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NANTICOKE — A sewer project a year-and-a-half in the making has been stalled because of nearby fiber optic cables. The city’s sewer plan was supposed to begin in late April and has now been suspended.
The project was supposed to replace sewer lines in three blocks on Main Street, between Walnut Street and the Burger King on Market Street, as part of the city’s streetscape plan.
The streetscape project is a federal earmark, which the city has had for “years” but the sewer line update has pushed the project back to phase I.
When the Geisinger building on Main Street came into the downtown in 2014, it was hooked up to the sewer line, creating an issue with the lines when its new lines connected to the old lines of the city.
According to Donna Wall, interm city manager for Nanticoke, when Verizon came into the city to lay cables, it ran them on top of or in the immediate proximity of existing sewer lines.
“We want to rebuild the downtown and we have old lines,” Wall said. “We had to do something.”
Last year, the city received a local share account grant of $500,000 to update its “over 100-year-old” sewer lines.
If the city has to move sewer lines and subsequently, storm drains, Wall said, the “cost will go up.” Wall hopes Verizon could do a “soft dig” to find out exactly where the cables are but cautioned a permit from the state may be needed for the construction.
Verizon spokesman John O’Malley said he would look into the issue.
Wall said Verizon was on Main Street May 6 redoing its street markings.