LEWISTON — City crews will crack into the Sabattus Street pavement Monday, beginning a summerlong stormwater and sewer separation and paving project downtown.
“It’ll be going on for several months,” Lewiston Project Engineer Jeff Beaule said. “It’s a project we’ve been putting off for several years, because it’s going to be expensive.”
It’s one of several projects across the Twin Cities that either kick off this week or are already under way.
Beaule said Monday’s project will include work on Sabattus Street between Wood and Oak streets, and Oak street between Sabattus and Blake streets. All told, the project is budgeted to cost $1.1 million.
The city is starting with the easy project first: the Sabattus Street storm sewer separation project, beginning at Wood Street and working toward Oak. That work should take two weeks, weather permitting.
“Oak Street will be much more difficult,” Beaule said. “It’s a really deep, large pipe with a lot of rock to remove, but it’s the last part of that separation work we did upstream on College Street last year. It’s the missing link to get the water from that neighborhood to the river.”
Lewiston crews are also preparing to repave three different portions of Cotton Road.
Engineering technician Wes Enman said they’ve already ground away the old asphalt for the first 1,000 feet beginning at Ferry Road. They’ll do the same thing farther along Cotton Road, for about 900 feet beginning at Salmon Brook.
They are scheduled to repave the first 1,000 feet, the 900 feet immediately south of Salmon Brook and pave a new top layer on the 600 feet of the road beyond that. Paving work is scheduled for mid-May, Enman said.
In Auburn, crews will begin work grinding off the old pavement along South Main Street between Vickery and Witham roads on Monday, part of complete reconstruction of that road.
Auburn City Engineer Dan Goyette said that work includes improvements to the storm drains, new grading, gravel and new pavement.
Another road reconstruction project along Winter, Summer and Dennison streets began last week. And two sidewalk projects — one around the Walton School in New Auburn and a second between Court Street and Park Avenue Elementary began two weeks ago, during the Auburn School Department’s spring break.
“We tried to get both started when the schools were closed,” Goyette said.
The Park Avenue sidewalk construction has been planned since the school was built in 2006. The $963,000 project is being paid with state and federal grants.
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