A group of residents tasked with helping determine the path of a water main that will snake through the lower third of Montgomery County discussed the pros and cons of options for the pipe at its first meeting Tuesday night.

The residents were chosen to join the Citizens Advisory Committee of the Clean Water Connection. The Clean Water Connection is a plan by the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission to install the seven-foot water main under homes, roads, parks and businesses in Bethesda, North Bethesda, Kensington and Garrett Park.

Because the project will affect much of the downcounty, WSSC officials wanted to ensure an even geographic distribution among the committee members.

"We got a large community map of the study area and filled out little tabs for each person who was interested in being on the committee," said WSSC spokesman Chuck Brown. "The entire area was well represented."

Brown said that in addition to geographic diversity, WSSC wanted to ensure that committee members were open minded to the project and to each other.

The water main project will connect two existing pipes, one that originates at the Potomac Water Filtration Plant in Potomac and runs underground to the intersection of Tuckerman Lane near where it crosses Interstate 270, and the other that begins in Kensington near the Mormon Temple. Officials from WSSC said the new pipe is needed because projected growth in Prince George's County will cause decreased water pressure in some parts of Montgomery and Prince George's counties.

Officials with WSSC have explained to the community at three public meetings that the agency wants to ensure the region has a reliable water supply before new development occurs.

Although Tuesday night's meeting took place after The Gazette deadline, committee member Bill Zwack said before the meeting that his understanding is the committee would discuss both positive and negative aspects of each of the nine proposed alignments and begin the process of eliminating some of those.

WSSC's timeline for the project calls for the committee to meet twice this month and provide feedback about the proposed alignments and the methods of construction by the end of May.

Committee member Tony Celeste, president of Windermere Estates Home Owners Association, said he's been impressed with how WSSC officials have handled the project so far.

"They've been very open, very receptive," he said. "They're taking appropriate steps to get the community involved."

Celeste's home is near the starting point for the construction, so he said he knows he will be affected by the installation of the pipe, but he also knows it has to be done.

"Nobody's going to want to be impacted," he said. "The reality is that some people are and so we have to look at how we accommodate and what can we put in place to ensure it's the least disruptive."

WSSC wants the final alignment and construction method chosen by early 2006, with construction beginning in summer of 2007 and lasting about three years.

"Originally, I was worried about what it's going to do to my house," said Zwack, who lives along Saul Road in Kensington, which is located along one of the proposed routes.

Zwack said he was relieved to find out that if the alignment near his home is chosen, the pipe would be constructed hundreds of feet below ground in the bedrock, meaning there would be little evidence on the surface.

Zwack said he wanted to participate on the committee because he's concerned about how the construction of the pipe will affect the environment.

The main will be built along one of nine proposed routes using either a cut and cover method, in which the ground is dug up and the pipe place inside, or a deep tunneling method, in which a machine digs a hole in the bedrock 150 to 350 feet underground. Builders could also elect to use a combination of the two methods.

WSSC has said that if it uses the cut and cover method, about 60 acres of land would need to be cleared. If it uses the tunneling method, about nine acres would be cleared. Several of the proposed alignments run south along I-270 and then east through Rock Creek Park.

"Right now, my big concern is the removal of trees," said Zwack, who has lived in his neighborhood about five years.

"[Rock Creek] park is one of the big reasons we moved to the neighborhood," he said. "My wife runs, we take the kids down there, we bike on it. ...It would be pretty devastating to go through the park."