Snow.......take 2

We are now entering day two of our ice/snow storm here in Atlanta.

I have to admit, I love snow. It's beautiful. The insulation makes everything so quiet, there is an abandoned peace about it........it's just beautiful.

As this is the second times in as many weeks that we have had a major weather event, people are a bit more cautious.

You may recall that Atlanta came to a crippling standstill a few days back with an inch of snow.
People were sleeping in their cars, abandoning cars and children had to remain in schools overnight.
Not a stellar performance by a major metropolitan city.

Well this time is a bit different......or is it?

The Mayor and the Governor are proclaiming a success.

Yes, we have avoided the traffic nightmare of the past storm.
There has not been mass stranding, I have not heard of children sleeping in schools.
Injuries and fatalities have been at a minimum
Even the power outages they were expecting were not as severe.

However, Atlanta, a major city and economic player in this country has had to completely and totally cease to operate in order to avoid the cluster from just a few short days ago.

Is that a success?

Now to my northern brothers and sisters I have to advise that ice storms are not anything to mess with.
Having lived in the Northeast I can tell you, they don't get ice like we do.
What appears in pictures to be snow is actually hard, impenetrable ice and no.....
no can drive on that crap.
I don't care that you've been driving in snow your whole life.......
you can't drive on ice either.

But, the fact that individuals and businesses have been unable to operate is a financial disaster.
We have set up and poised this city to become the new Hollywood.
We have two more major studios opening in 2014.
We have remained a huge convention city for years (thank you all-nude Gentleman's clubs)
We have Fortune 100 and 500 companies operating in and around our city.

But what about the small guy.
Having to shutter your doors and stop operations for 2, 3 even 4 days can be devastating to a small business.
If you think I am over-reacting I would like to bring up 2003.
I lived in Astoria Queens.
There was a massive power outage that lasted for days.
Most of the main stores had power restored in two or three days.
A couple of days of lost revenue was fine for the bigger guys, but many of the smaller businesses never recovered.

Losing profits for just two days caused many of those small Mom and Pop stores to close up.
Not to mention what it does to the employees who do not make an income unless they work.
Not all people are on salary and many people do not have sick or PTO days.
No work, no money.

I'm not saying we should just forgo the dangers of ice and snow storms
but we need to really look at how we can better handle the financial side of these storms.
How can we keep many companies and business operational during inclimate weather?
Can we do a better job of keeping our main roadways open and safe for travel?
Can we do better with mass transit? Is mass transit an answer for a city as spread out as Atlanta?

As Atlanta continues to grow and become a bigger and bigger player, we cannot afford to
shutter our doors for days at a time.


It is just not smart business.

Yes, we survived this one but at what cost.