[h=3]By TED MANN[/h]
Getty ImagesBusinesses were boarded up along Atlantic City's boardwalk on Sunday.
Hundreds of thousands of New York City area residents were ordered to leave their homes Sunday ahead of Hurricane Sandy, a dangerous storm that forced the closure of the nation's largest mass transit system and upended daily life for millions.
[h=3]2012 Storm Season[/h]
Hurricane Sandy headed north off the U.S. East Coast on Saturday after leaving 58 people dead across the Caribbean, following a path that could see it blend with a winter storm and hit the U.S. East Coast with a large storm early in the week. Follow real-time coverage in the 2012 Storm Season stream .
Video: NJ Gov. Christie Declares State of Emergency
Video: New Jersey Residents Prepare
Even before Sandy's expected landfall early Tuesday morning, the threat of high winds, storm surges and a deluge of rain rippled through Greater New York. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority halted train, bus and subway service throughout the region, airlines canceled thousands of flights and coastal communities from the Jersey Shore to eastern Connecticut moved hospital patients, closed schools and urged residents to seek shelter or higher ground.
Just 14 months after Tropical Storm Irene devastated many surrounding communities but largely spared the city, government officials and many residents said they were bracing for a far more serious blow. President Barack Obama granted New York's request for a federal emergency declaration on Sunday.
"This is the largest threat to human life our state has experienced in our lifetime," said Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy.
Power companies across the region said they were prepared for the storm, but elected officials predicted that hundreds of thousands could lose power for days. Utility workers were on high alert in New York state, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said, and Con Edison said it would have crews in the city prepared to disable underground equipment in the event of serious flooding.
Elected officials urged residents to take evacuation orders seriously, but their calls were met with divergent reactions.
In New York City, where some had cleared out before Irene, only to see minimal impact, some shrugged at Mayor Michael Bloomberg's evacuation order. Fewer than 500 went to 76 city shelters, which have a capacity of 70,000.
In Broad Channel in Queens, Joe Stephan, 68 years old, said he was planning to stay on the Jamaica Bay island where he was born and raised. Mr. Stephan said his family lost a rental house in 1960 during Hurricane Donna, when he was in high school, but he said he had never fled from a storm.
In preparation for Hurricane Sandy's arrival, Gov. Cuomo ordered the MTA to suspend service beginning 7 p.m. Sunday. Metro North and Long Island Rail Road service will also stop at that time. Service is expected to be suspended until Tuesday.
[h=3]Photos: Preparing for Sandy[/h]
Getty Images
He had parked his car on higher ground near the visitor center of the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge, where a parking lot and dozens of cars lining the road seemed to indicate he wasn't the only one planning to ride out the storm. "I would never leave," he said. "Everything's buttoned up, I battened down the hatches."
Others were taking the warnings to heart. In Battery Park City, some jogged through Battery Park or carried grocery bags, seemingly stocking up to ride out the storm rather than departing. Jacob Senker, 24, of the Financial District, decided to stay with friends in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. "There's something very ominous about this area right now," he said. "I don't want to be here right now if the power goes out."
In New Jersey, where Sandy was expected to make landfall late Monday, Gov. Chris Christie ordered the evacuation of a vast stretch of shoreline, including Atlantic City. Many there appeared to have followed orders, but some stuck around.
Alyce Gordon said she wasn't going anywhere, insisting her house was at a high point in Atlantic City. Several police officers pleaded with her to go to a nearby shelter at a school, but she said she was safest in the home her mother bought in the 1950s.
"This house is safe," she said, knocking on her door frame. "They don't make them like this anymore."
One of the police officers, who was not authorized to speak to reporters, said he thought many people would stay because of their experience with Irene last year. The storm made landfall as a Tropical Storm and caused more problems inland than on the coast, and the city didn't see much damage.
On Long Island, officials ordered evacuations of Fire Island, Long Beach and a huge swath of the densely populated South Shore. To the north and east in Connecticut, low-lying sections of Stamford and Bridgeport were ordered abandoned by residents, as were towns and cities on the shoreline all along the Long Island Sound as far east as Stonington on the Rhode Island border.
The shutdown of virtually all of the mass transit into the city—subways, commuter rail and buses—could last through Tuesday, officials said. "It's difficult to predict, but I do think Monday and Tuesday are going to be difficult days," MTA Chairman Joseph Lhota said. "Wednesday we should have service, but whether it's a full complement of service, it'd be very difficult for me to say now. I don't know when this event will end and when the power issues will be corrected."
It was only the second weather-related planned closure of the MTA in its history, a step that was poised to sever usual connections for workers trying to reach New York. A full two weekdays without functioning subways is a prospect New Yorkers hadn't faced since a 2005 transit strike that crippled the city during the winter holidays.
The move also required a complex dance on the part of the MTA, which announced plans to begin closing down service at 7 p.m., even as it hurriedly shifted subway trains and buses out of low-lying rail yards that could be susceptible to storm surges.
