Mahwah February 27, 2013 THE VILLADOM TIMES IV • Page 5 Judge grants easement access to Bear Swamp Road by Frank J. McMahon District Court Judge William K. Martini has granted the Tennessee Gas Pipeline Company, LLC an order of condemnation and immediate possession of 1.7 acres of land along Bear Swamp Road in Mahwah. This decision will provide a temporary access road easement so the gas company can travel on Bear Swamp Road over portions of several private properties. Bear Swamp Road is accessed from Ramapo Valley Road (Route 202), which is under the jurisdiction of Bergen County, the Cleveland Bridge over the Ramapo River, and a stretch of paved, municipally-owned public roadway. The road continues up the mountain in an area called Price Valley, which was named after a former governor who once owned the land, and alongside the state-designated trout stream called Bear Swamp Brook. The one-lane wagon road is currently used to access Boy Scout Camp Yaw Paw where the rough paving ends. It continues on one of the spurs of Cannonball Road, a Revolutionary War-era military road that is mainly unpaved, and then crosses the existing pipeline and continues north toward New York State. TGP intends to use the road to reach the gas company’s pipeline right of way and facilities in order to begin construction of a portion of a pipeline extension in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The project, known as the Northeast Upgrade, includes a 7.6-mile gas pipeline expansion in New Jersey from Ringwood to the Mahwah metering station at the top of Bear Swamp Road. That expansion is part of a larger pipeline expansion program by TGP that will include building 40.3 miles of 30-inch underground pipe parallel to the company’s existing 24-inch pipe that was installed in 1955. Known as “loops,” the underground piping will store high pressure gas from fracking production wells in central Pennsylvania. The looping will end at the Mahwah metering station in the Bergen County State Park where the TGP pipes are connected to the 1,100 mile Algonquin pipeline system, which delivers natural gas to New England. TGP could not reach a negotiated agreement with several property owners whose land is traversed by Bear Swamp Road. The company took its case to the U.S. District Court, (continued on page 8) Budding bankers Mahwah Daisy Troop 5487 recently took a field trip to Boiling Springs Savings Bank.