Melrose Cleans Up After Irene As More Than 800 Without Power

Over 800 Melrose residents woke up on Monday morning without power, according to the latest figures from National Grid—the greatest impact Tropical Storm Irene appeared to have on the city over the weekend.

According to the utility company, 812 customers were without electricity. Residents told Melrose Patch that the power was off in the Wyoming Hill area, including on Mt. Vernon Street—where arcing wires caused brief a utility pole fire last night—although sections Boston Rock Road had power as of 9:30 a.m. on Monday.

Other areas that faced power outages included Lovell Road, where multiple limbs and trees fell on wires, and Penney Hill Road, where trees took down a utility pole and a transformer leaked out on to the roadway.

According to the state office of Energy and Environmental Affairs, the three major utility companies—including National Grid—expect most power online by tonight.

No major injuries or flooding reported

According to Weather Underground, only approximately 2 inches of rain fell in Melrose on Saturday and Sunday, far less than what was seen in other parts of the state. The maximum wind gust recorded was 63 miles per hour.

Lt. Mark DeCroteau said on Monday morning that police did not receive any reports of major flooding or injuries during the storm—basically, Melrose Police officers kept busy responding to reports of downed power lines and tree limbs.

"It did tax us far as manpower went during the day, because we had a heck of a lot of lines down," DeCroteau said.

Downed power lines are being evaluated and addressed by National Grid and, when they involve city trees, the , DeCroteau said, who said that downed live wires have already been addressed.

"The power company responded and anything that was live, they assigned right away," he said. "When they were first reported, we'd go up and evaluate. If it was low voltage—like telephone or cable—we'd relay that info to the Fire Department and power company. Anything live, we taped off and kept people away as best we could."

Public Works picking up brush, tree limbs; water flushing program delayed

The help with the Irene clean up effort, the DPW will collect brush and fallen tree limbs over the next two weeks.

The DPW asks residents to bring the branches to the city strip in front of their homes. Small brush should be bagged, but larger branches can be left as is.

Also, pickups this week will not necessarily correspond with the neighborhood’s regular trash day, while yard waste will be picked up on the regular schedule during the week of Sept. 6. The DPW asks residents to be patient; there is a large volume of brush across the city, but it will all be picked up.

previously scheduled to start has been delayed by one day and will now start tomorrow—Tuesday, Aug. 30.

Melrose Public School students shouldn't get their hopes up—.

Check out Melrose Patch's weekend coverage of Irene:

• Tweets, Facebook updates, photos and videos from Melrose during the storm in our Storify article