LIVERMORE – Voters will decide Thursday whether to discontinue a public easement on Batten Road or act on anything in relation to it. The town’s right-of-way was gated off to motor vehicle traffic by two property owners.

Some residents on Bean Street want a shortcut up to Brettuns’ area instead of going through North Turner. Others want to discontinue it with the land going to abutters. And some in town want to hold on to the public easement.

Voters will take up the issue at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Community Building.

Residents voted in 1988 to discontinue Batten Road, a dirt way, to town maintenance but maintained a public easement. The decision was made after the dam burst in 1987 and washed a bridge out. Access to the southerly end of the road was lost at that time because of the bridge washout. The road was discontinued near the bridge’s location up to Route 108.

Now those that live on Bean Street, which is an extension of Batten Road, have to drive down Bean Street, which begins in Turner and then go up Route 4 to Livermore, Livermore Administrative Assistant Kurt Schaub said.

In 1992, selectmen voted to allow Ralph Walton to gate off the north end of the road so that motor vehicles could not go through.

But Schaub said that vote was illegal because the law doesn’t allow for selectmen to make that decision. Voters are the only ones who have the right to make that decision, Schaub said. Selectmen at that time also allowed Walton to mine sand from the road bed with the promise to leave the road in better condition than it was, he said.

The southern end of Batten Road was gated by property owner Ken Constantine.

Last fall, Livermore resident Steve Mancine, who lives on Bean Street, requested the road be reopened in Livermore for convenience and safety.

In it’s current condition, the road could not be reopened to vehicular traffic because of the mining operation, Schaub said.

dperry@sunjournal.com