Bloomberg reverses course, cancels Sunday's marathon

Commuters pack into a train on Thursday, November 1, in New York City. Limited public transit has returned to the city, where 14 of 23 subway lines are running. View photos of New York bracing for Sandy. Commuters ride the subway. Public transit is operating in New York City, but travel times are long, up to five hours in some cases. A police officer directs passengers waiting on Thursday to board city buses into Manhattan at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. About 4,000 buses are replacing the subway lines still closed by Superstorm Sandy damage. Thousands of people wait to board city buses into Manhattan, and some subway lines remain underwater. Getting water out of the tunnels is "one of the main orders of business right now," Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Thursday. A police officer directs traffic entering the Brooklyn Queens Expressway into Manhattan. A police officer checks cars entering the Brooklyn Queens Expressway to confirm that they have three occupants before allowing them to cross into Manhattan on Thursday. Limited public transit has returned to New York, and most major bridges have reopened. However, vehicles must have three occupants to pass. Parts of lower Manhattan are still without electricty on Thursday. Superstorm Sandy, which made landfall along the New Jersey shore on Monday, October 29, left much of the Eastern Seaboard without power, including much of Manhattan south of 34th Street. Residents of New York City's East Village enjoy a bonfire on Wednesday, October 31. East Village residents charge their phones with power from a generator on Wednesday. Traffic snarls in New York City on Wednesday. Residents and businesses across the Eastern Seaboard are attempting to return to their daily lives in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy. A Caring Foundation worker hands out food to residents of the heavily damaged Rockaway section of Queens on Wednesday. Water floods streets in the Rockaway section of Queens on Wednesday. Traders stand outside of the New York Stock Exchange in New York on Wednesday. Stocks advanced as U.S. equity markets resumed trading for the first time this week after the storm. A man surveys damage on Wednesday, October 31, in the Rockaway neighborhood of Queens, New York, where the historic boardwalk was washed away during Superstorm Sandy. Residents walk with their belongings through the Rockaway section of Queens on Wednesday. The remains of homes burned down in Rockaway are seen Wednesday, a day after an inferno spread across the flooded neighborhood. Firefighters continued to survey the damage in Rockaway on Wednesday. At least 80 homes were destroyed. People wait for buses on Sixth Avenue in New York on Wednesday as New Yorkers cope with the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. People attempt to squish into a crowded bus on First Avenue in New York on Wednesday. Con Edison crew members work on a steam pipe on First Avenue on Wednesday. The foundations to the historic Rockaway boardwalk in Brooklyn are all that remain after it was washed away Wednesday during Hurricane Sandy. People walk to work Wednesday on a normally busy street near the New York Stock Exchange. Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday after it had been closed for two days. Commuters arrive in Manhattan by ferry from Jersey City, New Jersey, on its first day back in business after Sandy. CNN iReporter Jordan Shapiro captured this view of the Williamsburg Bridge in New York at 11 p.m. on Tuesday, October 30. Half of the bridge and Brooklyn is lit, while the Manhattan side and the surrounding part of the island remain shrouded in darkness. A subway station and escalator sit underwater in New York on Tuesday. Much of the New York City skyline sits in darkness Tuesday evening after damage from Superstorm Sandy knocked out power. About 6.9 million customers are without power in 15 states and the District of Columbia, according to figures compiled by CNN from power companies. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, center, views the damage Tuesday in the Breezy Point neighborhood of Queens, where a fire broke out during Superstorm Sandy and destroyed at least 80 homes. A resident looks through the debris of his destroyed home in Breezy Point, Queens, on Tuesday. Burned-out vehicles and destroyed homes line a street in Breezy Point, located on the western end of the Rockaway peninsula in New York. A fire continues to burn Tuesday in the remains of a structure that was destroyed by the Breezy Point blaze. A New York City man hands a dog to first responders while being evacuated on Tuesday. A bartender at the International Bar in the East Village neighborhood of New York City makes drinks in the dark on Tuesday as electricity remains out for many in the city. Water floods the Plaza Shops in New York, in the wake of Superstorm Sandy, on Tuesday, October 30. Con Edison employees monitor the drainage of water being pumped out of Seven World Trade Center in the Financial District of New York on Tuesday. Onlookers watch a construction crane dangling from a $1.5 billion luxury high-rise after collapsing in high winds. The construction crane dangles from a high-rise in midtown Manhattan. Ramiro Arcos clears debris from a storm drain in the Financial District of New York after Sandy swept through the city. A couple walks in the rain Tuesday, with the East River and the Lower Manhattan skyline as a backdrop. The Manhattan skyline remains dark after much of the city lost electricity in the storm. Cars float in a flooded below-street-level parking area in the Financial District on Tuesday. People take a Tuesday morning walk on the Brooklyn Bridge, which remains closed to traffic after the city awakened to the storm damage. A car sits crushed by a tree in the Financial District on Tuesday. Photos: New York braces for Sandy. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 NEW: The mayor says the race has become a "source of controversy and division" NEW: "We cannot allow a controversy" over marathon to be a distraction, he said The 26.2-mile course typically winds across New York's five boroughs The race had been scheduled to begin Sunday morning on Staten Island New York (CNN) -- The New York City Marathon -- scheduled for Sunday -- was canceled Friday due to lingering effects from Superstorm Sandy, the city's mayor said. Mayor Michael Bloomberg had said earlier in the week the race would go on -- despite transportation, power and other issues -- contending, among other things, that businesses could use the economic boost the event provides. But on Friday, he issued a statement saying city officials and race organizers decided to cancel the race because they did "not want a cloud to hang over the race or its participants." Obstacles and challenges after Sandy Staten Island reeling days after Sandy NYC marathon will go on "While holding the race would not require diverting resources from the recovery effort, it is clear that it has become the source of controversy and division," Bloomberg said. "We cannot allow a controversy over an athletic event -- even one as meaningful as this -- to distract attention away from all the critically important work that is being done to recover from the storm and get our city back on track." As to what comes next, the mayor's office tweeted that "the New York Road Runners will have additional information in days ahead for participants," referring to the race organizer. Officials had been in meetings Friday to decide if the race would go on in the midst of storm recovery efforts, according to a city official who declined to be named. While there has been significant progress since Sandy, large swaths of the city remained without power Friday and public transit options remain limited. First held in 1970, the New York City Marathon now attracts about 47,000 runners and 12,000 volunteers -- not to mention an estimated 2.5 million spectators who annually line the course, which goes through all five city boroughs. The race had been scheduled to begin Sunday morning on Staten Island, where runners would have crossed the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge into Brooklyn and run through Queens before crossing the 59th Street Bridge into Manhattan and the Bronx. But the 26.2-mile course does not include lower Manhattan, where heavy flooding left many neighborhoods in the dark.