Walking Brooklyn: Scenes from a blizzard

Monday, December 27, 2010

Scenes from a blizzard

Bedford Ave. and Grand St.

Pretty snowy out there today. A lot of streets in our part of Williamsburg (the Northside) had not been touched by midday.

Bedford Ave. Grand St. to Metropolitan Ave.

Not just the side streets but Driggs Avenue, a major thoroughfare and the route of the B62 bus from Queens Plaza to downtown Brooklyn, had not seen a plow at all.

Driggs Ave. near North 5th St.

But I saw that a bus had broken down during the storm and had been abandoned on Driggs Ave. near North 9th St., so a plow couldn't have gotten through anyway until the bus was towed away.

Driggs Ave. near North 8th St.

Actually it was sort of fun if you were walking and were dressed for it. There were lots of places where the sidewalks hadn't been cleared; mostly on the side streets and over on Driggs.

Bedford Av. at North 3rd St.

The walks on Bedford were pretty good. But even where most of the sidewalk was clear, the corners were generally impassable so many people were sticking to the middle of the street.

North 4th St. at Bedford Ave.

Whenever I saw cars coming down Bedford or across Grand Street or Metropolitan Ave., I thought of that World War II slogan from England: Is Your Trip Necessary?

North 5th St. at Bedford Ave.

Maybe some people had a good reason to be out on the road but I think there were people out driving for the sake of driving or at least not for a really urgent reason.

Bedford Ave. bet. North 5th & 6th Sts.

It didn't make a lot of sense because you'd never know whether a road you needed to take would be open or not.

Bedford Ave. near North 1st St.

The owner of our Local bakery, La Villita, played it safe and walked over from his home with his son, and I think they live over in Ridgewood or close to it, so that was a pretty good trek.