I-395-Route 9 options move to federal level 4-5 choices eyed; more public meetings possible

AUGUSTA – Public meetings on the controversial Interstate 395-Route 9 highway connector have stalled, but Department of Transportation officials are meeting with their federal counterparts monthly and apparently are tinkering with the few options left on the table for the proposed 10-mile highway.

A March 11 meeting in Winthrop with several federal and state agencies resulted in a “lukewarm” reaction to further reducing alternatives, according to Raymond E. Faucher, project engineer.

It further appears that more public meetings on the connector may not be in the works and that officials may proceed directly to developing an environmental assessment by the end of the summer. The study is a prelude to getting federal funding for the road project, which is meant to improve safety and to serve as this area’s segment of the proposed east-west highway.

Asked if local meetings were in the future to add residential comment on the road issue, Faucher said it “could be hard to tell.” He said Eddington had asked for another public meeting this month. “I said I could come up but there really was no new information to provide,” the DOT engineer said.

Faucher said there were “four to five” options left. “Once we narrow those down, there may be requests for additional local meetings. We’d have to look at it at that point,” he added.

As far as residents of Brewer, Holden and Eddington know, route alternatives for the proposed limited-access highway were reduced to the “2” options at local meetings of the Public Advisory Committee this winter. The panel was formed to advise the Transportation Department on the proposal.

Yet as of March 11, the federal agencies that will be involved in final planning and funding arrangements still believe another option – Route 3A-3EIK remains on the table.

According to Faucher, the action taken at the agency meetings is much slower paced because decisions require thorough consideration of all details.

At local meetings of the Public Advisory Committee, however, action comes as swiftly as a public vote taken at the meeting’s conclusion.

Option 3A-3EIK-1, one of the longest and most expensive routes, supposedly was eliminated in January at a Holden PAC meeting. On Tuesday, March 18, Faucher said 3A-3EIK-1 “is still on. It has higher environmental impacts, but the agencies really didn’t come out and say they agreed or disagreed with it.”

More work needs to be done, Faucher said, “to see if they want to take it [Option 3A-EIK-1] off.”

Agencies involved in the March 11 meeting included the Environmental Protection Agency from Boston, the Army Corps of Engineers, the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department and a commission representing the Atlantic salmon.

Faucher said the only “level of comfort” achieved at the March 11 meeting was to eliminate 2C-2, a follow-up to action taken months ago at a local meeting.

As of now, the federal agencies believe the following route options remain:

The “2” routes — 2B-1, 2C-1 and 2C-1/2B-1. All begin where I-395 ends in Brewer and head northeast, along the Holden-Brewer line. They end beyond the intersection of Routes 9 and 46 near the Eddington-Clifton line.

Route 3A-3EIK-1 – which begins at the Brewer end of I-395 and heads north after crossing the Holden town line, dips south and then heads northeast to its endpoint on Route 9 near the Eddington-Clifton town line.

Another idea being floated around the DOT office – but not officially presented to the federal agencies involved – is to adjust the 2C-1-2B-1 route option to reduce the impact to residential developments in Brewer, according to Faucher. It is DOT’s response to a flurry of complaints about disrupting households along Eastern Avenue and other Brewer neighborhoods. The idea consists of substituting a portion of 2C-1 at the point where both 2B-1 and 2C-1 begin at the end of I-395.

Option 4B, long favored by Brewer residents, is “not being considered at all,” Faucher said Tuesday.