Communities throughout the Catskills and commuters who ride the rails to New York City are seeing a slow return to normalcy in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy - Hudson Valley Bureau Chief Dave Lucas has an update.
Susan Horner is clerk to the supervisor in the Ulster County Town of Olive, where phone and power service came back on Thursday at Town Hall. She says daily dry ice drops and water distribution have helped those coping with power outages.
Central Hudson spokesman John Maserjian says the power restoration effort is heading toward completion, on track to reach a targeted goal of 11pm Friday.
Susan Horner adds her town's website is also back up and running - Lissa Harris is editor of the online "Watershed Post" - she notes there are still many people in close-knit but far strewn communities with no power. She explained that being without power isn't too terrible a hardship until it stretches beyond a day or two.
Harris points out that many residents throughout the Catskills are getting their post storm updates by way of computer and smartphone - she says a lot of communities have set up facebook pages and use them as information portals.
Closer to the Hudson Valley, railroad service is slowly coming back - the MTA has service partially restored on Metro-North Railroad’s Harlem Line. Metro-North spokeswoman Marjorie Anders says there is service running out of Mt. Kisco to Grand Central.
Amtrak and Hudson Line service remain suspended. Track beds were undermined by the storm surge but Anders says everything is repairable: switch motors and other items that cannot be repaired will be replaced.
