Now that we’re under NY State PAUSE (‘shelter-in-place’ by another name), I’m only doing the updates for the data.

Trapp Family Lodge and Bear Notch are hanging tough, despite the weather and the coronavirus. Osceola may yet open its trails if they get the snow they’re expecting.

Craftsbury called out the congregations of skiers and lack of ‘safe distancing’ (six feet) among reasons they’ve closed the trails. I suspect something similar contributed to Jackson XC ceasing to groom or report on trail conditions, even after closing their public facilities last week.

Another factor for rural areas appears to be concern that they might attract people from outside their locality and contribute to transmission. Closer to home it’s related to fears that NYC folks will try to leave the city as well as fears of depleting county resources for its live-in residents. In case you were thinking about holing up at the second home in Sullivan county, an excerpt from this message specifically for us:

 Please DON’T travel here from another county or geographic area (including the five boroughs of New York City) which is experiencing community transmission of COVID-19… Please DON’T have an expectation that resources will be available to you here that are not available to you in your home town.

Sullivan county government, Wednesday, March 18, 2020

As a quickie exercise, using the map in this article on Lohud and population data, Sullivan county has 13 ICU beds for 78,000 people, or a ratio of 1:6000. It’s a rough gauge of the county’s hospital capacity. By comparison, Westchester has 1:6800, and NYC counties collectively have 1414 ICU beds for a ratio of 1:5900. That’s before counting the additional 2000 beds expected by converting the Javits center and the arrival of the hospital ship Hope. With those beds, the NYC ratio becomes 1:3500.

Which is not to say that care is convenient in rural counties that may have only one or two hospitals at most, and fewer doctors or nurses of any kind to draw on in an ongoing crisis.