All points west

The entire nation — almost all of the continent, for that matter — lies to the west of Maine, a state without a west-going highway. Is a study needed to detect a problem here or can Maine conclude that it ought to do something about this?

The something is an east-west highway. It is an idea so basic to the geography of the region that it should have been built decades ago. But it wasn’t, an oversight akin to Florida neglecting to build a north-south road (it has three, the Florida Turnpike and Routes 75 and 95). Fortunately, a coalition of Maine state lawmakers, municipal officials, business people and residents who know economic development when they see it have committed themselves to getting one constructed.

The Bangor City Council took an encouraging step in that direction this week when it authorized $10,000 to beat the drum and support research for the project. The research will be done by the University of Maine’s Canadian-American Center, and to understand why it is fitting for the center to be involved, look at a map. The nearest major cities to Northern Maine? Quebec and Montreal. The largest inter-provincial trading partners? Quebec and the Maritimes. It is no accident that Canada has major routes stopping in Sherbrooke just to the west of Maine and in St. Stephen, just to the east.

Between these two points, however, sits Maine’s state government, reluctant to invest in this development project even as it eagerly advocated for highway widening for the same reason in the southern part of the state. Town and city leaders statewide, however, have shown through their support that they clearly see the advantages an east-west highway brings to all of Maine. They need to explain to Augusta that what works along one highway (I-95) can work elsewhere.

The proposed route for the new highway is from Calais on the eastern border of the state to Bangor, riding on I-95 to Newport, continuing to Skowhegan, then splitting, with one road going to northern New Hampshire and another heading to Coburn Gore, on the way to Sherbrooke. The total cost for the project depends on what is eventually built. One estimate for a four-lane, limited-access highway put the cost at just over $1 billion.

That is a lot of money, but there is a lot at stake. This half of the state has been losing population and has had feeble economic growth even as Southern Maine and most of New England has rebounded strongly from the last recession. The trend in this part of the state is evident: continued slow erosion of towns and businesses until large swaths of the region no longer can be sustained. Maine either acts to stop this trend or gives up on its people.

The east-west highway is an important part of the solution. It will take decades of work and the support of many, many people from all over Maine. It will also require big thinking from leaders in Augusta. Those leaders having trouble with the proposal could being with this question: What is the alternative?