ORLANDO, Fla. — The Orlando Utility Company is planning to pay tens of thousands of dollars to find out how much it will cost to bury power lines in an Orlando neighborhood.
In June, residents of the Lake Lawsona Historic District circulated a petition to have their power lines buried.
OUC officials said they’ll be able to take this study about burying power lines in the neighborhood and use it later down the road if other neighborhoods decide they want to consider it.
Nancy Bartram has lived in the Lake Lawsona historic district for nearly three decades.
“It’s such a variety—a variety of homes, a variety of people. It’s close to everything,” she said.
Bartram was one of the many residents who signed a petition to look at having the power lines in the neighborhood moved underground.
She said she isn’t sure how much she’s willing to pay to have that work done.
"I don't know. I'd have to kind of see and decide whether I thought it was worth it once I got the figure,” she said.
That’s where OUC comes in. The utility company will pay $95,000 for a feasibility study to find out the cost for homeowners.
"We know that it's expensive. It really is. We know a lot needs to be done. Things need to be moved. Some of those trees are extremely, they've been there for a long time so they have a deep root system. There's a lot of things that have to happen to do an underground electric neighborhood. A retrofit if you will,” said Tim Trudell, OUC spokesman.
Cox Media Group
