LEWISTON — A summertime traffic study will look at the city’s downtown streets and determine if they work or if traffic patterns need to change.
It could result in swapping one-way and two-streets, repainting lanes and adding more bike routes.
“How can we improve the traffic flow for vehicles, but also for pedestrians and bicyclists?” Jennifer Williams, director of the Androscoggin Transportation Resource Center, asked. “Are there opportunities to get bike lanes on these streets? Does it make sense to make some two-way streets one way, or vice versa?”
The traffic study could do for the entire downtown what Lewiston’s public works crews plan for Park Street over the next few weeks. Crews are scheduled to repaint Park Street lanes, replacing parallel parking with angle-in parking spaces and removing one lane from Ash Street south.
“We’re not looking at doing any widening or anything. Any work that would be done would stay within the existing curb lines,” Williams said.
The study will create a computer model of average traffic loads around the downtown, forecast through 2030.
Engineers will compare travel times and traffic on the roads, first in their current configuration and then with potential changes — opening one-way streets to two-way traffic or making new roads one way.
“We know that on-street parking is critical in many of these neighborhoods,” she said. “But we also need to see if there’s room for more bike lanes — or at least a wider shoulder.”
Lincoln Jeffers, interim director of Lewiston’s Economic and Community Development department, said the effort could make downtown Lewiston more friendly to outside investors and developers.
“Just having the street grid be a bit more functional,” Jeffers said. “It could make travel there more predictable and maximize parking and other modes of transportation.”
Williams said the $40,000 study is being paid with $32,000 in state and federal transportation grants and $8,000 from the city.
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