A winter storm that has closed government offices in Washington and schools in New York is arriving late but slowly moving north, threatening to set snowfall records across the Northeast.

Only a few flakes had fallen in New York by 6:30 a.m. local time, but the city still stands to get 12 inches (31 centimeters) as the storm intensifies through the morning and peaks in the afternoon. Washington, where light freezing rain was falling early Wednesday, remains on track to 4 to 6 inches. Boston is forecast to get 5 to 9 inches, the National Weather Service said.

“New York still seems to be in the jackpot area for precipitation,” said Rob Carolan, a meteorologist with Hometown Forecast Services Inc. in Nashua, New Hampshire. “The areas from southwestern Fairfield County in Connecticut to Bergen County in New Jersey, including New York, is in for a pretty sizable snowfall. ”

A foot of snow would be a record in New York for this date. The latest in the year that Central Park has received 12 inches of snow was a storm in 1896 that fell on March 15 and 16, 1896, according to Carolan, who provides forecasts for Bloomberg radio.

Government offices in Washington are closed, the Office of Personnel Management said on its website. As of 7 a.m., 3,400 flights were canceled for Wednesday, according to FlightAware, an airline tracking service in Houston. Amtrak and Metro North Railroad are operating with a reduced schedule, and the Long Island Rail Road plans to suspend some trains if more than 10 inches of snow falls.

Federal Reserve

Congress plans to work through the snow, even if federal offices are closed. The Federal Reserve indicated in an emailed statement on Tuesday that an announcement on interest rates scheduled for 2 p.m. will go ahead as planned. A press conference hosted by Fed Chairman Jerome Powell will follow at 2:30 p.m.

Leaders of the Senate Intelligence Committee told reporters Tuesday that their high-profile hearing on election security, which is part of the panel’s Russia probe, will be held Wednesday regardless of the weather conditions.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration expects to send its weekly data dump of oil supply and demand figures as planned at 10:30 a.m., a spokesman said.

In New Jersey, Governor Phil Murphy declared a state of emergency.

“Please do not head out into the snow unless you absolutely have to,” Murphy said. There’s a chance for “the combination of gusty winds and wet snow, which could bring down power lines.”

The storm will mark the fourth nor’easter to hit the region this month. The previous systems dropped snow by the foot from Long Island to Boston and left more than 2 million customers without power during their peak.

“It is still coming, and there is still quite a lot coming,” said Patrick Burke, a senior branch forecaster at the U.S. Weather Prediction Center in College Park, Maryland. “Snowfall is always one of the most challenging events to predict.”