MEA to discuss new power line routes Thursday

PALMER — Valley-ites are invited to an open house Thursday on Matanuska Electric Association’s proposed routes to connect big power lines from its new power plant to its substations.

Construction equipment was moved to the site of the Eklutna Generation Station last week, with construction scheduled to start Monday, according to MEA’s Facebook page.

Once the plant is running the co-op will need 115 kV double circuit transmission lines to carry the power from the power plant to substations. These aren’t the normal neighborhood power poles, these are super-sized, 80-foot-tall, metal poles.

The open house has to do with identifying a route for those lines to travel from Eklutna to the utility’s main customer base in Wasilla.

A previous set of meetings was canceled after MEA deciding against its preferred route, which would have taken the lines through the city of Wasilla and required a conditional use permit from the city.

“Given our difficulties in the city of Wasilla we are looking at options that would take us through other substations around Wasilla,” said MEA spokesman Kevin Brown. “These routes are more expensive and we’ll be able to talk about them more in detail at the open house.”

The “difficulties” Brown referred to was stiff opposition from Wasilla Mayor Verne Rupright and the city planning commission.

“This beautiful viewscape will be ruined by these 80-foot towers,” Rupright said in an interview then.

Brown said that the new routes under consideration are available for view on the project’s website at eklutnagenerationstation.com

There are three routes shown on the new map. One essentially follows Bogard Road from Trunk about where Carrs is in Wasilla, where it heads south to an MEA substation on the south side of town.

Another would follow the Parks Highway before jumping north of the highway at Seward Meridian Parkway, then crossing the highway again just before Sportsman’s Warehouse and skirting around downtown Wasilla to the south to that same substation.

The third route stays out of Wasilla altogether, running instead through the Fairview Loop area down to a substation on Knik-Goose Bay Road just outside of city limits.

Written comments will be accepted at the public meeting. Engineers and MEA employees will be on hand to talk informally with attendees. A formal public hearing is scheduled for March 14.

Contact reporter Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.

IF YOU GO

WHAT: Open House on MEA power line routes

WHEN: 6-8 p.m. Thursday

WHERE: United Methodist Church, Fairview Loop

For more information e-mail publiccomments@mea.coop