a constant state of panic over whether or not some random piece of debris has destroyed said vehicle.
Here is some other Sandy related news from around the Seaboard:
- If you were thinking about spending the hurricane gambling your petty cash away, you can still do that in the privacy of your own home while playing Uno. Atlantic City, though, will shut its tables down at 3 p.m. today as the Jersey coast begins to evacuate.
- Tolls! For those of you that don't drive, tolls are a payment that drivers have to make to have the privilege of using deteriorating interstates. In Jersey, tolls have been suspended going north on the Garden State and west on the Atlantic City Expressway. If you're going east you will pay tolls, and will be swallowed by a monsoon.
- D.C.'s Metro has yet to announce any shutdowns to its transportation, though alerts will be going up on their Twitter feed.
- Lastly, Sandy is not expected to bring the most destruction to the region this weekend, as the Jets play at 1 p.m. today.