Residents of Airdrie are concerned with recent developments in their neighborhood.  

The concern comes from recently hearing that trees and driveways in their neighborhood will be taken out and torn up.  

With the removal of the trees and driveways comes worries that more trees will be removed and no financial compensation will be given, Laurie a resident of Big Springs said.  

Fortis gave two notices that they would be working in the area and while they gave ample time for notice, however they never mentioned the removal of the trees within the community Laurie said.  

Only that they would be working with the city to get landscapers to mitigate destruction and to return the property to its original state, the landscapers told the residents that they would be going through properties to rip up driveways and take trees out.  

Laurie also said the emotions that came with the initial shock was anger, 

“It felt like they had sent somebody else to do their dirty work for them”.  

Fortis did say that “We advised customers in Big Springs in October of 2021 of the upcoming electrical distribution upgrade project and then sent further communication at the end of May with specific information. The project has not started yet and we’ll ensure we address all customer concerns beforehand.” 

The construction process is to begin August 2 and 3.  

Laurie said many questions still remain, such as, if there's another option, why couldn’t they go under sidewalks a proposal in which the city said no, and what will happen to the value of their properties? 

Tanya Croft the Manager of Corporate Communications at Fortis helped clear up some of the miscommunication. 

Croft says it will be taken care of by “having an individual conversation with the customers if the tree needs to be removed if they want it replaced, relocated or if they want to keep the wood on their property”.  

Fortis also mentioned that before they remove any trees or tear up driveways from anyone's property, they will be giving notice two weeks in advance.  

As for the compensation to reach out and they will work on the requests on an individual basis.  

Croft ended with saying “We understand the concerns that residents have and just want to ensure that we have done everything possible to sort of mitigate disruption to property and power services. We do apologize for the inconvenience that this caused and definitely recognize those concerns and appreciate everybody's understanding”. 

Croft said if there are any concerns from customers to please reach out to Fortis.  

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