Photo by [-Travis-].Good morning, Washington. Well, that had to have rivaled the ugliest commute on record, did it not? Between five to twelve inches of snow fell around the region in a span of but a few hours, leading to one of the messier evenings we can recall: northbound traffic on the George Washington Parkway only reopened this morning, passengers were stuck on buses for up to five hours, and D.C. Councilmember Tommy Wells reports that a plow driver told him that rush hour traffic in the city didn’t die down until 1 a.m. Crazy. Did you abandon your car in the city last night and can’t find it today? You should call the Department of Public Works at (202) 541-6083 to see if it was towed. More information you need to know:
Government: The Office of Personnel Management announced early this morning that the federal government will be open today, but operating on a two-hour delay. Non-emergency federal employees have the option to take unscheduled leave — an option that, with several people not getting home until the wee hours last night, we expect many to pursue. As we noted, the District government is closed today. Both D.C. Superior Court and D.C. Public Libraries are closed today, for those of you who may have had jury duty or want to borrow a book. Also, with no snow emergency declared, the Department of Public Works is enforcing rush-hour restrictions on parking this morning for anyone who is actually driving in today — or just wasn’t able to move their vehicle last night.
Metro: Metrorail actually opened on time this morning and appears to be working somewhat smoothly. Metrobus, which shut down around 9:30 yesterday, resumed service this morning — but like last night, is still only operating on snow emergency routes, as many side roads are impassable. (For a list of emergency routes, click here.) MetroAccess will begin servicing customers at 10 a.m. For those who rely on the D.C. Circulator, that service resumed at 7 a.m. this morning, but there are 20-30 minute headways on all routes.
Schools: Yeah, they’re pretty much all closed today, including D.C. Public Schools.
Roads: Crews in Virginia, Maryland and the District have been working around the clock to try and clear and treat as many roads as possible, though many side streets, especially those in residential areas, will still be rough sledding. TBD has a nice roundup of ways you can monitor the plows, like DDOT’s real-time plow map. Those who want to report unplowed roads in D.C. should call 311.
Power: There are still tens of thousands of people without power in the District, and the number of household outages in the region now numbers over 400,000. A reminder for those who are Pepco customers: if you are without electricity this morning, you should report it through 1-877-737-2662, if you haven’t already.
Travel: We’re hearing that things are sluggish but moving at National, though there are still several delays and cancellations at all three local airports. One runway is in service at National and Dulles; there are similar conditions at BWI. Confirm your flight before you head out this morning. Amtrak has announced that service between Washington and New York is operating with limited cancellations, but train service anywhere north of Penn Station is a crapshoot. As far as commuter rail goes, VRE is operating a very light schedule, while MARC is only operating Penn Line trains, canceling all other service. Intercity bus service, as noted yesterday, is very spotty.
Briefly Snow-ted: What you really want to hear: snow flurries possible on Friday and Saturday…Mayor Gray: “I think we were well prepared” for the snowstorm; Twitter doesn’t necessarily agree…Baby born inside car stuck in traffic on Beltway near American Legion Bridge…Man dies on Military Road after tree falls on truck during storm…Not even Obama could escape last night’s traffic nightmare.
This Day in DCist: Last year, it wasn’t snowing — but you could purchase some Marion Barry ‘Pearls of Wisdom’ pins.
