CUMBERLAND — The town is working with the Maine Department of Transportation on the reconstruction of part of Blanchard Road, a $1 million project that could be complete in May 2014.

A neighborhood meeting on the project will be held at Town Hall at 7 p.m. Tuesday, April 30.

DOT is funding $500,000 of the project, while Cumberland is paying for the other half in its fiscal 2013 and 2014 budgets, Town Manager Bill Shane said last week. The town portion comes from tax increment financing funds, and not taxpayer dollars, Shane said.

The project, which could begin in June, includes about 6,000 feet of Blanchard Road, from Bruce Hill Road to Skillin Road. The work is the final piece of a plan to pave road shoulders and extend water mains from Route 1 to Route 100.

“We’ve been working on trying to extend the water mains out to Route 100, which we were successful in doing, and widening the road for additional commercial, vehicular and pedestrian traffic,” Shane said.

The Blanchard Road water main installation has already be completed, with road and shoulder paving to come. Work on the road from Bruce Hill Road, near the Cumberland Fairgrounds, to Main Street was completed a decade ago.

Shane said he expects the project to be about 90 percent complete this fall, with final paving to occur in May 2014.

Alex Lear can be reached at 781-3661 ext. 113 or alear@theforecaster.net. Follow him on Twitter: @learics.

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