EDDINGTON, Maine (WABI) – People driving in Brewer, Holden, or Eddington may have seen some progress on a new roadway.
“The project is about halfway through, maybe a little bit more than halfway through. It’s phases have started the January of 2022 and we’ve gone through two construction seasons.” said Scott Blanchard, Project Superintendent at Sargent.
This road will provide a direct connection from I-395′s terminus in Brewer to current Route 9 in Eddington.
This aims to reduce travel times to the Calais area and Eastern Maine as a whole.
It will also keep semi-trucks off of roads better suited for local traffic.
“Road is really not built for the heavy truck traffic that comes from Route 9 off out of Canada into the Bangor area and further points South. So this is going to alleviate a lot of that congestion and heavy traffic.” stated Blanchard.
The new roadway also means tractor trailers coming to and from Canada can skip 1A through Holden and a portion of Route 46, a windy and narrow road, not ideal for large trucks.
“They don’t like Route 46. That’s tough on the trucks. It’s tough on that intersection down there off with 46 under Route 9. You can see the roads unraveling a little bit because of it because they’re pushing to get through this tough intersection. They’ll be able to go right through here without even stopping.” said Blanchard
As the project progresses, the company has opened some of the bridges that will span the new six mile stretch of Route 9.
“Three out of the five bridges are complete now. So, we have Levenseller, and another bridge that goes over Eaton Brook, that’s down in the woods here a ways back.” said Blanchard.
While the recent bridge openings and pavement may make it seem like the project is nearing completion, there is still a good bit of work to be done before the road opens to traffic.
“The issue with limited access highways is you can only get on one spot and the other spot, so it has to be complete before we can even start using it. Like some of the roads, you can phase into it and use part of it as it goes, but this has to be completely done and the target date for that is July 2025.” stated Blanchard.
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