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Gas Line Repair in Paterson, NJ
Paterson is a mains gas town — 83% of households heat with utility gas. The useful thing to know before anything goes wrong is where the utility’s responsibility stops.
Read this first
The utility's regulated line ends at the meter outlet and the piping beyond it belongs to the property owner. That boundary decides most gas line questions in Paterson, where 83% of households heat with utility gas and a buried service line runs from the street on most properties.
Source: US Census Bureau, American Community Survey table B25040; the service line boundary is 49 CFR § 192.3.
If you smell gas right now
Leave the building on foot. Do not use a phone or a light switch inside. Call 911 and your gas utility from somewhere else, and do not call us — we are a referral service, not an emergency line. The full list, in order.
How Paterson is supplied
Everything upstream of the meter outlet is the operator’s service line under 49 CFR § 192.3. Everything after it is customer piping under local code. That single point is what a contractor establishes before quoting.
It is also why the answer to "is this my problem" is sometimes no, and why it is worth asking before assuming it is yes.
| Households in Paterson | Share |
|---|---|
| Utility (mains) gas | 83% |
| Bottled or tank propane | 2% |
| Electricity | 13% |
| Fuel oil and kerosene | 2% |
| Wood and everything else | 1% |
Source: US Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-year estimates, table B25040 (house heating fuel), 2023 release. Universe: 49,654 occupied housing units. This is the heating-fuel table. It does not enumerate service lines, and no table does at this geography; what it gives is the best available indication of which arrangement a property is on. Service line definition: 49 CFR § 192.3, via PHMSA interpretation PI-12-0003.
Across New Jersey as a whole, 74% of households are on mains gas and 2% on tank propane. Paterson sits 8 points above the state on mains and 1 point below it on propane. The state number would tell you something true about the state and very little about here, which is why it is not the number above.
Before anyone digs on the property
A locate before digging is free, and PHMSA is unambiguous about the value — excavation damage is the leading cause of pipeline incidents and calling 8-1-1 first avoids one 99 times in a hundred. The gap to ask about is private buried line, which a standard locate may not mark.
Source: PHMSA, 811 Day.
What to ask whoever quotes it
If any part of the job is in the ground, ask when they are calling 8-1-1 and whether a private line may be in the way. Both answers should come before the excavation, not during it.
Other New Jersey towns we route in
- Stockholm 3% mains gas · 23% tank propane
- Oakland 88% mains gas · 2% tank propane
- Sea Girt 95% mains gas · 0% tank propane
- New Milford 83% mains gas · 2% tank propane
- Audubon 79% mains gas · under 1% tank propane
Checking a plumber in New Jersey
New Jersey licenses are issued by the New Jersey State Board of Examiners of Master Plumbers, Division of Consumer Affairs, which publishes a public search you can use before work begins.
Gas work is separately permitted and separately licensed in most jurisdictions, so ask specifically about gas rather than plumbing in general.
For repair work, not for a suspected leak.If you can smell gas, leave and call 911 or your utility from outside; this is the wrong number for that. For everything else — a line, a meter, an appliance connection — we will route you to a contractor covering your area, free of charge to you. Gas is one part of what Paterson calls us about.
Call (888) 752-8038