YARMOUTH — An expanded road reconstruction project for West Main Street will now include two phases at a cost of about $1.2 million.
The project will cover approximately 1 mile of roadway and include new drainage, wider ADA-compliant sidewalks, new curbing and new pavement, according to Town Engineer Steve Johnson.
A public meeting on the planned roadwork was held Tuesday, after The Forecaster’s print deadline, but Johnson said preliminary engineering designs are available for review at Town Hall.
A proposed reconstruction of West Main Street in Yarmouth will cost about $1.2 million. Kate Irish Collins / The Forecaster
The hope, he said this week, is to get the project underway by April 2020 and completed in June 2021.
The first phase is expected to cost $568,000, Johnson said, and will concentrate on the section of road between Elm and Bowdoin streets.
The second phase, added to include the section from Bowdoin Street to Rainbow Farm Road, is estimated to cost $696,000.
Johnson described West Main Street as being in “pretty rough shape.” The sidewalks are also crumbling and he said the drainage is also “very deficient.”
Johnson said the Maine Department of Transportation would pick up a portion of the costs for the West Main Street project, which is being designed by Ransom Consulting, Inc. with an office in Portland. He said the plan is to go out to bid on the project later this fall.
Johnson said Yarmouth’s share of the cost would be covered by a $4 million infrastructure bond that passed at Town Meeting in June 2017.
Originally, Johnson said the plan was to begin work on West Main Street this year, but the project was postponed because Hillside Street was undergoing major construction this past summer and it didn’t make sense to risk having traffic delays and backups on two such important local streets at the same time.
Johnson said during the West Main Street project at least one lane would be open to traffic at all times and he doesn’t anticipate any road closures or detours. He said the project is “a long time in coming” – especially since several decades have passed since there was any major reconstruction of the roadway.
He said the town has repaved the road several times and that MDOT also did some shoulder work in 2010, but other than that nothing has been done to address some of the more serious deficiencies.
Johnson said input gathered from this week’s meeting would be incorporated into the final design. Anyone with questions should contact him at sjohnson@yarmouth.me.us or 846-2401.
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