Thanks to everyone that replied to my original post:  Link to original post

I contacted a different township trustee (we have three trustees per township) on Monday morning and he was willing to listen to me and take some action.  He called the county prosecutor (who they use for legal advice) and asked for their opinion on the matter.  The prosecutor said that the trustees do have the right to grant a pipeline easement in the road right of way.  However, if the pipeline is NOT a registered public utility, then the pipeline company MUST get an easement from the landowner too (the landowner owns to the center of the road).   The trustee then called the pipeline rep and he confirmed that the pipeline in question is not registered as a public utility.  The trustee then ordered him to stop all operations until they obtain an easement (pipeline right of way) from the landowner.

Thanks to the effort of this one trustee, my neighbor did not have to hire a lawyer (yet).  The trustee told me that another gas company tried the same tactic in a neighboring township and the county prosecutor  was able to stop them too.  He was very glad to have this information for future reference and told me that they would not grant any more road easements to private companies in the future.  He said that after our conversation, he came to realize that NON-Public gas lines should not be placed in the roadway easement.  The roadway easement should only be used for public utilities such as water and sewer.  By letting private companies (or individuals) use the roadway would make it difficult in the future for installation of the public lines and also make it difficult to do road improvements (culvert replacement, road widening, road re-alignment, ect).  He also admitted that he was not aware that damage was going to be done to my neighbor's property with NO restitution being offered (driveway, fence, tile line, crop damage).

We are in the Marcellous and Utica shale area and there will soon be many more pipelines being installed in the area.  Hopefully now at least one township will be prepared when the reps come knocking on their door for more easements.