NY ATC w/x delays
 

I am just curious if anyone else has info regarding w/x delays throughout NY airspace last week on the 8th of August? There were numerous Thunderstorms like often occur and resulted in EDCT delays going into TEB of about 4 hours(nothing new), but we changed destination to HPN, then took indefinate delays getting out of there. We eventually had to scrub the return due to duty time. During the 3 hour wait in HPN, there were numerous comments about NY ATC, and total shutdown of all sectors due to w/x. Some very disparaging comments were said, and even by tower controllers not understanding the rational. We are very familiar with how congested that airspace is, but this time it seemed something else was contributing to the delays?

I agree it happens a lot, but my observation was more specific to that evening. Basically NY shut down all the gates except southerly departures. Watching the cells move by, the expectation was that the other corridors were going to open. When they didn't, and time went by, alot of pilots questioned the process, and I have never heard clearance delivery and ground controllers also question what was happening. Comments and criticism arose that questioned the lack of movements, and it ended up resulting in several VFR departures that always screw up the system when they pop up trying to avoid Class B airspace and weather, trying to grab a clearance. I just thought maybe someone knew of a unique reason?