Mayor Warns Of New Snowstorm Ahead

Mayor Michael Bloomberg warned New Yorkers Thursday afternoon that another snowstorm is heading this way.

This time, the mayor says, the city is prepared for whatever is likely to hit the ground.

After the response to December’s blizzard, Bloomberg has been quick to assuage fears that snow called for on Friday and Saturday will slow the city to a halt again.

“My grade for the city last time was unsatisfactory and we're going to do better next time,” Bloomberg said from the blue room at City Hall. “I don’t think the information was collected and distributed such that it was near as useful as it should have been [during the last storm].”

With the weather service calling for between two and six inches of snow in all five boroughs starting tomorrow and lasting through Saturday, Bloomberg has been working overtime to ensure New Yorkers that he’s doing everything possible to prevent a repeat of last year’s lambasted snow response.

Bloomberg said he’s made several changes in the last week to improve the city’s snow removal efforts, including demoting the head of the city’s emergency medical services office.

The mayor also outlined several other changes that will be effective before the snow even begins to fall on Friday.

The city will deploy scout teams with video cameras throughout the city — all of which will send information to the coordination centers at City Hall — to give the department of sanitation and other agencies real-time looks at the situation on the ground.

The mayor said sanitation will also have GPS locators in trucks based out of a depot in Brooklyn, a pilot program designed to make sure that sanitation trucks, plows and salt spreaders are where they are most needed.

“While I realize there were problems with the city’s snow cleaning efforts last week, I want to continue to reassure New Yorker’s that we’re doing everything in our power to make sure we don’t experience those kinds of problems again,” Bloomberg said. "We're always looking to improve the city's response to emergencies."