This Saturday, a dedication ceremony will be held for the new Gambo bicycle/pedestrian bridge that crosses from Windham to Gorham.

The new bridge is the final link in what is now being called the Presumpscot River Loop Trail. With the opening of the bridge, pedestrians and bicyclists will be able to pass over the bridge and either make a loop back over the Presumpscot via the Mt. Division train-trestle bridge or follow the Mt. Division “rail trail” toward Standish.

Around 11 a.m., Windham Parks and Rec Director Brian Ross and Gorham Parks and Rec Director Cindy Hazelton along with David Kinsman of the Mt. Division Alliance will discuss the trail’s history and cut the ribbon officially opening the bicycle/pedestrian bridge.

“It’s really a story of two towns that built a bridge and met in the middle,” Hazelton said.

From the beginning, the bridge has been a collaborative effort. Windham and Gorham built the original bridge together 85 years ago. According to Hazelton, Windham built the steel green “pony trusses” to support one half of the bridge while Gorham erected a granite pier system to hold up the other end. For over half a century, motorists and pedestrians passed to and from Windham over the Gambo Bridge. Then in 1990, a truck broke through the wooden deck rendering the bridge impassable. Now 15 years later, with help of many organizations, that deck has been rebuilt and refortified to create the new Gambo bicycle/pedestrian bridge.

“It’s been a big project for us,” Ross said. “It really shows a good cooperative spirit between Gorham and Windham and the state of Maine.”

Maine Department of Transportation (MDOT), Mt. Division Alliance, Greater Portland Council of Governments and various other agencies and organizations have all collaborated with the towns to help rebuild the little bridge. And for many involved, the completion of the bridge, and subsequent creation of the loop, marks the end of one project, but just the beginning of many others.

“At the same time the towns were thinking about the bridge, we were working on the Mt. Division Trail and we all sort of joined forces,” MDOT Bicycle/Pedestrian Coordinator John Balicki said.

The Mountain Division Alliance, a coalition of rail, trail and economic development advocates, and MDOT hope to extend the “rail trail” in the future. The Mountain Division Trail currently starts at the trestle bridge entrance of the new Presumpscot Loop Trail and then departs from the loop, following the tracks to Johnson Field in Standish. According to Balicki, it could be possible to reinstate the rail system for commuter or recreational trains. MDOT owns the rail extension from Windham to the New Hampshire border in Fryeburg, but not, as of yet, the tracks that extend east to Portland. In the meantime, the new Gambo bridge has widened the access to the Mountain Division Trail and has created a short loop at the trailhead for those who want to partake in a “noontime” walk or ride opposed to the longer “rail trail.”

Across the bridge where the loop connects with the Mountain Division Trail, Hazelton and the Gorham Parks and Rec Department are working on a new park for recreation and education. According to Hazelton, “Shaw Park,” a gift from the Shaw Brothers Construction, is slated to be a passive recreation area with a youth baseball diamond and an outdoor picnic pavilion. The pavilion will act as both a picnic spot and classroom setting for school fieldtrips to the nearby Gambo Powder Mills. The ruins of the old powder mills are an historic Civil War landmark, which provided nearly 25 percent of the gunpowder used by the Union Army during the war.

The reconstruction of the old Gambo bridge has opened many opportunities for Windham, Gorham and the organizations involved, but more than that a little piece of history has been replaced with many united in the cause. And now, after so many years, the public may once again cross the little Gambo.

“It’s an incredibly big opportunity for the towns,” Hazelton said. “I have not been out yet and not seen somebody on the trail. Elderly people, toddlers in strollers, families walking, biking, horses… it’s just a nice little loop that’s less than two miles.”

The new Gambo bridge, from the Windham end, crosses the Presumpscot into Gorham. The old bridge has been rebuilt in a cooperative effort between Windham, Gorham, the MDOT and many others. A ceremony will be held this Saturday to dedicate the reopening of the Gambo.

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