Schools remain closed Thursday, thousands without power or heat
By Joanne Degnan, Managing Editor
Chain saws, generators, board games and early dinners by flashlight were the order of the day for thousands of families in Robbinsville and neighboring towns in western Monmouth and Ocean counties on Thursday – three days after Hurricane Sandy pummeled New Jersey.
Local communities were spared the catastrophic destruction that Sandy left in her wake along the New Jersey shore and New York City, but area residents on Thursday were still coping with prolonged school closings, widespread power outages, long fuel lines and costly cleanups.
Area residents for the most part appear to have escaped the extensive flooding that was Hurricane Irene calling card in 2011. Instead, most of the damage came from Hurricane Sandy’s howling winds, which mowed down fences, toppled traffic signals, and uprooted towering trees that often became tangled with overhead utility wires as they crashed to the ground. The downed trees damaged buildings and blocked numerous roads, while the snapped utility lines cut power to homes, schools and businesses.
“Sandy was the anti-Irene because it was wind, not water this time,” said Mike Conroy, the coordinator of the Upper Freehold Office of Emergency Management.
At the Mercer Mobile Homes trailer park in Robbinsville, live power lines dangling near homes during the storm Monday prompted the evacuation of residents to the safety of the BAPS Hindu American religious center five miles away. Mayor Dave Fried said BAPS had been “incredibly generous” by volunteering to set up 70 cots for residents in need of shelter during the storm.
For the fourth day in a row, all public schools remained closed Thursday in the Robbinsville, Upper Freehold Regional, Millstone and Plumsted school districts due to impassable roads or power outages at school buildings. Superintendents said they would wait for updates Thursday afternoon from municipal and utility officials before making a decision on whether to reopen schools Friday.
"It really depends on when we get the power back," Harry Miller, the school board president in Plumsted, said late Wednesday.
The tall trees knocked down by the storm caused havoc, forcing the temporary closing of numerous roads, including Church Street in Allentown, Tindall Road in Robbinsville and Route 33 in Town Center until crews could remove the mess. Police closed numerous four-way intersections on Route 130 on Tuesday and Wednesday due to nonworking traffic signals. In rural Upper Freehold, Mr. Conroy estimated at least 100 roads were closed in the immediate aftermath of the storm.
Mr. Conroy estimated that 90 percent of Upper Freehold homes were without power Thursday and 10 roads were still impassable because of fallen trees, Mr. Conroy said.
In Plumsted, where 70 percent of homes were without power Wednesday night, township police asked residents to stay off the roads because inoperable traffic signals and the difficulty of obtaining gasoline would make traveling dangerous.
Long lines at gas stations were observed throughout the area, including the Shell station on Waker Avenue in Allentown, the borough’s only open gas station on Wednesday night. Cars snaked around the block along South Main Street as people waited to fill up their vehicles and the 5-gallon gasoline containers they’d brought to keep their generators humming back home.
Allentown Mayor Stuart Fierstein said Wednesday the devastating flooding that occurred near the dam and bridge in 2011 with Hurricane Irene had not occurred this week with Sandy. This storm did not bring as much rain and, before Sandy even arrived, the mayor said he asked the county to lower water levels in the lake near the Old Mill by two feet to reduce the risk of flooding.
In Allentown, PSE&G had restored power to most of the homes south of Church Street by Tuesday evening, Mayor Fierstein said. On Wednesday afternoon, the arrival of eight trucks from Ameren Power of Illinois – “mutual aid” reinforcements brought in by PSE&G – had residents north of Church Street hopeful their power would be back on shortly.
In Robbinsville, about half the township’s homes were still without electricity on Wednesday night. The line dividing the coverage area of PSE&G and JCP&L runs through Robbinsville, splitting the town between the two utility companies. Most PSE&G customers had their service restored within 48 hours of the hurricane, but Mayor Fried said that 95 percent of JCP&L customers were without power Wednesday night and were being told it could take days or weeks to restore it.
“I am extremely frustrated by this situation,” said Mayor Fried, whose Robbinsville home is in a JCP&L service area. “Their communication with us is better this time around, but their ability to restore power still leaves a lot to be desired.”
Gov. Chris Christie issued an executive order postponing trick-or-treating and other public Halloween celebrations until Monday, Nov. 5. for safety’s sake, and area mayors are complying with this directive. The annual Allentown Halloween parade and trick-or-treating has been rescheduled to 6 p.m. on Monday. Mayor Fried also asked that children in Robbinsville wait until Monday to go trick-or-treating.