[h=3]Compare Sandy With Irene[/h]Experts say Hurricane Sandy is wider and stronger than Hurricane Irene, which caused more than $15 billion in damage in 2011, and could rival the worst East Coast storm on record.
[h=3]Hurricane Tracker[/h]Track the latest Atlantic hurricanes and tropical storms, and look back over past seasons.
The prospect of damage to subway infrastructure and vehicles from corrosive saltwater was one that didn't pan out in Irene, a result that an MTA spokeswoman said was "very lucky." With the likelihood of a more extreme storm surge from Sandy, Mr. Lhota said they would take no chances.
Restoration of mass-transit service wasn't likely until at least 12 hours after the storm had passed, Mr. Lhota said.
The task of restarting will be complicated by the widespread disassembly of the train lines that the agency performed to prepare for Sandy. On the Metro-North New Haven line, workers pulled up electrical motors attached to rail switches, to safeguard them against flooding seawater. As rail service shut down on Long Island and upstate, workers fanned out to detach crossing gates, which could become dangerous projectiles in high winds. At the 148th Street subway yard in Harlem, workers were hastily constructing a floodwall, to keep water expected to surge through the area from spilling into the No. 3 subway tunnel.
Other systems followed suit, with NJ Transit beginning a phased shutdown of rail, bus and light-rail operations at 4 p.m. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey planned to halt PATH train service on its New York and New Jersey route and ordered the securing of cranes and heavy equipment at the construction site of One World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan.
Closure of city bridges and tunnels Monday morning was "highly likely," a Port Authority spokeswoman said, echoing the remarks of Mr. Cuomo and state officials, who said their respective spans would be shuttered if winds reached 60 mph.
The Port of New York and New Jersey was ordered closed at midnight, shuttering terminals and sending the largest vessels out to sea.
As light faded Sunday evening over Manhattan, Mayor Michael Bloomberg made his second televised briefing of the day, urging those in low-lying Zone A neighborhoods to evacuate immediately. "Time is running out," he said.
Mr. Bloomberg waved off criticism from some who questioned the city's failure to call for evacuation earlier than Sunday morning. "Why would we do that when we don't know whether there's an emergency?" he said. "It's dangerous. It's expensive. It's inconvenient to people, and we're not here to inconvenience anybody. We're here to protect safety. When conditions warrant it, we will make those decisions. And when conditions don't warrant it, we're not going to do it just to get you a story."
—Jennifer Weiss, Jacqueline Bischof, Lisa Fleisher,
Heather Haddon, Michael Howard Saul and Will James contributed to this article
Hundreds of thousands of New York City area residents were ordered to leave their homes Sunday ahead of Hurricane Sandy, a dangerous storm that forced the closure of the nation's largest mass transit system and upended daily life for millions.
[h=3]2012 Storm Season[/h]
Hurricane Sandy headed north off the U.S. East Coast on Saturday after leaving 58 people dead across the Caribbean, following a path that could see it blend with a winter storm and hit the U.S. East Coast with a large storm early in the week. Follow real-time coverage in the 2012 Storm Season stream .
Video: NJ Gov. Christie Declares State of Emergency
Video: New Jersey Residents Prepare
Even before Sandy's expected landfall early Tuesday morning, the threat of high winds, storm surges and a deluge of rain rippled through Greater New York. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority halted train, bus and subway service throughout the region, airlines canceled thousands of flights and coastal communities from the Jersey Shore to eastern Connecticut moved hospital patients, closed schools and urged residents to seek shelter or higher ground.
Just 14 months after Tropical Storm Irene devastated many surrounding communities but largely spared the city, government officials and many residents said they were bracing for a far more serious blow. President Barack Obama granted New York's request for a federal emergency declaration on Sunday.
"This is the largest threat to human life our state has experienced in our lifetime," said Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy.
Power companies across the region said they were prepared for the storm, but elected officials predicted that hundreds of thousands could lose power for days. Utility workers were on high alert in New York state, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said, and Con Edison said it would have crews in the city prepared to disable underground equipment in the event of serious flooding.
Elected officials urged residents to take evacuation orders seriously, but their calls were met with divergent reactions.
In New York City, where some had cleared out before Irene, only to see minimal impact, some shrugged at Mayor Michael Bloomberg's evacuation order. Fewer than 500 went to 76 city shelters, which have a capacity of 70,000.
In Broad Channel in Queens, Joe Stephan, 68 years old, said he was planning to stay on the Jamaica Bay island where he was born and raised. Mr. Stephan said his family lost a rental house in 1960 during Hurricane Donna, when he was in high school, but he said he had never fled from a storm.
In preparation for Hurricane Sandy's arrival, Gov. Cuomo ordered the MTA to suspend service beginning 7 p.m. Sunday. Metro North and Long Island Rail Road service will also stop at that time. Service is expected to be suspended until Tuesday.[h=3]Photos: Preparing for Sandy[/h]
Getty Images
He had parked his car on higher ground near the visitor center of the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge, where a parking lot and dozens of cars lining the road seemed to indicate he wasn't the only one planning to ride out the storm. "I would never leave," he said. "Everything's buttoned up, I battened down the hatches."
