BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB)- Driving down Grape St. in Buffalo, it’s hard to miss the orange cones and sheets of plywood covering parts of the sidewalk.
“If you pull up certain planks you can see it doesn’t even have gravel under it,” said Joseph Tucker, who lives on the street. “We do have children and sometimes we have to tell the kids don’t walk on the wood because it’s still unstable.”
News 4 talked to Tucker on Wednesday. Our crew saw the plywood covers holes in the sidewalks, including one that was more than a foot deep. There were no signs marking what was underneath the plywood.
Tucker said it’s a safety hazard and it’s been like that for months.
“I really believe if we was in a different neighborhood they would’ve cleaned it up and been more attentive to it, especially with the boards all over the place, and the cones, and the hills, and the dirt,” said Tucker.
We called National Fuel on Wednesday to see why the sidewalks were in a hazardous condition. Karen Merkel told us it’s a main line replacement project that started about eight weeks ago.
“Because of the paving moratorium in the City of Buffalo, which prohibits us from digging in streets that have been paved within the last five years, we had to dig on the grass as well as on the sidewalks on Grape St.,” said Merkel.
She said National Fuel crews faced delays because they needed access to several homes.
“What we’re waiting for now is for access to residential customers along the mainline route to connect the service lines,” said Merkel.
She told News 4 they hoped to get it done within a week but they would send crews out immediately to clean up as much as possible.
“We have to have things in a temporary state so they we can continue to do work there,” said Merkel. “We do apologize for any inconvenience the project has caused to residents. We’re almost done and we ask for added patience.”
Five days later, News 4 checked on the progress and found some holes had been filled with gravel, others still hadn’t been fixed. Plywood had been added in places to cover hazards but much of the plywood had been removed.
National Fuel said on Monday they still have one last house to connect to the main line. When the project is finished they plan to put in new sidewalks.
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