July 21, 2006
Queens Fights the Power -and the Power Outage- for 5h Day
Mayor Bloomberg finally made his way to Astoria yesterday to be briefed on the situation leaving thousands of Queens residents and business owners have been with little or no power. Yet he nor Con Ed could not explain why power had been out for four days. Mayor Bloomberg did say, “I cannot explain why we’re in this situation. It’s an intolerable situation.” And the Mayor and Con Ed don't know when power will be back on. What is known is that there were multiple manhole fires, cables just seem to be melting all around, and Rikers is using back-up generators!
The outages are in Astoria, Sunnyside, Woodside, Long Island City, and Hunters Point (there have been reports of outages in the Bronx and parts of Park Slope, but not at the level of what's happening in Queens), and Con Ed has over 500 workers trying to repair and replace wiring. Ice will be distributed at Ditmars Boulevard and Steinway Street in Astoria.
Newsday reports that Con Ed admits today that the "blackout in parts of Queens is 10 times worse than the power company had previously reported" - with 25,000 customers "without power. Previous estimates were based on the number of customers who had called the company to say they were without electricity." The Daily News' editorial today points out that Con Ed's previous estimates were based on people with no power and didn't count those with very little power. Oh, and:
Worse, Con Ed defines "customer" in a rather devious way. A single, large apartment building containing, say, 100 units and several hundred tenants, is counted as one customer. One. Uno. One. See, the blackout isn't as bad as you think, New York!Our readers recounted their experiences with no power and trying to get in touch with Con Ed yesterday, with Con Ed saying power might be back today, tomorrow, or next week and people passing along helpful links to Con Ed's claims forms (you can claim up to $350 for spoiled groceries if you have the receipts and you can claim only $150 without receipts; businesses can claim up to $7,000 - a very tiny consolation). You can also try calling 800-75-CONED for information. Keep telling us what's happening and we'll post updates.
And City Councilman Peter Vallone said, Welcome to Queens. Welcome to the dark ages...People of this neighborhood want to storm Con Ed with pitchforks and torches." Vallone, if a Con Ed worker is injured by a pitchfork or torch, you're responsible. But the sentiment is understood.
Photographs taken in Astoria from Dan Dickinson on Flickr
Posted by Jen Chung in News: NYC | Recommend this! (2) |
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In addition to Con Ed handing out ice, the Red Cross has disaster relief trucks out in the neighborhood handing out food. I passed one on Steinway and Ditmars last night and this morning to/from the subway.
[1] Posted by: Terrence | July 21, 2006 11:56 AM
I don't want to start a Bloomberg0bashing cuz i like the guy, but why'd it take so long for him to address the issue? his deputies need to step up the reporting. This should've been dealt with by the administration a few days ago.
[2] Posted by: Papercutninja | July 21, 2006 12:03 PM
Anyone in the Slope have problems with power this morning?
[3] Posted by: Rocknrope | July 21, 2006 12:08 PM
Anyone see the CBS2 report about the Con Ed workers sitting around doing nothing and/or sleeping.
Should be on the wcbstv.com website.
Was also unimpressed with the way the local residents were kept 100 yards away from the Mayor's press conference by police. WTF?
Sounds like someone's PR staff needs some training in human relations and crisis management!
[4] Posted by: tj | July 21, 2006 12:16 PM
Why don't people quit complaining and enjoy life without watching 70 hours of television a week, or relying on electricty to make life seem perfect. Suffer like the rest of the world.
[5] Posted by: Raymond | July 21, 2006 12:18 PM
Con Edison has been untruthful since this situation started. They studiously hid the real numbers of people affected. Up to Wednesday they were advising people to control their use of electricity - when they knew perfectly that thousands were in the dark. Now they claim they were unaware, counting only those who called, a paltry 2,000. What kind of explanation is that? They say now there are 25,000 people affected. They continue their lies, many more people are suffering through this.
The Con Edison crews have been, mostly, killing time. They have been seen cat calling women, sleeping in their trucks or simply standing by. They have opened manholes and underground facilities and left them open. Today morning, the rain caused by the storm has flooded these places. Now they have crews syphoning the water out. What a joke!
The mayor and all the politicians have shown their true colors. Not only they have not asked for a true explanation from Con Ed, but they took days to beging to acknowledge the crisis. Vallone was silent for the first two days. Gianaris idem. About Bloomberg, he is nothing but a useless twit. How can he say that Con Ed is doing a good job? Northern Queens is still NYC, you know. We have been FIVE DAYS and counting out of power.
No doubt if this had happened in Manhattan, say Park Avenue or Wall Street, all these pathetic figures would have been running to correct the problem.
