NYC marathon and hurricane

But.... wrote:

I'm a New Yorker and I love this race. Our cities energy and resources need to be focused and taking a lot of it to put on this event is selfish. It's not a NYC resiliency thing. Most of the runners aren't even fron NYC. It is. NYRR image and money thing.

Yes it sucks for those who have trained all year, but hey, having your house destroyed sucks. Not having power or water for a week sucks. Not having a way to get to work sucks.

Well said.

Sandy Firstheand wrote:

Energy needs to be refocused to helping others instead. I love the marathon but.... If people still want to run it why don't they run themselves downtown and climb 20+ stories and bring food and water to those in the dark. Or why don't they go out there and volunteer to all those people in Breezy Point and Seaside Heights that lost EVERYTHING. Mary would come out a bigger person if she refocused her resources.

Seriously. I trivial silly matter like the NYC marathon should be the LAST thing people worry about. Stretching the EMS & police resources so some dude from BFE Illinois can try for a PR is stupid.

What a shocker: this board's full of nattering nabobs of negativism!

It's going to take a long time for all the infrastructure to get back to normal and an even longer time to recover from private property losses, but getting the city back to some sense of normalcy as soon as possible is a big deal and an important part of the recovery process. If they can pull off the marathon I think it's a good thing for the city. Bloomberg obviously thinks so.

A top official from Consolidated Edison Inc. ED +0.45%said it could take up to a week to restore power to the bulk of Manhattan neighborhoods plunged into darkness Monday evening.

John Miksad, senior vice president of electric operations, said he couldn’t give a clear timetable and still needed to investigate the scope of damage left by the explosion in substation at East 14th Street and F.D.R Drive. That explosion knocked out power to about a quarter-million customers below 39th Street in Manhattan.

Con Ed was expecting major flooding, he said, but the utility was caught off guard by a tidal surge that topped pre-storm estimates. “Nobody was forecasting that,” he said. “We are in a bit of uncharted territory.”

Miksad said the utility is still trying to figure out the cause of the substation explosion, which might have been due to flying debris or flooding.

Con Ed expects to restore power to Lower Manhattan neighborhoods below the Brooklyn Bridge — areas shutdown preemptively Monday evening and not connected to the substation explosion — in three to four days

getting 40,000 people to staten island is hard. Getting all the marathon staff to staten island is hard even a few key people who don't show could be a catastrophe.

Then each water stop has to be dealt with - you aren't going to have many people show up to man the water - do you let 5 hour marathoners run without water?

the marathon is hard enough to put on on a perfect day - with a much smaller volunteer force it may not be safe.

dream crusher wrote:

But.... wrote:

I'm a New Yorker and I love this race. Our cities energy and resources need to be focused and taking a lot of it to put on this event is selfish. It's not a NYC resiliency thing. Most of the runners aren't even fron NYC. It is. NYRR image and money thing.

Yes it sucks for those who have trained all year, but hey, having your house destroyed sucks. Not having power or water for a week sucks. Not having a way to get to work sucks.

Well said.

Agree. The city should be focused on recovering from this terrible natural disaster. NYRR should be embarrassed for putting itself first.

LGA still closed.

Due to HURRICANE, the La Guardia Airport (LGA) was closed as of Oct 29 at 08:00 PM EDT. The date/time when the airport is expected to reopen is not known.

Newark and JFK are open but experiencing massive delays.

Have fun getting to New York.

Citizen Runner wrote:

It's going to take a long time for all the infrastructure to get back to normal and an even longer time to recover from private property losses, but getting the city back to some sense of normalcy as soon as possible is a big deal and an important part of the recovery process. If they can pull off the marathon I think it's a good thing for the city. Bloomberg obviously thinks so.

Yeah but Bloomberg is a politician, of course he wants it to go on because to politicians stuff like this is all about appearances. I'd love to hear from the police, EMS, and other staff. I bet they have a different story.

This will be a boon for Mary.

She'll be all over the news talking about "resiliency" and "the show must go on" and the "can do attitude" of New York.......you know, all the ones that didn't lose their home.

Then she'll talk about everything her and the NYRR make this "happen for the runners and the city."

She'll do all this knowing there will be an enormous amount of no shows due to either inability to get there or fear of what difficulties they would have when they arrived.

Then she'll graciously say those who couldn't get there GET GUARANTEED ENTRY NEXT YEAR! As long as you pay another entry fee.