Others were taking the warnings to heart. In Battery Park City, some jogged through Battery Park or carried grocery bags, seemingly stocking up to ride out the storm rather than departing. Jacob Senker, 24, of the Financial District, decided to stay with friends in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. "There's something very ominous about this area right now," he said. "I don't want to be here right now if the power goes out."
In New Jersey, where Sandy was expected to make landfall late Monday, Gov. Chris Christie ordered the evacuation of a vast stretch of shoreline, including Atlantic City. Many there appeared to have followed orders, but some stuck around.
Alyce Gordon said she wasn't going anywhere, insisting her house was at a high point in Atlantic City. Several police officers pleaded with her to go to a nearby shelter at a school, but she said she was safest in the home her mother bought in the 1950s.
"This house is safe," she said, knocking on her door frame. "They don't make them like this anymore."
One of the police officers, who was not authorized to speak to reporters, said he thought many people would stay because of their experience with Irene last year. The storm made landfall as a Tropical Storm and caused more problems inland than on the coast, and the city didn't see much damage.
On Long Island, officials ordered evacuations of Fire Island, Long Beach and a huge swath of the densely populated South Shore. To the north and east in Connecticut, low-lying sections of Stamford and Bridgeport were ordered abandoned by residents, as were towns and cities on the shoreline all along the Long Island Sound as far east as Stonington on the Rhode Island border.
The shutdown of virtually all of the mass transit into the city—subways, commuter rail and buses—could last through Tuesday, officials said. "It's difficult to predict, but I do think Monday and Tuesday are going to be difficult days," MTA Chairman Joseph Lhota said. "Wednesday we should have service, but whether it's a full complement of service, it'd be very difficult for me to say now. I don't know when this event will end and when the power issues will be corrected."
It was only the second weather-related planned closure of the MTA in its history, a step that was poised to sever usual connections for workers trying to reach New York. A full two weekdays without functioning subways is a prospect New Yorkers hadn't faced since a 2005 transit strike that crippled the city during the winter holidays.
The move also required a complex dance on the part of the MTA, which announced plans to begin closing down service at 7 p.m., even as it hurriedly shifted subway trains and buses out of low-lying rail yards that could be susceptible to storm surges.
[h=3]Compare Sandy With Irene[/h]Experts say Hurricane Sandy is wider and stronger than Hurricane Irene, which caused more than $15 billion in damage in 2011, and could rival the worst East Coast storm on record.
[h=3]Hurricane Tracker[/h]Track the latest Atlantic hurricanes and tropical storms, and look back over past seasons.
The prospect of damage to subway infrastructure and vehicles from corrosive saltwater was one that didn't pan out in Irene, a result that an MTA spokeswoman said was "very lucky." With the likelihood of a more extreme storm surge from Sandy, Mr. Lhota said they would take no chances.
Restoration of mass-transit service wasn't likely until at least 12 hours after the storm had passed, Mr. Lhota said.
The task of restarting will be complicated by the widespread disassembly of the train lines that the agency performed to prepare for Sandy. On the Metro-North New Haven line, workers pulled up electrical motors attached to rail switches, to safeguard them against flooding seawater. As rail service shut down on Long Island and upstate, workers fanned out to detach crossing gates, which could become dangerous projectiles in high winds. At the 148th Street subway yard in Harlem, workers were hastily constructing a floodwall, to keep water expected to surge through the area from spilling into the No. 3 subway tunnel.
Other systems followed suit, with NJ Transit beginning a phased shutdown of rail, bus and light-rail operations at 4 p.m. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey planned to halt PATH train service on its New York and New Jersey route and ordered the securing of cranes and heavy equipment at the construction site of One World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan.
Closure of city bridges and tunnels Monday morning was "highly likely," a Port Authority spokeswoman said, echoing the remarks of Mr. Cuomo and state officials, who said their respective spans would be shuttered if winds reached 60 mph.
The Port of New York and New Jersey was ordered closed at midnight, shuttering terminals and sending the largest vessels out to sea.
As light faded Sunday evening over Manhattan, Mayor Michael Bloomberg made his second televised briefing of the day, urging those in low-lying Zone A neighborhoods to evacuate immediately. "Time is running out," he said.
Mr. Bloomberg waved off criticism from some who questioned the city's failure to call for evacuation earlier than Sunday morning. "Why would we do that when we don't know whether there's an emergency?" he said. "It's dangerous. It's expensive. It's inconvenient to people, and we're not here to inconvenience anybody. We're here to protect safety. When conditions warrant it, we will make those decisions. And when conditions don't warrant it, we're not going to do it just to get you a story."
—Jennifer Weiss, Jacqueline Bischof, Lisa Fleisher,
Heather Haddon, Michael Howard Saul and Will James contributed to this article