Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Police charged a 52-year-old man with DWI, after he allegedly crashed into a telephone pole on Lemoine Avenue late Tuesday night. Lemoine was closed between Main and Whiteman Streets until about 4 p.m. Wednesday.
An Englewood Cliffs man was charged with drunk driving after allegedly crashing into a telephone pole late Tuesday night and bringing down live wires across Lemoine Avenue at Hoym Street in Fort Lee, police said. Lemoine remained closed between Main Street and Whiteman Street Wednesday morning, snarling rush hour traffic in the borough, and police said the section of road wasn’t expected to reopen until late afternoon or early evening. Fort Lee police were detouring traffic at intersections leading to the scene Wednesday morning, and PSE&G crews were working at the scene near Whiteman Plaza, where wires remained on the ground across the entire roadway. Palisades Avenue was open leading to the George Washington Bridge, but traffic was …
Monday, December 10, 2012
Of all the proposals, building redundancy into the grid looks to have the best chance of keeping the lights on next time
- OPINION
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Monday, December 10, 2012
The devastation left behind Hurricane Sandy poses huge challenges for the state -- not the least of which is how best to prevent future storms from leaving 2.7 million customers without power, some thousands of whom still lack electricity or gas on the barrier islands along the coast. In the more than a month since the storm hit, there has been no shortage of proposals to prevent disaster from striking again. The recurring questions are whether any of the schemes will work, and at what cost to ratepayers, who ultimately bear the cost. Those plans range from requiring utilities to install so-called smart meters in customers' homes and businesses; ordering gas stations and other facilities to buy backup generators; and forcing Jersey Central…
Sunday, December 9, 2012
Widespread power outages in Teaneck, Englewood Cliffs and Leonia were caused by nesting birds, according to report.
- NEWS
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Sunday, December 9, 2012
A monk parakeet nest on a utility pole outside Overpeck Park caused a transformer to short out and power lines to come down, knocking out electricity to more than 3,000 customers in areas from Teaneck to Englewood Cliffs, northjersey.com reported. The outage was reported shortly before 1 a.m. Saturday and impacted up to 2,000 customers in Teaneck, according to PSE&G. Service was fully restored more than four hours later. The large nests can cause heat to build up in transformers, eventually leading to a short circuit, according to the report. Monk parakeets have been nesting in Edgewater and the Overpeck Park area for at least 30 years. Last week, parakeet supporters managed to stop Edgewater officials from cutting down trees where the …
Friday, December 7, 2012
Power companies have not done enough to coordinate outreach with local officials, state Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg says.
- BUSINESS
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Friday, December 7, 2012
By Joe Tyrrell, NJSpotlight.com Utility companies acknowledged communications problems during and after Hurricane Sandy, but defended their overall performance before a state Senate committee studying responses to the superstorm. That did not sit well with Stefanie Brand, director of the Division of Rate Counsel, who also took issue with the idea that the utilities wanted to spend some $1.1 billion to $1.2 billion to deploy smart meters. Brand argued that the BPU and Legislature must scrutinize utility spending and revenues before funneling more customer or taxpayer funds to them. But not all cost estimates brought a similar response. The Passaic Valley Sewerage Commission, whose Newark treatment facility inadvertently dumped 775 million …
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
A redundant grid, and a smarter one, will help protect power during superstorms
- BUSINESS
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Wednesday, December 5, 2012
by Tom Johnson, NJSpotlight.com If New Jersey wants a better response to major storms like Hurricane Sandy, the state needs to build more redundancy into the power grid and get serious about aggressive tree-trimming efforts, utility executives said yesterday. The state also needs to look at ways to develop a smarter electric grid, a step that would improve communication between electric companies and customers and allow more efficient dispatch of crews to restore service, the executives said at a forum sponsored by the New Jersey Alliance for Action. The event at the PNC Arts Center in Holmdel provided a glimpse of what the state’s four utilities will likely tell a pair of legislative committees today and tomorrow, as they explore what …
Monday, November 12, 2012
Great? Good considering the circumstances? Terribly? Share your views in the comments.
