Despite a potential blizzard threatening to drop another 14 inches of snow on Boston Saturday night into Sunday, Mayor Marty Walsh says a functioning MBTA system is vital to the city’s economy.

The mayor issued the following statement Friday morning, challenging the T – which has come under fire for its poor service during a historic stretch of snow storms – to remain open even if blizzard conditions set in:

The MBTA has faced incredible difficulties over the past few weeks due to the historic amount of snowfall and increasingly cold weather, coupled with an aging system. Closing the T for the weekend would pose an incredible hardship to workers and people living throughout Boston. We have another big storm coming our way Saturday night into Sunday and I hope that our public transportation system can safely remain running to keep Boston open, support our local economy and get people to work.