Riders stuck on subways for hours

Not even the city's venerable subway system was spared by the massive blizzard. Usually dependable during a snowstorm - the subway broke down in spots, trapping riders for hours.

Christopher Mullen was among the riders stranded for several hours aboard a cold train yesterday. "I just huddled with my girlfriend. We just tried to stay close," he said.

The train was stopped by snow drifts on the tracks and ice on the electrified third rail. It took hours to rescue the passengers because crews first tried to push the train, and when that didn't work, a diesel locomotive had to be dug out of a rail yard and brought in to move it.

With snow totaling as much as 20.5 inches on Staten Island to 19 inches in lower Manhattan and 15 inches in the Bronx, city sanitation workers have been working round the clock with 1,700 plows and 365 salt spreaders.

The Department of Environmental Protection also brought out a number of plows to help the sanitation crews. "The world has not come to an end," Bloomberg said yesterday. He stressed that people should take mass transit, particularly the subways as he had done Monday.

With The Associated Press