Update on Rhode Island Snowstorm

Although down here on the Rhode Island coast it stopped snowing a long time ago, and turned to sleet / rain, apparently it's a total disaster in Providence and surrounding areas. There is gridlock everywhere, cars have been abandoned on roadways, intersections are blocked with trucks, and there have been over 100 car accidents according to Rhode Island State Police Maj. Steven O'Donnell, who also reported that the State Police had helped drivers of over 200 disabled cars. In some areas it’s been taking people hours to go a mile, with some people reporting waiting hours just to get from city streets onto highways.

Part of the problem, according to former Mayor Buddy Cianci, is that the DOT let the storm get ahead of them. Mayor Cianci stated that he doesn't believe the DOT adequately sanded and salted before the snow started. Nor were there enough trucks on the roads early enough.

But Providence traffic is always a nightmare at rush hour, which seems to begin about 2:30PM and doesn't end until about 6:30PM according to my son, Ian Waid, Chef at the Blue Elephant Restaurant, 312 Wickenden Street. (http://www.blueelephantprovidence.com) The roads were not built to handle the volumes of cars commuting on them these days, and any attempts that the state has made to alleviate the problems have fallen short. Building a major mall right smack in the middle certainly didn’t help! It only takes one minor accident to cause a gridlock in the downtown Providence area. During normal rush hour traffic it can take half an hour to get 5 miles. Today it was taking hours. Businesses and schools closed early, putting thousands of extra motorists on the roadways right at the height of the storm.

At 9PM this evening the news was reporting that there are still 60 school buses on the roadways! That’s insane!!! This wasn’t exactly a surprise storm, and it was predicted to start at 11AM, at a rate of about 2 inches per hour. What on earth were the Providence school officials thinking when other schools were announcing school closures as of 5 AM this morning??? At 9:30PM, Providence Mayor David Cicilline reported there are still approximately 40 school buses with children stranded, and mentioned sending out 4-wheel drive vehicles to pick up the children. I pray that none of those children were on prescription medications that they needed to have after school.

Today was starting to bring flashbacks to the Blizzard of 78, when motorists were stranded and highways were closed for days, with some stretches not reopening to traffic until the following week. Back then they didn’t have the sophisticated weather forecasting techniques that we have today. But we knew this storm was coming, we knew when it was coming, and we knew how intense it was going to be.

Many stranded motorists claimed that they never saw a police cruiser or a plow truck. The school officials should not have opened schools today, the City should have called in all police and emergency personnel, and the DOT should have been out in full force with salt and sand, keeping the major roadways cleared.

I’m sure there will be lot’s of official finger pointing tomorrow. Let’s just hope that City of Providence officials, as well as Rhode Island State officials, learn from this debacle and the rest of the winter goes a lot smoother and safer.