Community Corner

CL&P Power Line Project Concerns Mansfield Officials, Residents

The town is opposing the proposal before the State Siting Council.

 

is opposing a plan by to install several miles’ worth of new transmission lines in town, a proposal some say could threaten a school, its students and shut down a local golf course.

The proposal is part of a much larger plan by CL&P to install 345-kilovolt electric transmission lines and make other improvements to its electrical distribution system along a 75-mile route stretching from Rhode Island to Massachusetts.

Find out what's happening in Mansfield-Storrswith free, real-time updates from Patch.

The project, proposed by CL&P late last year, is intended to improve the company’s electrical distribution system in the three states and would see the new transmission lines installed through six towns in northeastern Connecticut, including Mansfield.

But residents and town officials here are worried about the project’s impact on property values and the potential to harm at least one business in town.

Find out what's happening in Mansfield-Storrswith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“In Mansfield, in our town, we think that the proposed project would negatively impact property values for budding businesses, private schools, child care facilities and homes as a result of the visual impact of the project,” Mansfield’s town manager, told the Connecticut Siting Council during a public hearing on the project held here last month.

He said the might have to close if the power line proposed for that property is not moved. The line, Hart said, goes directly through the golf course.

“We think the owner would be in a position where they would need to close the facility and we’d hate to see that occur.”

He went on to say that new poles and lines that would be installed along Route 195 and in would be close to homes and childcare facilities, which could negatively impact those businesses and residences.

In addition, Hart told the council, CL&P’s plans to install the new transmission lines near the has raised serious concerns among the school’s parents.

“The school has been informed by various parents …  that they may be very reluctant to send their children to the school if the proposed line is put in place there.’

While Hart said the town opposes the proposed route of the CL&P project through Mansfield, he said the town is recommending that those lines be relocated if the siting council approves the project.

Other concerns that Hart raised included plans for transmission lines in Mansfield Hollow State Park, near a subdivision on Hawthorne Lane and near working farms along Bassetts Bridge Road.

Tony Moran, the town’s deputy mayor, said the proposed transmission lines for the Mansfield Hollow area of town has residents there worried about so-called EMF, or electro-magnetic fields, that such lines can create. Experts have argued for years over whether EMFs might cause cancer in humans, but public perception of such a possibility, officials said, have made residents wary of the lines.

“It’s very clear that parents who are contemplating sending their children to the Montessori School are going to be particularly alarmed by the increased electricity flowing through the area, however you want to define what it is that they’re afraid of,” Moran told the council. “But they will be concerned and the school is really put at risk.”

The council has to approve the utility’s plan to install the new power lines before the project can move forward. The state agency will hold a series of hearings, beginning June 4, on the proposal. It anticipates making a final decision early in 2013.


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