Gas pipeline installation puzzling to Jackson resident

I’m a little confused and was hoping someone would provide me an answer. Last week Perrineville Road was closed at Leone Boulevard so New Jersey Natural Gas could install a natural gas pipeline.

This pipeline was installed on a half-mile section of road that is currently forested. Surprisingly, the pipeline was installed right in front of the Hovbilt Inc. property.

The Fairview at Jackson application has generated more negative public opposition than any other project in Jackson’s history. In fact, I have yet to hear anyone totally in favor of this project, with the exception of the applicant’s contracted experts.

The applicant’s environmental impact statement was so poorly written and lacking in content as to be almost laughable. The traffic study projected traffic in an illogical pattern unrealistic to actual driving in a pathetic attempt to portray the project in a favorable light.

This is the application where the lay person can find a flaw or expose a non-truth within the first few pages. And yes, it’s the project where Hovbilt Inc. still has no concrete plan to route traffic safely to and from Route 571. You know the traffic that won’t be going that way.

Despite their feeble attempts to deceive and their failure to disclose crucial information relating to threatened and endangered species, there has been no legal change in the position of this application since it was submitted. So why did the gas company install gas lines?

If I’m not mistaken, this application has failed to gain a single approval to date. The application was originally submitted for approval in March 2000; it’s September 2001 and still it has yet to receive one single approval on any level.

In fact, the last time this application was heard in front of the Planning Board, the developer had withdrawn the golf course component due to a reclassification of the wetlands by the Department of Environmental Protection, and new sightings of threatened and endangered species on and around the property. You know, the plants and animals that aren’t supposed to be there.

Yet New Jersey Natural Gas installed a pipeline in front of the Hovbilt property. Why would they do such a thing? And who gave the OK? Didn’t they need some kind of permit?

What’s more, how long has this been in the works, and why aren’t people notified? And why would the gas company run a line in front of a piece of property that has generated so much public outcry and opposition and where approval at this point seems uncertain? Does New Jersey Natural Gas know something we don’t?

Can anyone give me an answer?

Janet Gearman

Jackson