He said the failure of the city’s public utility system is of real concern.

“The utility system we have was designed at a different time for a different place. I believe the system is archaic and is obsolete in many ways.”

The storm has led to calls for power companies to bury more electrical lines underground. But, at least one expert says similar efforts did not help New York. Otto Lynch is vice president of Power Line Systems in Wisconsin.

“The reason many people in New York are out of power is because it was underground and when the water came onshore, water and electricity don’t mix. And they’ve got problems and it takes forever to find the problems. And when you do find the problems, it’s not just a quick fix. You have to dig. You have to work. Out of sight, out of mind is great until there’s a problem.”

Otto Lynch says a bigger national problem has to do with electrical distribution poles. He says the current poles do not have to meet industry weather requirements. And he says the ones in New York did not.

“The structures aren’t designed for the ninety-mile per hour winds that occurred and there were a lot of distribution failures.”

Mr. Lynch is a member of the America’s Infrastructure Committee at the American Society of Civil Engineers. The group produced its last report on the nation’s infrastructure in two thousand nine.