August 31, 2011:  The cleanup has begun, but being prepared paid off.  Although parts of Bronxville suffered damage from Tropical Storm Irene over the weekend, possible disaster was mitigated by careful plans and lessons learned from past storms.

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Tropical Storm Irene

Lawrence Hospital:  "We spent a lot of time preparing for the storm," said Heather Morrison of the marketing and media relations department at Lawrence Hospital.  "Patient safety and care are our primary concerns.  Our employees really stepped up, and many of them stayed the whole weekend."  The hospital weathered the storm well.  With the Paxton Avenue employee parking lots flooded, Morrison said that the parking valets who serve visitors are helping to park employee cars as well.  "This will work fine for a couple of days."  Morrison can see the Paxton Avenue lots from her office window and noted that village crews were pumping the area on Monday morning.  She anticipates that the lots will be back in service by Wednesday.

The Bronxville School suffered significant water damage, but mitigation efforts following the 2007 flood were effective in preventing further problems.  These efforts included the school's relocating the boiler and switchgear above the flood plain, with the result that the school maintained electrical power throughout the storm.  Another improvement was that baseboard vents in classrooms were replaced with vents closer to the ceiling to keep water from entering the building through classroom walls.  To prepare for the storm, the school moved copy machines and some athletic equipment to the second floor.  Student athletes removed the contents of their lockers.  Personnel moved materials off classroom floors and placed sandbags at all building entrances.

The school parking lot and first floor began to flood early Sunday morning.  The main gym floor will have to be replaced.  As of Monday morning, remaining water was being pumped out of the school building and full recovery efforts had begun.

The athletic field and parking lot will be sanitized.  In addition, floors, walls, and furniture will be dried, cleaned, and sanitized.  The school is working with an industrial hygienist to ensure safety for all building occupants.  Personnel are documenting the effects of the flood and working with a consultant to prepare an insurance claim.  In the meantime, all key activities, including student leadership training and new teacher orientations, are proceeding as scheduled.

Business District:  Peggy Conway, executive director of the Bronxville Chamber of Commerce, reported that, happily, she had not heard any "horror stories" from local businesses.  "What I personally can't get over," she said, "is how wonderfully the village is responding."  Conway complimented the village public works crews she has seen cleaning out sludge from drains, removing fallen tree branches, and pumping out flooded areas.

"We were fortunate in many ways, because we didn't have a lot of trees that fell," said Nancy Hand, former Bronxville mayor.  "Past storms have felled trees on major thoroughfares, blocking streets and knocking out power for days."  She said that she had never seen so much water at The Bronxville School.  "It was running down Tanglewylde, down Midland Avenue, and onto the football field.  Then it reached Willow Road and the townhouses there.  Midland was impassable."  Hand said that, later in the day on Sunday, she saw people at Scout Field in kayaks.  She attributed most of the damage around the village to the significant amount of rain that fell in a relatively short period.

Bronxville Police Department set up an emergency operations center starting at 8:00 pm on Saturday and running through the following day and Chief Sattriale sent e-alerts to residents to update them on the storm.  The department reported wires down on Avon Road and Northwestway and a few trees and limbs down but said that there were no injuries reported as a result of the storm.

Con Edison:  The substation on lower Milburn Street was damaged by floodwaters, and as of Monday, Con Edison hoped to have it repaired by Wednesday.  Con Edison anticipates complete power restoration to all sections of Bronxville by Thursday, September 1.

To help village residents clean up after Tropical Storm Irene, the village has lifted the ban on gasoline-powered leaf blowers through September 2.

Pictured here:  Splashing in the flood waters after Tropical Storm Irene.

Photo by J. Murrer