New Jersey Transit will run additional trains on the Pascack Valley and Port Jervis lines today, New Year’s Eve.

An additional Port Jervis line train will depart Hoboken at 1:25 a.m., stop at Secaucus Junction (connecting train departs from Pennsylvania Station in New York at 1:15 a.m.), express to Suffern and make all stops to Port Jervis.

An additional Main Line/Port Jervis line train will depart Hoboken at 3 a.m. and make all stops on the Main line to Port Jervis, except Delawanna (connecting train to Secaucus Junction departs New York Penn Station at 2:50 a.m.).

Train 41, the 12:05 a.m. departure from Hoboken to Port Jervis, will not run.

An additional train on the Pascack Valley line will depart Hoboken at 3:25 a.m., and make all stops to Spring Valley; the connecting train to Secaucus Junction departs New York Penn Station at 3:15 a.m.

Click here for NJ Transit’s complete holiday and getaway schedules.

Drivers traveling on the New York State Thruway can help themselves to free small coffees and teas on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day.

The beverages will be provided at all 27 travel plazas along the Thruway from 11 p.m. tomorrow until 7 a.m. Thursday. Drivers are encouraged to take frequent breaks while traveling if they feel tired or sleepy.

Thruway travelers have been offered the free beverages for more than 40 years to help keep them warm and alert during late-night or early-morning travels.

New Jersey Transit is offering special fares during the holidays.

Its Family Super Saver Fare, which allows up to two children 11 and younger to travel free with each fare-paying adult, will be in effect from 7 p.m. today until 6 a.m., Jan. 5, on all trains, buses and light rail lines.

In addition, off-peak round-trip tickets, which offer up to 15 percent savings off the cost of regular fares, will be valid on all trains during this same period.

In Rockland, the train fares are only good from the Suffern station. County residents can take advantage of the savings if they travel to any station in New Jersey, such as Montvale on the Pascack Valley line.

An accident that was blocking a southbound lane on the Thruway near the Rockland-Orange border has been cleared.

I had this up on LoHud’s home page, but it was buried, ahem, under all the snowstorm coverage

Finally! No more metal plates on Tappan Zee Bridge

The last of the metal construction plates were removed this morning from the Tappan Zee Bridge — just in time for the season’s first major snowstorm.

For the past several months, the thick plates have been nothing short of a traffic nightmare for tens of thousands of people who cross the bridge daily. They added time to the commute, caused long delays and damaged some cars.

The state Thruway Authority had planned to remove the plates — needed to perform joint repair work on the span — by early next week, but were finished earlier.

The plates will return in the spring, when the last 12 deck panels will be installed, and work to replace bridge joints will shift from the two outside lanes in both directions to the interior lanes.

Rockland Editorial Page Editor Nancy Cutler reports that Route 59 in Central Nyack is “unpassable.”

Remember, New Jersey Transit is honoring bus tickets and passes on trains and light rail systemwide today.

For example, customers who normally take the bus from Montvale, N.J., to the Port Authority Bus Terminal will be able to use their bus tickets on the train from Montvale to New York Penn Station.

To help you get wherever you’re going in this storm, I’ll be posting regular updates about road conditions and delays with trains and ferries.

The Thruway Authority is reporting the left lane is blocked on Thruway southbound at milepost 35.7 between exit 16 (Harriman) and exit 15A (Ramapo).

New Jersey Transit is offering riders to bring a friend on the Pascack Valley line for free this weekend — but Rockland residents will have to catch the train from a station in New Jersey.

The closest NJ stations to Rockland are Montvale, Park Ridge, Hillsdale and Woodcliff Lake.

To save the most money, families can combine the bring-a-guest-free offer with NJ Transit’s Family SuperSaver, which allows up to two children (11 and under) to ride free with a fare-paying adult. By combining both offers, a family of four traveling from Montvale could take a roundtrip to Manhattan for a total of $11.75.

Visit www.njtransit.com/PVL and click on “Ride Free” tab at the top of the page to download a guest pass and present it when riding the train this weekend.

