Stories to watch in 2018: Burying utility cables

Longboat Key is scheduled this year to begin construction on the project that will put all of its overhead utilities underground.

If all goes as planned, work on this project — digging trenches along almost every street with overhead wires, tearing down poles and putting all wires in a conduit underground — should finish within the next three years.

But it’s taken nearly as long to get to this point. Town officials, who pitched the project as a way to protect the power grid from outages after storms and beautify the town, have talked about this since at least October 2014.

Plans were formalized with a November 2015 referendum question asking resident whether they’d like power lines and poles on Gulf of Mexico Drive removed for a cost of no more than $25.25 million. Voters approved this by a margin of 1,399, or 62.6%, to 835, or 37.4%.

The town went to voters again in March 2016 asking for approval of funding to put overhead wires in neighborhoods and on side streets underground, a project it said wouldn’t cost more than $23.85 million. Electors endorsed the town’s plan by a vote of 2,031, or 59.98%, to 1,652, or 40.02%.

Residents should not expect major interruptions to pedestrian or vehicle traffic as construction begins this year, said Public Works Project Manager James Linkogle.