Before the Thanksgiving break, we took a short drive around our area. As things stand now, it’s not at all clear how Enbridge is ever going to get any oil flowing through the new pipe– since there are long stretches of land between its various existing segments. A couple of miles to the east of us (the first two pictures here) is the border with Brandon Township. Nothing is happening east of that point pending the POLAR lawsuit in federal court. And starting just two properties to the west of us (maybe 500 feet or so), there has been no construction at all– and that appears to be the case for several miles heading west. The last three photos here are in Springfield Township, a few miles to our west. In the absence of any signs of activity– no construction crews, no stakes, no flags–we can’t for the life of us figure out how the pipe in our backyard is going to connect to this one, even though we know it eventually will.
Of course, it’s no mystery as to what is to account for this odd state of affairs. As one construction worker said to us recently (and cheekily), Enbridge “has had some land acquisition issues.”
After about two weeks of idleness, there were signs of life around the segments of pipe in our back yard today. They were welding, sandblasting, and coating today (we know because we asked and they told us so). The green stuff, we’re told, is the coating.
Which reminds us: our conversations with some of the construction workers–generally perfectly nice people in our experience– have given us an idea for a brand new feature– a quite revealing one, we think. As soon as we figure out how to overcome a minor technological hurdle, we’ll launch it!
Manshum said the company respects Veterans Day and has many veterans on its staff in the U.S. Enbridge is based in Canada.
We spoke with reporter Eric Lawrence yesterday also but didn’t make the cut for the story. Our remarks echoed Beth’s: we just thought the flag mistake served as an apt metaphor for the way pipeline companies place their own interests ahead of all others.
In addition to the indefatigable Beth Duman, we would also like to thank our original source for this little story: a neighbor of ours who happened to drive by that site last week. His tip (and befuddlement at what he saw) started this whole thing.
We received an astonishing and disturbing photograph from our friend Beth Duman today. And many of you have noticed that we’ve been posting lots of our own. Whatever else there is to be said about it, pipeline construction is rather extraordinary. And we don’t know about the rest of you, but we’re pretty interested in what everybody else’s properties look like these days.
So we’ve decided to get interactive and invite entries for our first (and possibly only) photo contest. (Well, there aren’t really any prizes nor any winners, but still: we can each judge in our own heads whose pictures are the most horrifying.
Everyone along Line 6B is welcome to submit an entry or two or three– as many as you like. And we won’t publish names or addresses or anything if you don’t want, though a rough location (county, township, and or street name) might be nice.
Violations of construction line list agreements were among the things we discussed yesterday with Mark Sitek. He seemed incredulous that such things were happening (except for one or two unfortunate mistakes). The latest from Christopher Behnan at the Livingston Daily Press & Argus suggests otherwise.
Oh, and we’ll award special bonus points to anybody who can make heads or tails of what Jason Manshum says here:
“The true test of any restoration work comes once the entire project is complete, so, during construction, patience is critical,” Manshum said in an email.
On the positive side, State Representative Bill Rogers has apparently decided to wake up from his slumber to become the first state elected official we know of to utter a single public word on behalf of landowners. Three cheers for Bill Rogers!
Most immediately, there’s our personal tale of today’s disheartening, anger-inducing construction line list violations by Enbridge– a simple, easily avoidable offense we saw coming months ago and tried to address during our negotiations. At that time, Enbridge wouldn’t take those concerns seriously; they just brushed them off and dismissed them and flat-out refused us our request. And now exactly what we were afraid of (though it may seem a small thing to some) has come to pass, just as we thought it would.
We’ll bring you that story as soon as we’re able. In the meantime, if you can: be vigilant about what construction crews are doing on your property. Watch them if you can. Take pictures. Remind your ROW agent about what Enbridge has agreed to. We’re hearing that violations similar to what happened on our property today are happening all over.
