Maine Department of Transportation officials are working with residents and the town of Freeport to plant shrubs and trees in areas near Interstate 295 where the agency clear-cut trees last summer.

Dale Doughty, director of maintenance and operations for the agency, said Monday that Bob Moosmann, a state landscape architect, has been meeting at the homes of people angered last summer when the trees were cut, leaving homes exposed to the noise and sights of the highway. Al Presgraves, town engineer, has attended the meetings on the part of the town, Doughty said.

“The town would contract for the work, and we would assist with the cost,” Doughty said. “The idea is to work with the town and see what they come up with in terms of vegetative screening. Hedges might work for some people, and one tree might work for others.”

Doughty said the idea was to meet with each resident affected by the clear-cutting, many of them just south of Exit 22. On June 16 of last year, Freeport residents aired their grievances on the clear-cutting during a Town Council workshop. People from the Elm Street neighborhood, facing the highway, and many others complained about the tree cuttings.

Residents said at the time they wanted to see a wooden barrier such as the one built along 295 in South Portland.

Doughty said that Moosmann and Presgraves will come up with a plan for the plantings, to be done in April or May.

Presgraves said that the Department of Transportation has offered $20,000 toward a project that will cost between $20,000 and $50,000.

“The town has asked them to pay the whole thing,” Presgraves said. “That has not been resolved. The DOT would never have paid for this, but they know that these were different circumstances. Bob apologized to people, saying he was on sick leave during the clear-cutting, and it wouldn’t have happened that way.”

Presgraves said that he and Moosmann met the eight abutters whose property was most affected by the cuttings, on Elm and True streets, Blueberry Lane and Kendall Lane. They met with the last two last Wednesday, he said.

“Bob has a good way, and he apologized to people,” Presgraves said. “He worked with them and they came up with landscaping specimens, and I’m still waiting on his summary on that, and the cost estimates.”

Where once there were trees, now just the stumps beneath it separate the view from the end of Elm Street in Freeport and I-295. Residents and the town are working with the state on plans to replant the area that was clear-cut last year.

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