BETHEL – A proposed sidewalk project that would give elementary school children and others a safe place to walk along Mason Street continues to slowly plod through town government processes.

Mason Street is between Broad Street and Chapman Street’s hairpin turn. A short side road off Mason provides access to SAD 44’s Crescent Park Elementary School.

At Monday night’s selectmen’s meeting, a 3-2 vote OK’d doing a traffic engineering study for the “Safe Routes to School” project, provided the town can back out of the mostly state-funded deal without penalties and an explanation, according to Town Manager Scott Cole.

“We will hire a traffic engineer to evaluate all options, which are variables like making Mason a one-way street, or a two-way with a wider travel way, or a reduced travel way with a wider sidewalk,” Cole said on Tuesday afternoon regarding the Sidewalk Committee’s recommendation.

“The committee recommended hiring a professional to evaluate all the alternatives. There is no support in the town budget to fund a study, but we were able to get the Maine Department of Transportation to fund it and increase the amount,” he added.

Two years ago, an application was submitted to selectmen to create an MDOT “Safe Routes to School” sidewalk, Cole said. That was approved last year.

However, after several Mason Street property owners argued against giving up their land and, in some cases, part of their homes, to a sidewalk, selectmen formed a committee consisting of some of those people.

Regarding Monday night’s discussion, Cole said MDOT Project Manager Catherine E. Small attended to answer questions regarding a study and the town’s ability to cancel the project if no suitable alternatives were found.

In a July 16 e-mail between Small and Cole, Small wrote that a traffic study would give Bethel a better understanding about community needs. She also said that if the town decides the project will cost more in the long-run than originally anticipated, town officials must explain project barriers to MDOT to help document good reasons to kill the project.

Should that happen, Small said the state would transfer the remaining funds into another safe routes’ project for another community.

Selectmen favoring the work were Chairman Stan Howe, Don Bennett and Robert Everett. Opposing selectmen were Jack Cross and Dennis Doyon, Cole said.

Cross and Doyon objected, Cole said, because they were worried about increased maintenance costs of a sidewalk, especially in the winter. They argued that it would cost an estimated $3,000 to $5,000 a year due to snow removal, Cole said. Rather than just plow snow off the street in one pass, a second pass would be needed to remove plowed snow from a sidewalk.

“There are no clear-cut solutions, so, we’re going to study it some more. This is more than we’ve had in the past. Before, we just had a concept in an application. Now, proponents feel the project would provide a larger benefit than just for school kids, while opponents agree about the benefits, but feel the cost of ongoing maintenance exceeds such benefits,” Cole said.