Stillwater Avenue study focus of public meeting

BANGOR – Transportation needs in the Stillwater Avenue corridor will be the focus of a public meeting at 7 p.m. Wednesday in the council chambers at City Hall.

During the meeting, representatives of the Bangor Area Comprehensive Transportation System and their consultant will present preliminary findings and recommendations from the Stillwater Avenue Corridor transportation study. The meeting also will mark the start of a public comment period.

BACTS, which handles transportation planning for the Bangor metropolitan area, hired Gorrill-Palmer Consulting Engineers Inc. of Gray to conduct the study, which is aimed at determining existing and future transportation needs of the Stillwater Avenue corridor. The corridor runs from Broadway to Chase Road.

The Federal Highway Administration funded 80 percent of the $50,000 study. The city of Bangor paid the balance.

The study’s purpose is to develop a plan that will guide short- and long-term transportation improvements and strategies along this corridor.

Gorrill-Palmer, which for the past year has been working with a public advisory committee, will present a variety of options during the meeting.

The BACTS policy committee asked the consultant to provide a design solution to serve the affected area. The design would involve a street configuration that will balance the need for safe and efficient access to the corridor, preserve the corridor’s capacity to allow the movement of traffic through and around this area and preserve the characteristics of the residential areas.

The committee recognized that the corridor has undergone significant changes over the last three decades, largely due to retail development in the Bangor Mall area.

The consultant measured and characterized existing travel and projected demand out to the year 2018 based upon the planned and existing land-use patterns influencing the corridor. The consultant also evaluated land use, lane configurations and access management in the area in an effort to identify possible improvements.

Gorrill-Palmer also identified deficiencies and recommended improvements to the existing and projected corridor to respond to existing and future needs. The firm will develop short- and long-range action plans for infrastructure improvements, as well as management and policy actions.

A public comment period on the study will begin during Wednesday’s meeting. Any comments after the meeting should be in written form and will be accepted until 4:30 p.m. May 12.

The consultant’s next task will involve working with the public advisory committee to develop a draft final report. There will be a comment period on the draft final report and then the final report will be published for BACTS policy committee approval.

Questions and written comments should be directed to Sarah Dubay or Rob Kenerson, who can be reached by e-mail at rkenerson@emdc.org; at BACTS, P.O. Box 2579, Bangor ME 04402-2579; or by calling 942-6389.