Lewiston to buy part of Ramada property for future fire station

LEWISTON — The city plans to purchase land behind the Ramada hotel on Pleasant Street to build a District 3 fire station.

The City Council entered into a purchase and sale agreement last week with the owner of the hotel, Emerald Hospitality, to buy roughly two acres for the project. The land is an empty lot at Pleasant Street and Alfred Plourde Parkway.

According to Fire Chief Mark Caron, the department’s response times to south Lewiston need to be better, and a previous study recommended the exact Pleasant Street location as ideal for relocating the Lisbon Street Fire Station.

In a memo to the council, Caron said a 2009 evaluation recommended moving the Lisbon Street Fire Station farther away toward Alfred Plourde Parkway. It also recommended an additional station to serve the rural area of south Lewiston as future development occurred.

Lewiston plans to purchase land, marked in red, behind the Ramada hotel on Pleasant Street to build a District 3 fire station. Submitted photo

Caron told the council that the purchase would “start us on that path.” The city is in the middle of a multiyear process to rebuild each of its fire substations. Lewiston’s newest substation, on North Temple Street, was completed in 2021. The Main Street Station is next in line, followed by the Lisbon Street station.

During the summer, Lewiston Housing had a purchase and sale agreement in place to buy the Ramada hotel and its 9 acres to create a transitional housing project, but it ultimately did not move forward due to pushback from elected officials and the public, as well as a Board of Appeals ruling.

The council memo said the proposed fire station will “replace the aging and outdated” station at 1046 Lisbon St.

The memo also states that the property is subject to an environmental review approval process through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in order for the project to qualify for a congressional earmark award. The agreed purchase price is $225,000.

During the meeting last week, Councilor Linda Scott said she’s “excited that we’ll be looking at this for a new fire station.”

The Planning Board had recently voted unanimously to send a favorable recommendation to the City Council. The land is in the highway business zone, which allows municipal buildings and facilities as a permitted use. Construction will require the approval of the Planning Board.