AUBURN – Not all Auburn councilors are eager for a new turnpike interchange.

Councilor Belinda Gerry said she couldn’t support a more in-depth study of a new exit from the Maine Turnpike until she knew what it would do to surrounding neighborhoods.

“Until I know what it will do to homes and the neighborhoods there, to mill rates and property values, I will not support it,” she said.

She was in the minority, however. Councilors voted to 6-1 to keep studying the interchange. The Lewiston City Council is set to vote on the matter tonight.

The Androscoggin Transportation Resource Center is beginning an 18-month study of a new Lewiston-Auburn interchange.

Two plans call for building a full interchange, either on Auburn’s Riverside Drive or Lewiston’s River Road. A third plan would put a full interchange on the Auburn side and a half-interchange across the river on River Road. The half-interchange would allow traffic coming to or going from areas south of Lewiston to enter or exit.

“Exits mean economic development for a city,” Mayor Normand Guay said. Every other metropolitan area in Maine has at least four exits off of the turnpike. Lewiston-Auburn have two.

“What we are doing is trying to let the study go forward and answer your questions,” Guay said. “We’re not approving it tonight. We’re just looking into it more to find out what does actually work.”

– Scott Taylor