JAY — Highway workers Tuesday took down the house at the corner of Route 133 and Hyde Road to make way for intersection improvements. A public hearing on the plan was held Monday.

The town bought the vacant home, large barn and 3 or 4 acres on April 30 for $36,970.44. The money came from the $200,000 voters raised in the current budget to help make the intersection safer.

The Maine Department of Transportation and the town partnered on the $480,000 project. Part of the town’s share is in-kind work, including demolishing the house and hauling the debris to Norridgewock, Town Manager Ruth Cushman said Tuesday.

DOT is going to cut nearly 2 feet off a small section of Route 133 and where the part of the house was to increase the line of sight, she said.

There have been 14 accidents at the intersection over the last five years, she said.

Brian Keezer, a DOT traffic project manager, said last week that they will be cutting back the slope on the northwest corner where the town recently purchased the property in order to increase sight distance looking left — north — as you pull out of Hyde Road.

“We’re also cutting the grade on Route 133 to the north of the intersection to also improve sight distance,” he said. The corner radius will be widened at Hyde Road so trucks turning right onto Route 133 will no longer have to cross into the northbound lane of Route 133, Keezer said.

“Drainage will also be improved by installing new riprapped ditches and replacing a couple existing culverts,” he said.

The DOT will wait a week to see if any more comments come in about the plan and then put the project out to bid, Cushman said.

Bids are expected to be opened in July and the work is expected to be completed by November, she said.

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