And pockets all the entry fees of the no shows.

Acting tough and putting on a participant diminished event will turn into quite a coup for Mary and the NYRR.

So we're not supposed to run? Apparently we aren't welcome or wanted. We show concern and we're morons, we say we'll run anyway and we're not compassionate, which is it? We should cancel our entries and leave our money with NYRR, and where does that end up? You're welcome for the donation!

agip wrote:

getting 40,000 people to staten island is hard. Getting all the marathon staff to staten island is hard even a few key people who don't show could be a catastrophe.

If NYC can't figure out how to move around a few tens of thousands of runners and a similar number of volunteers on Sunday, then how are they going to get a few million people to work on Monday? The marathon isn't the biggest problem they have to solve, but the near term solution to one is relevant to the other.

If you can get there and they let you run it, then more power to you! You are the symbol of American persistence, not the NYRR club.

Do us proud and race your best!

+1000Just cancel it, return our entry fees, done!My airline tickets will be refunded, my hotel can be cancelled and I'll run somewhere else. I could even use my refund to donate to relief efforts.

nftoa wrote:

This will be a boon for Mary.

She'll be all over the news talking about "resiliency" and "the show must go on" and the "can do attitude" of New York.......you know, all the ones that didn't lose their home.

Then she'll talk about everything her and the NYRR make this "happen for the runners and the city."

She'll do all this knowing there will be an enormous amount of no shows due to either inability to get there or fear of what difficulties they would have when they arrived.

Then she'll graciously say those who couldn't get there GET GUARANTEED ENTRY NEXT YEAR! As long as you pay another entry fee.

And pockets all the entry fees of the no shows.

Acting tough and putting on a participant diminished event will turn into quite a coup for Mary and the NYRR.

Led Zepp wrote:

+1000

Just cancel it, return our entry fees, done!

My airline tickets will be refunded, my hotel can be cancelled and I'll run somewhere else. I could even use my refund to donate to relief efforts.

Read the fine print that no one reads...it says "No Refunds". The NYRRC has already incurred millions and millions of dollars they won't get back. You think the business that took their money will refund it back to the NYRRC?

Your hotel can be cancelled but what cost have they incurred with you cancelling...none. Some people have pre-paid non-refundable reservations or have used Priceline so no refund for them.

Unless you paid full fare (which I highly doubt) you do not get a refund on your airfare. You will only be able to use the ticket to go to NYC within a year and there will be a fee.

You COULD donate your refund but I DOUBT you will.

LGA will be back tomorrow with limited service! There is hope!

Citizen Runner wrote:

agip wrote:

getting 40,000 people to staten island is hard. Getting all the marathon staff to staten island is hard even a few key people who don't show could be a catastrophe.

If NYC can't figure out how to move around a few tens of thousands of runners and a similar number of volunteers on Sunday, then how are they going to get a few million people to work on Monday? The marathon isn't the biggest problem they have to solve, but the near term solution to one is relevant to the other.

__

They aren't going to get millions to work on Monday, that is the point. There are 3 people out of a normal 40 in my midtown office today (Wednesday).

And Staten Island is, well, an island - that much harder to get to then midtown manhattan.

But I am for putting on the race - a little audacity gets this city going.

Citizen Runner wrote:

It's going to take a long time for all the infrastructure to get back to normal and an even longer time to recover from private property losses, but getting the city back to some sense of normalcy as soon as possible is a big deal and an important part of the recovery process. If they can pull off the marathon I think it's a good thing for the city. Bloomberg obviously thinks so.

what's this obsession with showing some sense of normalcy, or NYers keep going like nothing happened? The situation is far from normal. I repeat, the situation IS FAAAAAR FROM NORMAL!

Why don't just accept "we're really f-ed up and it will take a lot of time and effort to get back to normal (but we know we'll do it!)". It seems like everyone (not just politicians) thinks it some kind of weakness, or something to hide under the rug.

The worst I saw was this taxi driver in BBC;

Complaining about the poor millions of NYers who had no problem like a flooded basement to worry about, so they were bored in their houses with no place to go out to dinner or watch a movie. Patetico!!

because giving up after a storm is, well, a sign of weakness.

get some perspective - 50 people died. 50 people PER MONTH are murdered in chicago. This was not epic wrath of god sort of event. Well, it sort of was, but it just isn't in the category of 9/11 or the SF earthquake or the Japanese tsunami.

This is medium big.

Marathon goes on.