Four Hoboken Parks Closed 'Indefinitely' To Clean Up Trees, Wires

HOBOKEN, NJ — While Tropical Storm Isaias veered west and spared the Hoboken area the worst of its wrath, it still downed trees and left more than a million New Jersey residents without power Tuesday.

The city of Hoboken sent an alert Tuesday night after 5 p.m. saying that 35 blocks are completely closed due to downed trees, power lines, and wires, and that residents should stay inside. Driving is still prohibited until 5 a.m. Wednesday.

"Residents are asked to remain indoors for the next several hours," wrote the city.

The following parks are closed until they are safe:

• Church Square Park
• Maxwell Park (several uprooted trees)
• Stevens Park
• Columbus Park
• Portions of Elysian Park (due to damaged playground equipment)

Call the Hoboken police or fire departments at 201-420-2100 or 201-420-2004 respectively to report a downed tree or wire.

Street sweeping resumes tomorrow, the city said in its message.

The city said that although there were some periods of heavy rain, the sewerage authority had no reports of floods (unlike during the two recent July storms). Over an inch of rain fell, and the city's H5 flood pump was able to pump out 1.6 million gallons of rainwater, preventing flooding. Two resilency park's underground detention systems also helped.

A tornado watch was in effect for the state today.

A confirmed tornado was spotted in Ocean City in South Jersey earlier today.

Use this link to the National Hurricane Center to track the storm.

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Review storm preparation tips; visit https://nj.pseg.com/safetyandreliability/stormsafety.

Stay connected with PSE&G

Compile a list of emergency phone numbers; include PSE&G Customer Service 1-800-436-PSEG.
You can report an outage by texting “OUT” to 4PSEG (47734).

Stay away from downed wires

Downed wires should always be considered “live.” Stay at least 30 feet away from downed wires. Do not approach or drive over a downed line and do not touch anything it might be in contact with. If a wire falls on or near your car, stay inside the car, call 911, and do not get out until PSE&G de-energizes the line. If you MUST get out of the vehicle because it is on fire, jump as far as possible away from the vehicle, with both feet landing on the ground at the same time, and hop or shuffle away.

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