- OPINION
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Monday, November 12, 2012
Most of Fort Lee lost power after Hurricane Sandy, closing schools for more than a week, bringing many businesses to a halt, causing great concern for the borough's seniors and generally disrupting life around town. Some residents were without service for more than 10 days, and others saw power go out again when a snowstorm hit. PSE&G says Sandy was an unprecededented disaster, among the worst in the history of New Jersey. More than 1.7 million were without power at its peak, and it takes time to work through even with the tens of thousands of crews brought in from other states, the utility told customers. "Since the start of the storm, PSE&G call centers have handled more than 1.9 million calls (more than 12 times the normal volume)," …
Thursday, November 8, 2012
The latest company estimate projects full service restoration Saturday.
More than 160 PSE&G customers in Fort Lee were without electricity Thursday morning, ten days after Hurricane Sandy knocked out power to much of the borough. In an updated company work schedule, PSE&G said 165 local customers were still in the dark Thursday. Full service to Fort Lee was projected to be restored Saturday, according to the plan. Despite the continued outages, the amount of customers without power has gone down in recent days, according to utility company work plans. On Wednesday morning, PSE&G reported 1,791 customers without service in Fort Lee. In a statement Thursday, PSE&G said 70,000 of its customers remained out from Hurricane Sandy and another 40,000 from Nor'easter Athena. The progress of repair work has not …
Wednesday, November 7, 2012
PSE&G may have to halt repairs due to the latest storm.
The latest PSE&G work schedule shows 1,791 customers still without power in Fort Lee, a slight decline from the more that 2,000 reported out Tuesday. PSE&G said it planned to restore 702 customers Wednesday, 572 Thursday and 485 on Friday. Another 20 would be restored Saturday, leaving just 12 customers not accounted for on the current schedule. The only problem is that schedule could change because of the latest storm. Although the company has restored service across Fort Lee, some outages have lagged more than eight days after Sandy battered the borough, and Gov. Chris Christie warned a new nor'easter Wednesday could cause more outages in the state. The utility company said it expected to continue work, but might have to halt repairs…
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
According to PSE&G’s latest work plan, power is scheduled to be restored little-by-little throughout the week until everyone’s is restored by Sunday, but the company continues to stress that its work plan is only a projection and could change.
More than 2,000 of Fort Lee’s 16,580 PE&G customers were still without power Tuesday morning, more than a week after Sandy, according to an updated company work schedule. According to the work plan, 867 of the 2,190 customers in the borough remaining without power were expected to come back online Tuesday, followed by 597 Wednesday, 455 Thursday and 190 on Friday. The company also expected to restore 57 on Saturday and the remaining 24 on Sunday. PSE&G has stressed the schedules are only projections and could change at any point. They also give no indication of what parts of town are projected to get their power back on any given day. "Our work plan is prioritized by where we can restore the maximum number of customers in the shortest …
Monday, November 5, 2012
With as many as 5,000 customers still without power in Fort Lee, Mayor Mark Sokolich delivered a list of all the areas in town needing to be restored. He also said the pedestrian curfew is now 8 p.m. so people can vote.
Editor's Note: This article was updated at 7:15 p.m. Monday. Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich met with the president of PSE&G Monday afternoon—a meeting he said was arranged by State Sen. Loretta Weinberg (D-37), who will also be present—to give him a list of all the areas in Fort Lee that remain without power. Sokolich said earlier in the day that the meeting with PSE&G president and CEO Ralph LaRossa was “not going to be a pleasant one.” “I don’t know how productive it was for Fort Lee, per se, but I’m appreciative of anyone that faces the music, so to speak,” Sokolich said after the meeting, adding that he confirmed that work orders are in for what he called “critical buildings” and circuit breakers that need to be fixed. Although Sokolich …
William Mays
4:22 pm on Thursday, December 13, 2012
On one hand, it would be embarrassing to the employee, but I think that people have the right to know if they were at risk of being infected if they were around this person before. more ›