Maine DOT gears up for Camden’s Route 1 North highway rebuild project
CAMDEN — While construction and rehabilitation of approximately 1.5 miles of Route 1 in Camden to the Lincolnville town line is not scheduled to begin until next spring, the Maine Dept. of Transportation has posted a request for bids to starting clearing forest alongside the highway there.
The deadline for bids on “forestry clearing” are due at the DOT offices by 11 a.m., Sept. 6. Work is anticipated to take place later this year.
Then, in a few weeks, the DOT will advertise for bids for the road construction project.
The work site for the clearing begins one half mile north of Sagamore Farms, in Camden, and continues for 1.56 miles to Lincolnville. Plans for clearing are available here.
In 2015, the DOT first initiated conversations about rebuilding Route 1 along the 1.5-mile span of highway and raising the Spring Brook Hill bridge where crashes frequently occur in the colder months (according to DOT meeting minutes, there were 16 crashes alone in that section of the road in two years).
The proposed design entails reconfiguring slopes and roadbed, clearing trees so sun can dry the highway in the winter, and filling and raising bridges, in some spots by at least seven feet.
In 2015, DOT Project Manager Ernie Martin, who is part of the DOT’s Midcoast office, told Penobscot Bay Pilot that the plan was a good one, and at that point, fully funded. Martin said much water runs down from the hills, and the road is to be improved, in part, to better control drainage and slippery conditions.
The DOT had anticipated a 2017 start date for the then $4.4 million project. The $1.5 million replacement of the Spring Brook bridge and the $700,000 replacement of the Great Brook Bridge were to be done at the same time as the highway rebuild.
In 2022, the same project carried higher price tags, and in the DOT’s 2022 Work Plan, the funding was contingent on Congressionally Designated Spending approval. The Route 1 reconstruction was pegged at $8.65 million, the Spring Brook bridge at $2.76 million, and the Great Brook bridge at $1.2 million.
The State of Maine owns four rods — or 66 feet — of width that the highway occupies as it passes through communities. Route 1 is part of the national highway corridor system, but falls under DOT jurisdiction for maintenance.
