Modern Vespa

That's not the point whether it was more in TX or NY. The point is that with the problems the City is facing due to the hurricane it's just too much to deal with the marathon. They have priorities and good ones to have decide to cancel the marathon. You can't compare a passion or a life of training with people losing lives.

Also keep in mind that not everybody that runs the marathon take it so seriously. I know a couple if people that run it just for the heck of it. What I'm trying to say that it's not the end of the world for many of the runners not to run it. I would say that most of them do it for sheits and giggles.

hendon,

Thanks for the geography lesson.

Finally the people stood proud together and put Bloomberg in his place.

The cancellation of this event because of the protests of many concerned Americans made me love the USA even more.

Way to Go NY.

Need to stand up for your rights and the cause more often.

Should've been cancelled far earlier saving all those runners the grief of travelling. This would probably also have helped the airlines getting more trapped travellers out of NYC allowing the services to concentrate their efforts on locals and not tourists etc.

Absolutely. On Wed evening (the day before people were scheduled to start to arrive and four days before the marathon run), when the mayor said the marathon was still on, the situation, as he knew it, was:

Restoration of electricity - unknown
Restoration of public transit - unknown
Reopening of four key hospitals - unknown
Resumption of fuel supplies - unknown
Resumption of telecommunication services - unknown
Requirements for extended temporary lodging - unknown

Yet he was willing to dedicate public services and resources, fuel, food and lodging to some 50,000 or so people starting the next day. An insult to the residents of his city, and a dis-service to the marathon attendees.

With much sympathy to those who dedicate their lives to run marathons, what it comes down to is that we are talking about a footrace here.

I saw an interesting blurb in our local paper today that a number of marathon runners were planning to take backpacks and bags of food and other emergency supplies in to heavily damaged neighborhoods along the route of marathon to help the residents there who still have no resources available to them. Those who were involved seemed to prefer this to the actual running of the marathon.

Desi B.

I hope that areas without electricity or transport have warming facilities set up. I know after hurricanes here there were places set up as cooling stations (heat causes more deaths here than cold though when we do have a few days at or below freezing churches and other places make sure there is a warm place for those who may have trouble paying heating bills set up).

I've seen almost no mention of those sorts of shelters being set up on the news and it seems to me that would be important in many parts of the affected area.

55-gallon drum ablaze on every corner, I've heard.

Better than nothing but I was thinking more like the tent with heater inside we set up for people to warm up in during canoe instructor training. Since it was 42 outside and we were in and out of the water it felt really good to be in with the space heater and even the tent walls kept more heat in than you'd think.

Depending on what they are burning make sure you stay upwind. Some of the wood used in boardwalks and fences is treated to repel insects in a way that can be very carcinogenic if you breath in the smoke.

The info is widely published in local NYC media, the audience most in need of it.

If you live in TX and need to know the location of the nearest NYC warming station, look here.: http://www.nyc.gov/html/oem/html/nycsevereweather/weather_home.shtml Believe it or not, there are reams of material that address disaster preparedness and response that are used by cities, states and the Feds. While its been 30+ years since my assignment involved this kind of responsibility, all that stuff was in the books back then. We handled floods, hurricanes, tornadoes and blizzards during that time (5th Army, San Antonio. From the Gulf to the Canadian border, right up the middle of the US). The only really new wrinkle I have noticed is the provision of battery charging services.

A email from a friend on Long Island visiting. Do you think these people give a shit about a marathon or the people that might be "inconvienced"?

