Big Brother wants those sirens, aka megaphones, everywhere, great.

Article makes it clear, this isn't for JC or Hudson County, this is for New York.

Anyone consider how stupid those sirens look? Besides, they wont do any good. If anything happens, the last thing people will listen to is that siren/megaphone. By the time they are ready to make an announcement we could get all our info from the press.

The radio station seems like a better idea but again wont do any good. If something happens, I probably wouldn't remember the station number, i would just turn to 1010 Wins.

Great! The siren should buy us all enough time to put our head between our legs and kiss our sweet ass goodbye.

Um, for when Godzilla attacks JC, hello!!!???

I'm curious about the pole with all the megaphones at the top that's located on the corner of Columbus and Marin...What the heck is it?

Don't know how these sirens can help - If they ever go off it will be a stampede and we will have traffic and transport gridlock.
At least if the sirens go off we can run around naked until we burst into flames.

This is not a new idea. We had sirens around here in the 50's and 60's. They were tested every Saturday at exactly 12 PM. Of course the purpose of those sirens was to inform you that you are about to be vaporized so get ready.

Oh yeah - Instead of addressing the problem and potential dangers, lets just stick some sirens around to remedy the problem.
Dumb-ass solutions to serious issues - Who's lucky associate or family member from cityhall or government will have the job of sitting in a room and at the ready to push the siren button - I wonder how much it will cost us to have some lucky ass-wipe to sit there ?

If the chemical companies can't secure their site and have state of the art deterrents, then they shouldn't be in business - why should we pay for their security ?

Kick them out to some desert where there's no population and can cause minimal environmental damage!

PREPARING FOR THE WORST
All will be in earshot of emergency alert sirens

Saturday, August 30, 2008
By PAUL KOEPP
JOURNAL STAFF WRITER

In keeping with Hudson County's role as what officials call "the first line of defense" for the New York City metropolitan area, the county is installing an alarm system to alert the public to major emergencies.

The Board of Chosen Freeholders awarded a $795,000 contract earlier this month to Kevco Electric Co., of Bloomfield, and Acoustic Technology Inc., of Boston, to install 31 sirens throughout the county.

The sirens will not be placed in all 12 Hudson municipalities but will be audible at 70 decibels in every residential area, said Gerry Drasheff, an emergency management planner for the county. The cost is being covered by a 2006 homeland security grant.

Kevco will begin installing the sirens, which can also broadcast spoken information through loudspeakers, next month, and will complete the work by January, Drasheff said.

Many will be placed just outside transportation hubs like Hoboken Terminal, at Exchange Place in Jersey City, and Port Imperial ferry terminal in Weehawken.

However, Drasheff explained, the county has hit a roadblock in establishing a complementary piece of the alert system: An emergency broadcast radio station.

County officials obtained a license for an AM station from the Federal Communications Commission two years ago but the planned space on the dial was knocked out when a local commercial station went digital, he said.

Then, word came recently that officials in New York state near the Indian Point nuclear power plant have applied for a 10,000-watt station that would drown out any Hudson County broadcasts on a nearby frequency.

"That creates a potential problem for us, and we're working with the FCC right now," Drasheff said. "Obviously we're trying to block the station, but whether we're successful remains to be seen."

An FCC decision on the application is pending.

At the Aug. 10 freeholder caucus, several members of the county board said they were concerned that Hudson's lobbyists and federal legislators were not doing enough to protect the interests of the county, which they pointed out could provide an escape route to many New Yorkers in the aftermath of a disaster.

"Let's face it, we're in the middle of it all here" said Freeholder Maurice Fitzgibbons of Hoboken. "For Rockland County to have this radio station is ridiculous. Why don't we have that kind of clout?"

Fitzgibbons said Rockland County had applied for the station; the actual nuclear plant is in Buchanan, N.Y., in Westchester County, and is just across the Hudson River from Rockland.

The freeholders pointed out that Hudson County has its own environmentally sensitive assets to protect, such as the Kuehne Chemical plant in Kearny, which contains huge volumes of chlorine.

"This is a very serious and sensitive issue," said Freeholder Bill O'Dea of Jersey City. "I'm tired of being treated like the poor stepchild of New York on everything."