Lane closure, weight restrictions likely to put ‘crimp’ in firms’ work

ELLSWORTH – Bill Peasley, head of the local construction company Peasley & O’Halloran, said it’s common for him to send as many as seven dump trucks each day over the narrow Graham Lake bridge on Route 180.

The bridge is a vital link connecting the company to its gravel pit in the outskirts of Ellsworth, but Peasley and many others soon may be forced to find another route.

The Maine Department of Transportation wants to temporarily convert the bridge over the Graham Lake dam to one lane and restrict weight to 40,000 pounds, a decision that some feel could have dire consequences.

“It would put a big crimp in our operation, that’s for sure,” Peasley said Tuesday.

The DOT recently received a memo from its bridge maintenance committee indicating that the Route 180 bridge needs immediate repair.

“The memo has been forwarded to commissioner and it’s a recommendation at this point,” said Victor Smith, a traffic engineer for the DOT’s eastern region that includes Ellsworth.

In order to make those changes, a weight restriction would need to be imposed.

That posting would prohibit nearly all of Peasley & O’Halloran’s vehicles, along with those of many other contractors who have gravel pits off Route 180, including R.F. Jordan & Sons and Doug Gott & Sons of Southwest Harbor.

“What really burns us up is that this has been going on for a long time; why all of sudden overnight are they going to make changes?” Peasley asked.

The posting also would affect plow and sand trucks and even some fire engines, and those possibilities have elicited response from Ellsworth’s leaders.

“The city has sent a letter of concern [to the DOT] indicating that at a minimum we need more time,” City Manager Stephen Gunty said Tuesday. “The closure would have severe consequences.”

The DOT informed city officials of its decision on Jan. 11 and said it wanted to implement the lane closure and weight restriction within four to six weeks, pending approval by the commissioner.

Herb Thomson, a spokesman for the Maine DOT, said Tuesday that posting restrictions for bridges is not something that happens often, but it does happen.

“We do periodic bridge inspections, and this is a bridge has been on the watch list for a while,” Thomson said. “A team made the determination and concluded that in the interest of safety that it would be wise to post the bridge.”

The changes would be temporary until repairs are made to the rundown bridge between Graham Lake and the Union River, but those renovations could take several months, Gunty said.

“We haven’t been given a timeline [for repairs],” he said. “It’s a big-ticket item, and it’s not clear where the money would come from; that’s part of the problem.”

Gunty said a fully loaded sand truck weighs about 58,000 pounds and the city Fire Department’s aerial ladder truck weighs 48,000 pounds. Those two types of trucks, with their potential impact on safety, were of considerable importance.

“You never know what might happen out there,” Gunty said.

If the city’s public works department can’t reach the roads beyond the Route 180 bridge, the city manager said he didn’t know what would happen.

“It would be quite a massive undertaking,” Gunty said. “We would have to contract out that road or give it back to the state to maintain. So far, we haven’t received a response to our concerns.”

Smith said the DOT is well aware of the concerns.

“I think what the [city’s] letter will do is re-evaluate everything and see what options we have,” he said. “We will be taking a look at all the options and proceeding.”