NYC COVID-19 / Coronavirus Updates
 

On a few occasions, the FT-NYC community has discussed topics not directly related to travel. Given that most of our participating members live in the NYC area, I think it reasonable for use to host a NYC-specific thread on this topic. A few guidelines:

1) Keep discussions specific to NYC-area updates, restrictions, transit, travel, and personal considerations relevant to New Yorkers (e.g., apartment living)
2) This is not the place for general discussions of COVID-19, travel bans, or politics.
- For general discussions, see the new forum that was launched Mar 5: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/coronavirus-travel-773/
- For political discussions, see the OMNI/PR thread: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/omni...lobal-gdp.html
3) Any posts that do not meet above guidelines will be summarily removed

For general info, see:
NYC 2019 Novel Coronavirus (includes current NYC confirmed case count) and Information for Medical Providers
CDC Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) and Information for Travel
WHO Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Outbreak

Credit to NYU Langone, which I think was the first NYC medical center to ban all business travel, international or domestic, by its staff, including non-clinical staff, and canceled all seminars last Tuesday, March 3rd. At the time, it seemed like an overreaction, but every other medical center followed within the next few days and this week, all universities are taking or have taken their classes online.

Mrs. dstan and I were supposed to travel to Spain this week, but my meeting got canceled 24 h before departure. Proved to be fortunate!

Thurs 3/12 de Blasio press conference
 

https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs...pdate--3-12-20

• State of Emergency declared
• Gatherings of over 500 banned by NYS
• 95 confirmed cases in NYC
• 29 in mandatory quarantine
• First person exiting quarantine
• Schools to remain open if possible

Gatherings of 500+ in say a theater or concert hall have less density/sq ft than say a subway car with 100 people--but running the subway is essential, theaters and concerts are not.

What about the thousands gathered in Times Sq, Herald Sq, etc. often throughout the day and night?

What about the thousands of people at Penn Station?

Not that I care, but still it seems a bit too political to ban gatherings when we live in such an overcrowded city.

I think gatherings refers to planned events, and mass transit is excluded.

From the NYT:

I think the point is that large gatherings can be controlled. Public transit cannot (short of a shutdown, though I have heard commuters report that trains and subways are running well below full capacity). From an epidemiological standpoint, any decrease in interactions should slow the spread of the virus.

The subway Monday morning was just about as busy as always. At least the B line from the UWS. I guess without tourists it is more empty outside of rush hour.

I've been riding Acela up and down the NE corridor since then and that train has been half-empty. Amtrak says that nationwide sales are down 50% and getting worse.

Received some internal advice to adjust commutes a bit off schedule if possible to avoid peak times.

I suspect ridership has fallen much more significantly later in the week as more businesses have moved to work-from-home (my company starts alternate-week WFW on Monday). I often take the bus, as I think I did Mon-Wed, but the last 2 days the 1/2/3 line from UWS was significantly below normal crowd levels at the end of the AM rush (9:30am-ish, when it can often be bad because train frequency normally is diminished by then). I got seats (plus an empty next to me) both days! That's very anecdotal of course, but I think I've seen the stats that the subway is running down high-teens %.

It really depends on the train. Broadway line is dead. I take the 6/4 to the Bronx every day and there is little noticeable difference in ridership.

Calcifer and I both work for banks in Midtown. She's 100% WFH now and as of yesterday, my firm is asking all staff to work remotely if at all possible until April 10. For now, I have been commuting in, taking the Broadway line and like @nerd says, it is definitely less crowded. The office is basically empty, and the line for the sweetgreen in the Rockefeller Center Concourse is not even close to being a long at lunchtime as it normally is. Today I took the PATH to/from Jersey City and it was really empty. It feels a lot like a post-Thanos Snap world.

Oh, yeah, I missed that stimpy's post was about Monday. Thing changed pretty dramatically after the WHO pandemic call on Wednesday.

Fri 3/13 - NYS/NYC Updates
 

A few key updates from NY1 recaps of the Cuomo and de Blasio evening pressers:

NY State (https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs...-new-york-city)
• 3,200 tested, 412 confirmed cases, 50 hospitalized (12%), 18 in ICU (4%); state has 3,200 ICU beds and 53,000 hospital beds
• 28 testing labs contracted by state now approved by FDA, will be able to test 6,000 per day, up from 3,200 total to date

NYC (https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs...efing--3-13-20)
• Very high bar to close schools; if the school system were to close, "you might not see it for the rest of the school year."
• School attendance dropped to 85% on Thursday, 68% on Friday
• 154 confirmed cases in NYC (+59 vs Thursday), 29 in mandatory quarantine, 1,747 in mandatory isolation (not sure what the difference is)
• NYC has 503K N95 masks, has requested 2.2M more from FDA, only approved for 76K

My daughter sent me a photo of 14th street and 8th ave last night at 5:00 (1700). She said it looked more like a Saturday morning than a Friday night.

Article on plunging subway ridership and increased bike rental.

https://gothamist.com/news/nyc-mass-...virus-outbreak