Bad weather, track fire snarl commute

The icy weather conditions and a track fire snarled commutes for New Yorkers Wednesday.

The track fire at Grand Central around 9 a.m. caused No. 7 train service to be suspended between Times Square-42nd Street and Hunters Point. An alternative route into Manhattan on the N and Q trains, however, saw delays due signal problems north of Queensboro Plaza.

On the west side, around 8:30 a.m., a power failure knocked out No. 1 service between Times Square-42nd Street and 137th Street, No. 3 service between Times Square and 148th Street and caused the No. 2 train to be rerouted on the No. 5 line between 149th Street-Grand Concourse and Nevins Street in both directions. Service was restored around 10:30 a.m. Meanwhile, weather-related signal issues caused delays in Manhattan on the No. 4, 5 and 6 lines.

New York City Transit President Carmen Bianco said a grounded cable was the cause of the 7th Avenue line's problems, which took about 90 minutes to fix.

"We will continue to see sporadic problems throughout the day as long as we're encountering this weather," Bianco said alongside Mayor Bill de Blasio at a City Hall news conference.

Several straphangers voice their opinions of traveling in the lousy weather Wednesday.

“The train’s been really slow,” Shoshana Hockner, a 27-year-old marketing project coordinator from Washington Heights, said. “I waited 15 minutes for a train in rush hour -- because of the snow, cold, I don’t know what. It’s a disaster.”

Mike Solomon, 24, a marketing manager from Midwood, also express his grief.

"I was an hour and a half late today because there's no B train coming in from Brooklyn."

But it wasn’t just train passengers who were left exasperated by a challenging commute.

“The buses didn’t want to pull up to the curb because they didn’t want to get stuck in the snow, but how are you supposed to get through the snow?” Joe Deleo, 40, from Maspeth, Queens said.