Peoples lets down Gallitzin
When Gallitzin-area residents’ natural gas service finally is turned on, most probably will put aside quickly the sour feelings they might now be harboring toward Peoples Natural Gas.
But the anxiety they’re currently feeling is understandable.
They had been told all along that their service would be operational by the start of the heating season, or at least by Oct. 31.
Now Peoples has pushed back the full-hookup date to late November — sometime around Thanksgiving.
Peoples has said gas service can’t begin until all hookups are safely completed.
However, judging from the work that still needs to be done and the weather uncertainties between now and then, it isn’t beyond possibility that gas company installation crews still might be on the scene after Dec. 1, even if it’s premature for the company to acknowledge that.
After residents pressed for an answer at a town hall meeting on Oct. 18, Peoples Director of Construction Randy Ciotola disclosed that hookups have been completed for only about 200 of the 500 homes that are to be receiving gas service, and that about 1,400 feet of main pipelines have yet to be installed.
Those numbers will challenge the late-November target date.
“I don’t think they realize how cold it gets up here,” said Phillip Singer, one of Peoples’ customers-to-be.
Anyone familiar with Gallitzin and neighboring Tunnelhill Borough is well aware of what blizzard-like conditions those two communities can be experiencing while, only a few miles away, winter weather is much less vicious and more tolerable.
If Peoples has additional crews available beyond those already working in Gallitzin and Tunnelhill, it would be wise for the company to reassign them to the “mountaintop” project, rather than bet against the weather.
It’s reasonable to question the reasons for Peoples’ miscalculations about the time needed to finish the work and the company’s reluctance to keep the future customers more quickly informed.
Understandably, some people who have relied on heating oil now are in a quandary over how much they’ll need between now and when their gas service is turned on. The same is true for those who have relied on other sources such as wood.
For those who have already converted their furnaces to natural gas from other heat sources, Peoples said it would pay for propane heat until the company can begin providing natural gas service. That’s commendable.
However, there’s still uncertainty and anxiety over inconveniences the towns’ future customers might incur until the new system is successfully up and running.
Few will argue that it could be a very cold experience if problems are encountered upon the new service’s start-up, if the project continues into or beyond December.
Peoples has said customers may choose to continue with their current heating source until the spring and begin using natural gas service at that time, without experiencing any meter charges for months in which natural gas isn’t used.
For many, that might be the best option, but a project is supposed to begin on the right foot, not as a disappointment.
The project, now beset with shivering anticipation, needs much more bright sunshine until the full benefits of the new service can be enjoyed.
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