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12 April 2004 - American Transmission Co. says Madison needs a $21m transmission project to serve the Southeast Side, where new homes and businesses are pushing up demand for power.
The four-mile stretch from a substation near Sprecher and Cottage Grove roads to another substation near Femrite Drive and Hwy. 12 would fill in a missing link on a transmission ring that circles Madison, said ATC spokeswoman Annemarie Newman.
The 138 kV line is considered medium capacity. It carries more electricity than the lines that bring power to homes and businesses but it's considerably smaller than the 345 kV high-voltage line proposed for northern Wisconsin that's drawn big protests from residents of that area.
American Transmission Co., which operates and builds transmission lines in parts of Wisconsin, Michigan and Illinois, will hold meetings today and Thursday to provide details about the project and to hear public comments.
No specific route has been chosen; instead, American Transmission has identified a number of possible segments and will eventually narrow them down to two potential routes. "We want to route this in a way that it would have as little impact as possible," Newman said.
Newman said, though, at this point, the company plans to build overhead lines. "Generally speaking, underground lines are environmentally far more damaging because of the trench that needs to be dug up." They're also more expensive and repairs can take "weeks or months to locate and fix," she said.
If a route is chosen by fall 2005 and government regulators approve, American Transmission wants to have the line in service by spring 2007.
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