Metro-North has announced its holiday plans. Trains will operate on weekend schedules with added trains at key times on Christmas and New Year’s days and the days immediately after. On the eves, they’ll have more trains outside the peak hours — heading out of Grand Central Terminal the day before Christmas, and into Grand Central the days before New Year’s.

Find the changes below, but first, I want to mention that if you haven’t been down to Manhattan, you’re missing Grand Central Terminal putting on its holiday show.

At any time of year, Grand Central is as much a destination as a jumping off point to see the city. But this time of year, Read more of this entry »

If you take the Henry Hudson Bridge into Manhattan, get ready for a new, but temporary traffic pattern starting Wednesday morning.

Workers will begin making the switch 9 p.m. Tuesday and it should be done for the morning rush.

Take special note of these instructions: Cash customers going Read more of this entry »

Residents can weigh in tomorrow night on a local law that would ban writing, reading or sending text messages via cell phones or other electronic devices while driving in Rockland.

A public hearing is scheduled for 8 p.m. Tuesday in the Legislative Chambers, Allison-Parris County Office Building, 11 New Hempstead Road, New City.

County Legislature Chairwoman Harriet Cornell introduced a bill that would forbid text messaging while driving in the county.

The bill exempts police, firefighters and emergency personnel who can send text messages as part of the job and it doesn’t forbid drivers from texting if their car is parked, standing or stopped as long as it’s out of the traffic flow.

Seven states, including New Jersey and Connecticut, have a text-messaging ban for all drivers.

Westchester County banned texting while driving in September, and several bills are pending in the state Legislature. Cornell said that in the absence of a state ban, the Rockland law was justified.

Clarkstown International Collision will hold its annual holiday party for families from 2 to 4 p.m., Sunday, Dec. 21, at 95 Route 304, Nanuet. The party is free to attend. It will feature a live petting zoo, live music and children can take photos with characters including Elmo, Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Blues Clues, Frosty the Snowman and Santa Claus. Organizers said each child will be able to enjoy a free ride on Santa’s Sleigh and take home a gift. Refreshments will also be served. For information, call the auto body repair shop at 845-627-3100.

A serious accident this afternoon involving a van and a TOR bus has closed parts of Route 45, from Route 202 to Conklin Road.

Updates about injuries are available on LoHud.com.

Here’s how TOR’s schedule is being affected as of 4:30 p.m., courtesy of the county’s Department of Public Transportation:

• Transport of Rockland (TOR) 91, 91 Direct and 94 buses are using the Palisades Interstate Parkway to bypass the accident area, resuming their routes further south on Route 45.

• The Coach USA Rockland Coaches (Red & Tan) 45 buses are detouring via Pomona Road, Route 306 and Route 202 in order to serve the Mt. Ivy Park & Ride lot.

The road isn’t expected to reopen until 6 p.m.

People with visual impairments should have an easier time getting around Pennsylvania Station with the help of a new “talking” kiosk, which was unveiled today.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority and MTA Long Island Rail Road paid for the kiosk, the second permanent one in the Manhattan station. It is located on the Long Island Rail Road concourse.

According to the agencies, the kiosk will help visually impaired and other customers navigate the concourses, passageways and platforms of Penn Station. It features “a touch-activated, tactile map of the station, vivid visual displays for the partially sighted, and a voice designed for phonetic clarity. As a customer touches different parts of the map, the kiosk describes the corresponding location and gives directions of how to get there,” according to a press release.

The new version cost $23,000, or less than half the cost of a previous model removed earlier this year.

“The installation of this kiosk is just one of the many ways we are making transit more accessible to our disabled customers,” Elliot Sander, executive director and CEO of the MTA, said in a statement. “And while it is designed with visually impaired customers in mind, this kiosk is useful for anybody who is unfamiliar with Penn Station.”

The kiosk is located in the Long Island Rail Road’s main concourse, between the entrances to Tracks 14 and 15. To help visually impaired customers find the kiosk, the device emits the song of the lark sparrow, a bird species found by audiologists to have a unique set of phonetic properties that make it most effective at assisting in directional wayfinding, according to the MTA press release.