Nelson Ferry Takes Another Hit
Decatur Metro | May 19, 2008After residents of Ponce de Leon Heights lost power early last week due to down power lines near the church playground, yesterday we took another hit.
A large tree fell across Nelson Ferry Road (nearer to the Scott Blvd end) getting caught up in power lines and knocking out power across the neighborhood. Residents spent the evening without power, congregating in the street to survey the damage and compare stories.
We personally took a harder hit than most. Because the tree landed on lines very close to our house, we arrived home from Germany in the dark yesterday to find our driveway full of down and hanging power/cable/telephone lines. Operating on little sleep in the last 24 hours, we surveyed the damage and determined that it was just the phone and cable that had snapped…the power was just pulled away from the house.
To their credit, both GA Power and the city responded very quickly to this event. GA Power worked through the night (and rain) and had the power back on by morning, even though at least two transformers blew. The city was cutting up the tree early this morning. (Just another reminder of why we pay a little more for city services.)
I’ve been worried about all of the large trees in our neighborhood since the drought last year. Tree roots aren’t as strong as a result and many of Decatur’s old neighborhoods with mature growth are taking big hits when the wind picks up. A very large tree fell through a house on the Scott Blvd. end of Clarion just a few months ago.
How can large trees get the vast amounts of necessary water that they need in times of drought/water restrictions? Grass watering may be unnecessary and wasteful in times of water shortage, but deep tree watering could potentially prevent some of the destruction we will continue to see due to weak root systems.
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I live on Nelson Ferry and we are still without power! The tree knocked our meter box off, and we are waiting for the electrician to begin work. We are having to stay elsewhere for about a week or so. Ga. power no longer installs meter boxes, and the electrician has to get work permits to start work. Our home insurance company (Travelers) is not making it any easier.
Yikes.
Hey Robyn…how close is your house to the “impact site”? As I mentioned above, our power was only pulled away from the house up near the roof line…luckily it didn’t get down to the meter. But GA power told us the same thing…that we needed to bring in an electrician to fix it. Unless the line snapped, they apparently weren’t responsible for anything between the pole and the house.
We’re all cleaned up at this point. Sorry to hear your stuck elsewhere while everything gets repaired. Luckily the storms yesterday didn’t affect Nelson Ferry for a third time in less than 2 weeks! Let’s hope that trend continues!
The falling trees on Nelson Ferry are quite worrisome for me. The last incident happened just yards away from my home. The City of Decatur was very responsive and worked through the night to remove the tree which was good and bad…buzz, buzz, buzz all night long. However, given the drought I feel like something more proactive should be done. Even if the City of Decatur cannot physically inspect all of the mature trees in the neighborhood perhaps they could publish some information to help residents check trees around their property. We do call the city when we see very large dangling branches, but if there is something else that we could do to protect ourselves and our neighbors I’d love to have access to that information.
Almost cleaned up from Nelson Ferry tree. We are across the street from the tree that fell but down a few houses. Electrician starts Friday, and I am feeling better about the situation. Damage could have been worse…