[6] Posted by: Maria | July 21, 2006 12:20 PM
"Anyone see the CBS2 report about the Con Ed workers sitting around doing nothing and/or sleeping."
Con Ed employees are people too you know. You need to slack off at work just as much as everyone else.
I'm sure they are trying their best to solve the problem since they have hundreds of people on the job. But you can't expect all problems like these to be a quick fix. Patience is the key.
[7] Posted by: Jeebus | July 21, 2006 12:27 PM
Cool!!
[8] Posted by: Kimberly | July 21, 2006 12:33 PM
Hey Arch, me and the boys r gonna get together and steal some of Jewberg's gold stash - I bet he and the Polish they let in Con Ed are workin together to stick to us, the workin' guy, know what I mean?
Arch ie: I dont know, I mean yeah they hurtin us real good, but what can we do about it?
[9] Posted by: ConnEd | July 21, 2006 12:35 PM
A ray of light: I got power this morning. Does this mean I have to feel like part of the have's versus the have not’s? I hope not ‘cause I don't mind the strife! Anyway, my place is tiny, but I could share the wealth with two or three of you if you want to come over and stand in front of my crappy A/C or put some stuff in the fridge. I hesitate to get to excited about a weekend on the couch hoarding money because the work that they were doing on Steinway looked vicious and I feel that my good fortune could turn at any time...then again, maybe that is just the pessimist in me. What I’m really saying is that power was back on at 7.45 this morning at my place at 43rd street near 30th Ave.
[10] Posted by: bill brasky | July 21, 2006 12:37 PM
lol@ConnEd
[11] Posted by: Jeebus | July 21, 2006 12:38 PM
patience is nice and all, but so is electricity.
we without it understand that we're complaining, but i'm sorry, we have every right -- Con Ed is doing something totally wrong here. how is it that they weren't prepared for something like this? we're in NYC, not some bumblefck backwoods town - we should have better facilities. and the city's at fault too - our mayor and media should care a little bit more (and sooner - the story was on page EIGHT of the news yesterday) that this many residents are without electricity.
i'm originally from Staten Island - so i'm used to being forgotten. but this is just ridiculous.
[12] Posted by: c | July 21, 2006 12:40 PM
It's disturbing that ConEd has no idea why this happened or how to fix it 3 days later.
[13] Posted by: JMoney | July 21, 2006 12:48 PM
"25,000 customers" basically means 25,000 buildings. So the real number of actual people effected is much greater.
[14] Posted by: Toby | July 21, 2006 01:06 PM
Mayor Bloomberg and former Mayor Gulliani are to blame. They should have made sure that Con Ed rebuilt their systems first. They solicited the type new and old businesses after 911. They knew that Con Ed wanted to downsize. They should have made them take ten years to rebuild the system for back up energy supply. It should be a federal requirement or every four blocks of city should have a massive generator. Black outs should bring big fines.
Con Ed is trying to run a mondern city with dinasaur equipment.
If Verizon can keep up with new cabales and electronic computerized systems, the Con Ed should do the same.
Con Ed and MTA must be brothers. They have the same mentality. They continue to take the customers money and offer slow below value service.
When will they admit that there are too many people in the city. Admit it and compensate for it.
When will they learn that the MTA should be running on solar energy not electricity. The MTA is the one that should use electric energy between 11pm and 5am. I shouldn't have to wait to use my appliances if I am a house wife or work from 11pm to 7am. USE SOLAR OR WATER DRAWN ENERGY!!!! Con Ed!!!! Wake up.
When will they learn that a 13 hour day 3 days a week may save on evergy. It takes a lot to heat and cool a 50 or 75 story building. There are a lot of high rise building in NYC. There are many stystems, not people, in hospital and offices that need to remain in a very cool eviornment.
Also, and most importantly, why is it that Long Island, and Prisons have back up generators. The "little people" are at the mercy of electrical workers to repair a system that was built 100 years ago.
[15] Posted by: mh | July 21, 2006 01:11 PM
I understand that everyone without electricity is fustrated but how is this the Mayor's or the city's fault? Con Ed is a private company!
If my cable goes out, I blame Time Warner...not the city.
[16] Posted by: Bob A Booey | July 21, 2006 01:28 PM
Not everyone needs a Backup Generator. Only most mission critical services have one. You can’t have backup generators for an entire neighborhood, city, etc, its impossible. Electricity must be generated at the same pace as demand. If you don’t want to be in the dark, buy your own gas driven generator.
[17] Posted by: Jeebus | July 21, 2006 01:29 PM
You can't win. I Con Ed hike their rates to pay for improvements there would be a crowd screaming about the impact on the poor.
