Snowstorm Update: Area Transportation and Utilities Limping Along
By Kim Glovas
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The latest, and largest, snowstorm of the current winter season played havoc with transportation in and around the Delaware Valley.
SEPTA
SEPTA canceled all city and suburban bus service at the height of the storm (see related story).
After sending out SEPTA supervisors to inspect routes, deputy general manager Jeff Knueppel says a decision was made to resume bus service on 12 routes that feed the Broad Street Subway line and the Market-Frankford El -- but only between 3pm and 10pm.
Those bus routes include the 6, 14, 17, 21, 23, 52, 56, 59, 66, 79, 99, and 104.
Trolley service on Routes 101 and 102 is running to Media and Sharon Hill, respectively, every 30 minutes.
Septa says all buses and Regional Rails would be shut down at 10pm tonight, when another couple of inches of snow were expected to fall.
The Broad Street and Market-Frankford lines will be operating all night, and trolleys will run until their normal last runs.
(The Norristown High-Speed Line, which had been suspended for most of the morning, resumed full service by 1:45pm today.)
Philadelphia International Airport was especially hard hit by the latest storm. 866 flights have been cancelled since the storm began. The airport's Victoria Lupica says everyone who slept at the airport last night will be flying out tonight.
Anyone who had planned on heading to the airport should check with their individual airline for more information. You can call 1-800-PHL Gate or on the web at phl.org.
PATCO: Snow Schedule in Effect Thursday and Friday
Patco trains are running every 15 minutes until 7:30 p.m., and then from 7:30 until midnight, trains will run every 24 minutes. PATCO says add another ten minutes, because trains are running slower than usual.
AMTRAK: Due to the winter storm now moving up the east coast, Amtrak is operating on a "modified" schedule on the Acela Express, Northeast Regional, Keystone and Empire lines. All of these are also running with reduced frequency. Some long distance services, like the Auto train, have been cancelled, so travelers should either check Amtrak.com or call 800-USA-RAIL to check on their train.
PECO
This storm came right on the heels of last week's severe ice storm, piling up the snow and the problems.
Not everyone had power restored from last week's storm, so this storm is just adding insult to injury.
As of 10pm PECO was reporting about 694 customers still without service.
The breakdown: Philadelphia County had 264, Chester County follows with 167, Montgomery County with 134, then Bucks County with 115.