DIXFIELD – As soon as the rainy weather lets up, state transportation contractors are expected to begin nearly $47.8 million of road and bridge projects.
“Now that spring is here, we’re looking to get started,” said Richard J. Crawford, the Maine Department of Transportation’s western region project manager at the Dixfield headquarters off Route 2.
“I’m sure that contractors will fire up as soon as the weather and Mother Nature allows,” he said.
This year’s DOT projects in Androscoggin, Franklin and Oxford counties include nearly 50 miles of highway reconstruction and rehabilitation, and replacing or maintaining five bridges.
The estimated total cost of the 21 projects is $47,758,500.
The largest reconstruction project is 11.79 miles on Route 27 in Eustis and Chain of Ponds at a cost of $8.1 million. The project, which went out to bid Wednesday, is expected to be completed by Nov. 1, 2006, Crawford said.
Work on four reconstruction projects from Farmington to Paris to Gilead, which began last year, is expected to be completed this summer and fall, he said.
These four projects are:
• 9.48 miles of Streaked Mountain Road, which is Route 117, in Paris and Buckfield, $7.5 million.
• 4.17 miles of Route 2 in Bethel beginning at Fleming Road and extending east beyond the intersection of Route 5, $5.8 million.
• 2.04 miles of Route 4 and Route 27 north of Pleasant Street in Farmington, $2.9 million.
• 1.5 miles of Route 2 in Bethel and Gilead, east of the Maine-New Hampshire state line, $2.3 million.
Other new reconstruction projects include 3.76 miles of Route 4 in Phillips to begin near Route 142 at an estimated cost of $4.5 million; 3.09 miles of Route 4 in Livermore between Route 108 and Old Canton Road, $3.7 million; and nearly a mile of Route 26 in Woodstock between Dudley Road and Rumford Avenue, $2 million.
The intersection of Route 9, Route 126 and Route 132 in Sabattus, is to also be reconstructed to improve vertical alignment, at an estimated cost of $800,000.
Road overlay projects include:
• 2.41 miles of Route 2 and 202 in Auburn between the Oakdale northbound bridge and Minot Avenue, $965,000.
• 6.02 miles of Route 27 in Carrabassett Valley, $1,913,500.
• 3.57 miles of Route 2 in Dixfield and Wilton, $93,000.
• 3.57 miles of Route 17 in Dixfield and Jay between Routes 2 and 4, $253,000.
• 3.40 miles of Route 2 in Farmington between Bryant Road and Oakes Street, $935,000.
• 4.69 miles of Route 5 in Lovell north of Routes 5A and 5, $1.43 million.
• 0.83 miles of Route 2 in Wilton, $59,000.
Region Engineer Mark A. Hume in Dixfield said Wednesday that five bridge projects are planned.
In New Portland, the wire suspension bridge over the Carrabassett River, which was built in the mid-19th century, is to undergo an estimated $1.08 million in maintenance, mostly on the two cables that support the span, said project leader Wayne Frankhauser.
In Lewiston, Riverside Street bridge over the Maine Central Railroad is scheduled for $810,000 worth of work, to be completed by Dec. 1.
The large two-span Norton Bridge over the West Branch of Carrabassett River on Route 27 just north of Route 142 is to be replaced at an estimated cost of $1.55 million.
Hume said that the new bridge is to be set just downstream of its present location “to ease the corner in the road.”
The other two spans are Branch Brook Bridge on Route 26 in Newry at a cost of $550,000 and Black Brook Bridge on South Arm Road at a cost of $520,000.
Comments are no longer available on this story