Hanover and Rumford drivers will be affected.

Drivers using Route 2 in Hanover and Rumford may want to allow some extra travel time beginning this week, according to the Maine Department of Transportation.

“We’re going to be starting work on a project to improve over eight miles of U.S. Route 2 in Hanover and Rumford,” said Craig Nash of DOT’s Dixfield office, where the work is being coordinated. “The project area begins near Stony Brook Campground, just under five miles west of the Rumford-Hanover town line, and extends east toward Rumford for 8.3 miles.”

“The project calls for repairing culverts and roadside guardrails, adding shim to level the existing road surface and putting down a layer of new pavement,” Nash said. “It’s part of a larger contract that also will provide for improvement to Route 17 in Mexico and Roxbury and for work on Route 5 in Rumford. But the work that began Monday will focus on Route 5 in Hanover and Rumford.”

Nash urges drivers to slow down as they approach work areas and proceed with caution. “In some areas, we need to excavate a section of roadway in order to make culvert repairs. That may require some shifting of traffic patterns, and drivers need to be alert for that possibility,” he explains.

As an economy measure, DOT combined the contracts for the work on Route 2, Route 5 and Route 17 into a single contract. That contract, awarded to Pike Industries of Lewiston on a bid of just over $2.6 million, calls for completion of work on all three projects by early September.