Chill Prompts Officials To Open Warming Shelters

New Yorkers shivered and braced themselves against arctic temperatures yesterday as a lingering cold spell prompted officials to open warming centers throughout the city.

Acting in response to thousands of weather-related complaints logged through the city's 311 system, the city also stepped up efforts to shelter the homeless as temperatures hovered in the teens.

"Despite New York's historic gains reducing homelessness on our streets, when cold weather hits us and stays, we have to take extra measures," Mayor Bloomberg said in a statement.

Of the nine warming centers — which officials said are nearly double the number opened in previous cold emergencies — two each are in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx, and one is in Staten Island.

Frigid temperatures were reported throughout the Northeast, with temperatures dipping to 11 degrees Fahrenheit in Central Park at 8:38 a.m., according to the National Weather Service. Yesterday's wind chill factor made temperatures feel closer to zero, weather forecasters said, predicting that the cold weather will last for the rest of the week. "Yup, it's pretty darn chilly," a forecaster at the National Weather Service, Tim Morrin, said.

Pedestrians throughout the city echoed his sentiments. One man in Union Square, Barry Harbaugh, wrapped a purple neck warmer around his head after he lost his hat. "It's freezing out," he said.

As part of the Hudson River began to freeze over yesterday, transit officials suspended the Haverstraw-Ossining ferry service to Rockland and Orange counties.

In Midtown Manhattan, street vendors complained that business was slow because fewer pedestrians were on the streets. A doorman on West 59th Street, Artie Perez, said he put on two pairs of socks before his afternoon shift.

A spokesman for the city's Department of Housing Preservation and Development, Neill Coleman, said the city logged 2,795 complaints by 4 p.m. yesterday from individuals who called 311 to report a lack of heat. On Sunday, the city's 311 system received a record 5,496 calls about heat complaints, Mr. Coleman said.