Hurricane Irene, many will recall, was a big, wet sloppy drunk of a storm. Hurricane Sandy, in contrast, was a great big windbag. The devastation felt throughout the Atlantic coast, and not lightly in inland towns such as West Windsor and Plainsboro, was immense — far worse than Irene by most estimates.
The combined powerful hurricane and nor’easter hybrid that slammed into New Jersey on Monday, October 29, didn’t cause the same dramatic flooding as Irene, but it did leave a widespread band of destruction — much of it caused by hundreds of huge trees taking down major power lines as well as slamming into houses.
Four days after the storm, 40 percent of West Windsor residents still had no electricity in their homes, and some had no concrete time frame to expect any improvements. Public works and utilities crews gradually cleared trees, power lines, and other debris that blocked thoroughfares, like Alexander Road (shown above the morning after the storm). Some traffic lights were switched back on, after days of treacherous travel where most turns were prohibited on major roads, like Route 1.
West Windsor Township provided comforts in attempt to help residents survive the aftermath of the historic storm meteorologists dubbed “Superstorm Sandy.” While schools stayed closed for the whole week, West Windsor-Plainsboro High School South opened afternoons to allow residents a chance to shower. The township’s senior center served as a reception center, complete with areas for recharging electronics, microwaves for heating home-brought meals and, perhaps most vitally, working heat.
All township meetings were canceled, and five polling locations for November 6’s election were moved.
West Windsor Mayor Shing-Fu Hsueh said he and his administration worked diligently in the days after the storm, meeting daily with officials from the state Office of Emergency Management and representatives of utility companies PSE&G and JCP&L. Superstorm Sandy was unlike anything they had ever seen, and the storm’s aftermath has been more complex than what anyone involved has handled before, Hsueh said. Whereas other storms may damage a specific area, Sandy left destruction everywhere.
“They can’t focus on just one area,” he said. “There are trees down everywhere. It is much less predictable than what we used to have.”
The widespread nature of the outages stymied efforts to get power back quickly. Immediately after the storm, 70 percent of the township was without power. Major improvements didn’t come until November 2, when that figure decreased to 40 percent. Hsueh attributed the decrease to the more complete information flowing in to the utility companies later in the week.
“Now they have much of the information they need,” he said. “In other words, they know what the problems are and where the problems are.”
Most of the problems belonged to JCP&L customers. Hsueh said PSE&G provides service to two-thirds of West Windsor. By the morning of November 5, 4.8 percent of PSE&G’s 10,861 customers in West Windsor still did not have power. The utility company said it expected to have power fully restored to all its customers statewide by November 9.
Meanwhile, Hsueh said JCP&L didn’t act until it finalized its assessment plan October 31. By that point, PSE&G already had begun fixing major problems. The difference in approaches has deteriorated West Windsor’s confidence in JCP&L, Hsueh said.
“We are not very happy with JCP&L,” he said.
Robbinsville Mayor David Fried, a Republican, issued similar statements last week after 95 percent of PSE&G customers in his town had been restored before JCP&L had fixed a single issue.
Banter on the West Windsor Facebook page centered on the power companies, particularly JCP&L. “JCP&L is a disaster. Under-promise and then fail to meet those promises. I can only hope the utility commission penalizes them heavily,” wrote one resident.
Another picked up the thread: “I agree; we need to eliminate JCPL in West Windsor and get PSEG instead. Mayor should take measures to bring about a change in the quality of service of the utility company. PSEG has done a much better job in restoring power than JCPL under the current crisis in other regions of the county.”
More comments followed. “This lesson (that JCP&L is far inferior compared to PSE&G) was already learned last year during Irene.”
Suggested another person: “If given the choice to buy a proven item or a known inferior item I would bet hands down that we would choose the proven item so why is it that we don’t have a choice? For goodness sake, how many times does JCPL have to demonstrate their inferior service before they get held accountable?”
