At a Glance

The 2019-20 winter season was one of the least snowy on record along the Northeast Urban Corridor.Philadelphia and Washington D.C. couldn't manage 1 inch of snow the entire season.Parts of the NYC Tri-State Area picked up as much snow in a few hours as all last season.

Winter Storm Orlena delivered more snow in a matter of hours in New York City, Philadelphia and Washington D.C. than all of last season, one of the least snowy on record.

Orlena dumped over a foot of snow in parts of the New York City Tri-State Area with snowfall rates of , accompanied by winds gusting over 30 mph, leading to near whiteout conditions at times.

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At New York City's Central Park, Monday morning.

That was more snow in one morning than they measured all of last season.

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Only 4.8 inches of snow fell from fall 2019 through spring 2020, NYC's fourth-least-snowy "season" on record and only 19% of average, according to data from the National Weather Service.

The combination of Winter Storm Orlena and mid-December's – 10.5 inches – pushed New York City above its seasonal average of 25.8 inches.

It's quite the contrast from January 2020, when Central Park flirted with 70 degrees two days in a row – a feat .

A skier glides through Times Square in New York City on Feb. 1, 2021 (left); Holding their winter coats over their arms, pedestrians walk the Brooklyn Bridge during springlike temperatures nearing 70 degrees, in New York City on Jan. 12, 2020 (right).

(Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images (left); Sipa via AP Images (right))

Even areas with more modest snow from the storm managed to easily top last winter's totals.

Neither Philadelphia (0.3 inches) nor Washington D.C. (0.6 inches) could scrape up a measly inch of snow all last season. Each picked up at least 2 inches of snow from Winter Storm Orlena.

Last season was Philly's second least-snowy season and Washington's third-least-snowy season in records dating to the mid-1880s.

Orlena was the first time Reagan National Airport picked up a 2-inch snowfall since Feb. 20, 2019.

If a nor'easter did form last winter, it either was too far offshore and moved away quickly or lacked cold air.

instead of offshore, pumping warmer air into the East and taking snow off the table, particularly along the Interstate 95 urban corridor.

This winter, however, delivered a major Northeast snowstorm in mid-December, , followed by Winter Storm Orlena.

Surprisingly in a climate that has warmed, snowfall appears to have increased along the Northeast Urban Corridor over time.

According to a from Climate Central, three of the top five cities that exhibited the largest gains in snowfall since 1970 – Atlantic City, New Jersey; New York City and Newark, New Jersey – were near the Northeast seaboard.

These I-95 corridor snowfall increases over the decades were most prevalent in and , rather than .

This may be due to a combination of factors, including warmer ocean water able to supply more moisture to winter storms, and more frequent blocking patterns in the upper atmosphere, such as the , which ushers in cold air and can lead to slow-moving snowstorms in the East.

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