JP Digs Out: The Blizzard in Your Backyard

As the citizens of Jamaica Plain dig out today, several left lasting memories on various forms of social media while more than 2 feet of snow battered the area.

By 8 p.m. Friday, the blizzard was bearing down. While much of the Cape Cod area had power outages, most of the lights in Jamaica Plain stayed on.

Though there was a brief power outage scare. @TheMaxWhite tweeted at 8:30: “Power might be about to go out in Jamaica Plain... lots of flickers.”

Four-and-a-half hours earlier, a driving ban, ordered by Gov. Deval Patrick, kicked into effect. @Blackcurrents made use of Twitter’s new Vine video player. She tweeted along with the 6-second video: "Deserted and snow covered Jamaica Plain."

@LifewithRoozle was out with a ruler as late as 10p.m. Friday. He measured 15 inches in JP at about 9 p.m. Friday.

The Galway House said they would stay open till 2 p.m. via Facebook Friday afternoon. “We plan on being here till 2am whatsa problem...Afraid of a little/lot of snow? We are Bostonians ....Bring it on................maybe call first to see if the power is on ,if it aint bring a flashlite,” said a post on the tavern’s Facebook wall.

The Purple Cactus’ long awaited re-opening took place just before the blizzard hit with force, at 11 a.m. Friday.

The Twitterverse was littered with photos tweeted from JP Saturday morning. By about noon, the streets were full of people digging out their cars and sidewalks.

Patrick lifted the driving ban effective at 4 p.m. Saturday, but the parking ban remained in effect so that plows could clear roads.

Though the main roads looked OK by late afternoon, many side streets had not been touched by plows.

@LPerille tweeted a photo of his Governor Road neighborhood: “Governor Road in Jamaica Plain. This will take a while!”

By nighttime, several JP businesses and restaurants were reopened.

Whole Foods reopened today at 7 a.m., but Ula Café, Centre Street Café and City Feed opened for business at the end of the day, according to David Warner of City Feed on twitter @CityFeed.

@MBotastic asked the question a lot of people were wondering by Saturday evening: "Where do we put all the snow?"