And the assumption that a mayor can better monitor the situation in person is laughable. It's like assuming Katrina would have been less of a disaster if Bush had been in Louisiana instead of Crawford, Texas. If televised p.r. makes you feel better. . .
And has anyone stopped to think about the impact of New York's booming population? The population was declining in the 60s and 70s and was pretty stagnant in the 80s and 90s. Why invest in huge improvements?
[18] Posted by: turn off your ac | July 21, 2006 01:34 PM
"I understand that everyone without electricity is fustrated but how is this the Mayor's or the city's fault? Con Ed is a private company!
If my cable goes out, I blame Time Warner...not the city."
If your cable goes out for 4 days, I doubt you'll die. Mentally scarred maybe because you're missing your episode of the Sopranos but not die though I'm sure you'll argue me on that. There are quite a number of senior citizens living in Queens. Some depend on electricity for medical equipment such as respirators and such. Also I'm sure there are buildings that have elevators that aren't working and no water because you need electricity to pump water to the top floors (anything above 5 stories I think). So if you're in your golden years living in the outage areas of Queens your shit out of luck without food because there's no refrigeration, water, and sweating it out in your humid apartment. At least they have the comfort in knowing that if they had electricity their cable would be working. I'm sure they'll be relieved to know that.
As a private company that has a monopoly on electrical power in this city I believe they have to go to some State or City regulatory commission to request a rate hike so the State or City have a lot of influence in terms of how quickly Conned Ed gets their shit together.
[19] Posted by: Judas Iscariot | July 21, 2006 02:02 PM
Queens in the Stone Age
[20] Posted by: Jeremy | July 21, 2006 02:25 PM
Jeebus probably has someone in his family who workd for CON-ED [i like that the word CON is in their name].
So Jeebus is used to talk about unions getting paid for doing nothing but slacking, that's how they were raised.
Jeebus, get off your can and get back to work before i tell your boss you pathetic excuse for an employees.
[21] Posted by: JeebusIsATool | July 21, 2006 02:37 PM
Con Edison crews are bunch of lazy incompetent liars. Their hasn’t been any accountabilities and their supervisor accept their incompetence and lack of assertiveness. Granted most of these workers are not affected by the blackout and just want the overtime so they just stand around and do nothing. In a city as large as New York with massive amount of services, there is still no assistance on Roosevelt Avenue for the Woodside residents. Also for Con Edison to only find out on Friday that 100,000 elderly middle to lower income citizens have been without electricity is an atrocity and they need to make restitution to each and every customer in Woodside.
[22] Posted by: Frank Adams | July 21, 2006 02:52 PM
Hey, don't forget the official chant that solves all. Repeat after me (in your best Bloomberg nasal twang): "New York City is the greatest city in the world."
[23] Posted by: drewo | July 21, 2006 03:12 PM
Best move i ever made moving away from that city. living in a posh suburb outside of indianapolis is the shit. have a pizza place owned by someone in brooklyn, have a butcher that gets supersotta imported from italy, have mlb extra innings and nhl center ice so i can watch the yankees and devils. it's like being in new york with out the inflated prices and the weird syrup smell.
[24] Posted by: Beetlebum | July 21, 2006 03:48 PM
If it's so great, Beetlebum, why are you still reading Gothamist.com? Shouldn't you be reading BoringSuburbs.com and debating over SUVs or something?
[25] Posted by: MissPinkKate | July 21, 2006 03:53 PM
filing this under: phrases i never thought i'd hear
"living in a posh suburb outside of indianapolis is the shit"
hee hee
[26] Posted by: heh heh | July 21, 2006 04:35 PM
"If it's so great, Beetlebum, why are you still reading Gothamist.com? Shouldn't you be reading BoringSuburbs.com and debating over SUVs or something?"
i like to keep myself informed of my hometown affairs, not to mention all my relatives still live within and around the metro area. by the way i drive a honda accord and a vespa both get great gas mileage.
[27] Posted by: Beetlebum | July 21, 2006 04:48 PM
This is another story of a monopoly abusing their sure thing in every sense... and totally ignoring customer service because they can.
ConEd workers are the most consistent, aggressive cat callers in my neighborhood. When I finally got to speak to a supervisor about this he laughed and said it was "none of his concern and should be none of [my] concern."
[28] Posted by: Anya | July 21, 2006 06:16 PM
Had to laugh at the syrup-smell reference.
[29] Posted by: anonymass | July 21, 2006 10:33 PM
oh, don't apologize, the whole damn thing's been pretty funny.
[30] Posted by: bootsy | July 22, 2006 03:11 PM