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These Snowfall Charts Show How Terrible This NYC Winter Is So Far
By
Jen Chung
Published Feb 14, 2014
Modified Feb 14, 2014
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NYC Mayor's Office
By
Jen Chung
Published Feb 14, 2014
Modified Feb 14, 2014
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Mayor de Blasio has been worked over for his response to snow storms—he's barely been in office for two months and NYC has seen about 54 inches of snow! Compare that with Mayor's Bloomberg's first months as mayor—the 2001-2002 winter season only had 3.5 inches of snow (and he didn't give his first snow day until 2004).
With news that NYC's snowfall accumulation for the 2013-2014 season cracked the top 10 for the snowiest winters on record, we decided to look at how crazy this snowfall is compared to other years. And guess what—it's definitely one of the snowiest! Especially when you consider how March still lingers on the calendar, pregnant with potential for more powder. And history reminds us that there was a rare April blizzard (April 7, 1982, when 9.6 inches fell in Central Park).
First, the twenty worst winters of all time, with this year right in the middle:
Here's a look at the ten worst winters by month, compared with this year so far- you can see we're probably only about halfway through!
And here is every year going back to 1869. Some stats: the worst year for snow was 1996 with 76 inches. The best year was 1972, with only 2.8 inches. The median for the entire data set was 26.55 inches, and the average was 28.8 inches.
By charting the 10 year average and medians over time, you can see that NYC was more consistently snowier during winter up to the 1920s, then generally less snowy (but with more variation) until the 1990s, and consistently more snowy since then.
If you'd like to see the raw data, you can check it out here.
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Jen Chung
Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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