"I know i always seem to send boat photos, but to get to these boats, you pass thru the streets on foot or bicycle, blocked by 'stuff'. forget driving.
First it was debris of the storm, that is piled up by locals to find the street, then sanitation comes and picks it up, then the 'stuff' -more debris from the driveways, or property, piled in streets, sanitation comes picks it up. Then the residents strip the inside of their house of everything, and pile that'stuff' in the streets, couches, beds, china closets, lamps, electronics... everything!! The sanitation comes, and it's a group effort to dispose of their stuff and try to fit a couch in the 'eat-em-up' end of a garbage truck, or to fit it in a commercial dumpster. Nicholas said the first responders was the sanitation dept in his neighborhoods case. Electric isn't even a thought of having in these 32 degree mornings.
This, of course, all applies if your house remained there.... in the case of 'Slim', he has no house, everything, i mean everything of his washed away. you could offer him a storage bin to keep things in, but he has nothing to keep. gone baby....
As a neighbor and I helped Nicholas today remove things from his now two walled bungalo/shop/house, he said perhaps 'Slim' is fortunate, in that he doesn't have to sort thru things, and pick what to keep. ... the decision was made for him... 'nothing'. Easier to just walk away and start over, instead of keeping some and starting over.
I didn't take photos of the locals... just was too weird to be taking photos while passing in their nightmare.
There were by this time, numerous groups of people, sent by organizations, churches etc, people with shovels, (none with the needed chainsaw)just asking 'how can i help', one lady said her kids were in daycare, and she had valuable time to help, what can she do. people with cleaning supplies, toiletries, food to give walking around.
So, i couldn't just fly out, back to my plastic world, looking down on Nicholas and Slim, and the folks of that small part of the world, without helping more, sooo, i've taken Deltas offer of anyone needing to extend their flight out of ny, at no extra charge, I fly out Wed instead of tomorrow, Monday. Things are relative...... (Stehen, i think it was you that said "it's all relative")"

Since the marathon was canceled, it allowed for more out of state first responders like my wife to move to Staten Island, and get a room. They were trying to work remotely from MD because of the limited hotel supply.

I am a runner, I was supposed to run in this marathon, and while it is unfortunate that months of hard training will not have the pay off I was expecting, it was absolutely the right decision to cancel.

I live in the East Village. I was without power until friday. We were very isolated for several days. We'd hear news now and then, but we saw no images. Just heard reports. 'The Jersey Shore suffered massive flooding', 'Fires in the Rockaways', 'major storm surge in Staten Island'. It was hard to fathom because we had no tv, no internet, and barely any radio. We couldnt' SEE it. So when the mayor said the marathon was still on, I thought 'ok. He's in charge, I guess its alright, but I'll see how I feel tomorrow.'

So I went to the expo on friday morning to either pick up my race materials or defer to next year. There were many volunteers running things, everyone seemed upbeat and everything seemed fine. My husband and I shared a bus back across town, and when he got off to find an open office to work from in midtown, a man who had been standing next to our seats got in my face and screamed at me that I was a 'marathon asshole'. He kept at me until I was in tears. I didn't understand. The mayor told us the race was going to be turned into a live telethon to help raise money. He and the head of NYRR were adamant that it was the right decision and Rudy Giuliani put his 2 cents in as well. Go ahead with the marathon. Local businesses were going to make a lot of money, and the money that New York Road Runners pays for police support would go to helping support the city.

I went to a coffee shop in midtown to charge my phone, and get on the wifi to check my email and read some news websites for the first time since Monday. I got online and started looking at photos of Staten Island, Queens and New Jersey. It was massive devastation. I had only seen Manhattan. I had NO IDEA it was THAT bad. And then I saw the news reports that people were getting more and more angry about the marathon. I was now in a very uneasy position. Do I give up months of training, a heavy entry fee (I had given up my option to defer when I picked up my race materials)? Or do I run, and trust that the Mayor was right, and hope that I wouldn't get boo'd or anything thrown at me on the course. It was a tough spot to be in, and frankly unfair to ask the runners to make that choice. You sacrifice a LOT to run a marathon. You may have spent a lot of money to get there, you have gone through a lot of physical pain, and all of a sudden your big pay off becomes a moral decision.

Luckily, that choice was finally made for us and the marathon was cancelled. I was disappointed, but then relieved. Within minutes, friends from my triathlon team emailed me their condolences and asked if I'd like to join a few of them out in Staten Island. The plan was to get as many supplies as we could fit into a backpack, and run them to the communities that needed them. By Sunday morning, a dozen triathletes and marathon runners had grown to over one thousand. It took 2 Staten Island ferries to get us all over there.

I was not prepared for what I saw. It looked like the place had been bombed out. As recently as the day before, they were still recovering bodies in the marsh. To run the marathon when so much suffering was going on so near where the race starting area is staged would be incredibly insensitive.

I was very glad to help. I plan on going back to help more. There is so much to do.

One of the runners who joined us put together this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=M3iT1gOXeug

Starting at around 3:30, you see video of the devastation. He talks to a few of the people we met, shows some of the interior damage in the houses... it still overwhelms me.

I look forward to next year, and I feel better knowing that the right decision was (eventually) made.