Philadelphia schools, government open Wednesday

PHILADELPHIA - October 30, 2012 (WPVI) -- Schools in Philadelphia will be open on Wednesday, as will city government.

"The City of Philadelphia will be open for business tomorrow," Mayor Michael Nutter said in a Tuesday afternoon news conference.

All schools, including those in the School District of Philadelphia, Archdiocesan and charter schools, will be open.

Schools had been closed for two days due to Hurricane Sandy.

However, Superintendent Hite said there may be some transportation delays as cleanup continues.

Earlier in the day, SEPTA announced the start of some service following Sandy's impact.

At a news conference on Tuesday, SEPTA officials said the Broad Street, Market-Frankford and Norristown High Speed lines would resume, as would trolleys.

However, they said there would be no Regional Rail service Tuesday because there are too many trees down. Officials say they hope that rail service will be back up by Wednesday.

As for bus routes, SEPTA said 80% of city bus routes and 60% of suburban bus routes would be running at Noon. Those routes will be posted on the SEPTA's website.

LINK: SEPTA service website

Earlier, SEPTA officials said it appears the system avoided catastrophic damage from the massive hybrid storm.

SEPTA said power issues affecting the entire region will be among the hurdles to getting the entire system back up and running.

The Philadelphia International Airport said the majority of the airlines have canceled flight operations.

Some flight operations at Philadelphia International Airport will resume Tuesday afternoon, but will be limited. Travelers should check with their airline on the flight status before coming to the airport.

Meanwhile, PennDOT announced at 4:00 a.m. Tuesday that they were reopening I-95, I-676, I-476 and I-76. Many other roads remain blocked by downed trees, wires or flood waters.

The Delaware River Port Authority Police tell Action News that all DRPA bridges - Commodore Barry, Walt Whitman, Ben Franklin and Betsy Ross - have reopened to traffic. However, there is still a ban on large trucks and motorcycles.

The Tacony-Palmyra Bridge, the Burlington-Bristol Bridge and the Riverside-Delanco Bridge remain closed to all vehicular traffic. All flights were canceled out of Philadelphia International Airport and Amtrak has stopped service.

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philadelphia, hurricanes and tropical storms, severe weather, hurricane sandy, local/state

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