I gotta get outa this place, if it’s the last thing I ever do…
: NPR tonight quoted New York commuters quite rightly taking the city to task for its half-assed evacuation in the blackout.
As the second anniversary of 9.11 approaches, it is quite sobering to see that we’ve learned little and prepared less. It took too many hours and too much difficulty to get people out of the city again.
The goal is simple: To get as many people out of the city as quickly as possible so they can get home and so they will not strain the services of the city for those who must stay.
This is not hard to figure out. What the city should be doing:
1. Enlist all boats — tour boats as well — to get people across the river from all available piers.
2. Get busses, and just busses, shuttling through the tunnels out of the city to predetermined points — shelters, meeting points, and places where commuters can get further transportation. Those busses should bring emergency workers the other way.
3. Set up shelters in the city with generators and supplies. It’s time to reinstitute Civil Defense shelters.
4. Have points throughout the city where people can get information — where, for example, police or city employees equipped with walkie-talkies and megaphones can tell people what is happening and what they should do.
I was one of those people in the city trying to get out on 9.11 and I was within a half-hour of being stranded in the blackout. I don’t want to face this again.
What have we been doing these last two years?
