NORWAY – The owner of the Opera House tried unsuccessfully to get truck traffic on Main Street halted Monday because he said it was threatening the stability of the flooded three-story downtown landmark, town highway superintendent Ronald Springer said.

“I can’t stop traffic. It’s a state road,” Springer said he told Barry Mazzaglia of Bitim Enterprises in Londonderry, N.H.

Mazzaglia called Springer to say that vibrations from heavy equipment at the town square construction site at Main and Deering streets and the contractor’s trucks rolling along the street were presenting a hazard to his brick building, which was damaged when a water pipe on the top floor burst Friday afternoon.

Springer, who is also a volunteer firefighter, said a lot of water flowed from the third floor to the first. He said he saw a collapsed ceiling in the balcony on the back side of the building that allowed water to “come down every which way.”

“If a roof is caving in he’s got more problems. He’s trying to shore it up and the ceiling,” Springer said.

Electric service to the building was shut off Friday.

Fire Chief Michael Mann said from what he saw Friday he doesn’t consider the building to be a danger. He said he told Mazzaglia on Friday that he should check all the wiring and supports before he lets anyone inside.

Mann said the owner is responsible to ensure that the building is safe for occupants and the public, but as fire chief he can condemn it if he can justify it.

The building is not insured, he said.

Police said they are keeping a watch on the building.

Mazzaglia was at the Opera House on Monday morning with a pickup truck filled with two-by-four studs, ladders and lolly columns to brace ceilings and floors.

He declined to comment, saying he was too busy.

Code Enforcement Officer Jeffery VanDecker said Monday afternoon that he has not been in the building because no permits have been issued or are needed for it. “It’s not a change of use. It’s pre-existing. There’s no need to review it,” he said.

Meanwhile, the owners of the two first-floor businesses that flooded were trying to salvage what’s left.

“We’re all done,” said Sherwood Jordan, who works with Colonial Coffee Shoppe owner Elise Thurlow of Albany Township. Jordan was at the shop all day Monday trying to get some information and protect the property. The doors to all the first-floor shops were left open to apparently help dry them out.

Thurlow said Monday night that she is hopeful of reopening in a new location.

Addy Massimino of New York, owner of Beauty Beyond beauty supply store on the ground floor of the Opera House, said she drove all night Friday and arrived in town about 5 a.m. Saturday.

“It’s been such a shock,” she said as she and her son Joe moved merchandise to a storefront at 20 Main St. in Market Square, Paris, temporarily. Massimino said she has a five-year lease at the Opera House, and Mazzaglia is leasing her space in Paris until she can return to Norway. Like Thurlow, she has insurance on her business.

No damage estimates were available at either business Monday.

“You do what you have to do?” Massimino asked.

“I can’t believe this,” said Scott Anderson of Waterford, who looked in the open door of the cleaned-out beauty supply shop.

It’s unclear what will happen to the 1894 building.

“This is years and years of neglect,” said Andrea Burns of Norway Downtown. “It’s a history of irresponsible ownership of a building,” she said.

Burns said historic buildings such as the Opera House should have periodic reports on their conditions.

“It would give us a road map for its care,” she said.

The Opera House and its clock tower were built in 1894 by the Norway Building Association and bought by the town in 1920. Concerts, minstrel shows, ballroom dances, plays, movies, high school graduations and town meetings were held on the upper floors and small businesses operated on the first. It has had a succession of private owners since the town sold it in the mid-1970s. The upper floors have been unused for about 30 years.

The building is on the list of Maine’s Most Endangered Historic Properties. Its image is on the town seal.

The E. Howard clock was undamaged in the water pipe break and is expected to be reset if and when power is restored to the building.