Eversource says 2025 roadside trimming in Norwalk will be light; crews will request homeowner consent door-to-door

Eversource representatives told the Norwalk City Tree Committee on a routine meeting that scheduled roadside distribution trimming in Norwalk for 2025 will be smaller in scope than recent years and will rely on property-owner consent for work adjacent to private parcels.

Sam, an Eversource representative for roadside distribution lines, said the company’s scheduled maintenance trimming in Norwalk this year is “very light” and described mileage totals variously during the presentation, noting early in his remarks that the work for 2025 was “about 16 miles total” but later giving a breakdown of “backbone mileage” at 7.5 miles plus 4.3 miles of laterals — “totalling a little over 11 miles” for the area. He said the trimming is done by an outside contractor (Lewis Tree) whose permission specialists will go door to door and that “we get consent from the abutting properties to the work, and, no is an answer.”

The committee heard that distribution pruning follows a multi-year rotation. Sam said the trimming program operates on a roughly four-year cycle across the larger service area and that some towns that receive heavier work in one year will have lighter years later. He said Eversource may reassign circuits between years based on historical outage data and circuit performance.

Committee members pressed the company on long-term planning and tree-planting strategies aimed at keeping canopy while reducing conflicts with primary distribution lines. Peter, a committee member, asked how Eversource can cooperate on species selection and street-planting strategies so new plantings are compatible with overhead lines; he said such planning is important to “create streetscapes that can work with the high tensed power lines.” Sam responded that species compatibility and long-term management are part of the conversation—“trees are on their timeline. They're not on ours”—and suggested selective understory thinning and targeted planting could be part of a longer-term approach.

The committee agreed to post the trimming map and the issued permit on the city website so the public can view the planned locations and schedule. Sam described the contractor outreach process and said Lewis Tree specialists will inform affected homeowners prior to work.

The presentation did not include a formal vote. Committee members and a representative of the Norwalk Tree Alliance offered to partner on education and outreach around trimming and planting plans.

The discussion included differing mileage figures presented during the meeting; the company attributed the differences to how circuits are counted and to the broader multi-municipal rotation schedule.