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A round of winter storms ripped through the tri-state area on Tuesday, and while it wasn’t quite as bad as initially feared, the rain and wind still did enough damage in the New York City suburbs. Westchester County Executive George Latimer and Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman both appeared on 710 WOR’s Len Berman and Michael Riedel in the Morning program to assess the storm damage and cleanup.
Flooded roadways were rampant in Westchester, yet Latimer says several drivers still chose to forego common sense; some of them had to be saved from the Bronx River Parkway by first responders in scuba gear. “You have deep depressions in the [Bronx River] Parkway. The parkway goes down before it goes up and it ponds. You could have five, six foot of water in that area, and I don’t know what possesses the driver to think he can get through that. Maybe he’s got an SUV and he figures maybe he’s Macho Man, but we had people that had to be retrieved from their cars to save their lives on a parkway… when you get to a barrier, and you see the barrier, earth to you, it’s a barrier- don’t go around it!”
Flooding conditions also prevailed on Nassau, though the major source of flooding was not rivers and streams next to roadways, but neighborhoods in low-lying coastal areas. Still, Blakeman said the county is rapidly recovering. “The water is receding. High tide crested in most parts of Nassau County by 7:30 am, so the water’s going down. We have some flooding in the low-lying areas of the South Shore... but all major thoroughfares are open. The buses are running close to schedule and the trains are running close to schedule.”
Latimer and Blakeman will find out soon enough if drivers heed their advice, as more rain is expected to soak the tri-state area the first half of this weekend and by the middle of next week.
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