WATERVILLE — State Department of Transportation funds are now available to reconstruct Trafton Road, an issue the City Council will discuss at its meeting Tuesday.
The meeting will be at 7 p.m. in the Chace Community Forum at the Bill & Joan Alfond Main Street Commons at 150 Main St.
Crews work to unload a tractor-trailer of its payload of beer after the truck rolled over on Trafton Road when it hit a soft area on the shoulder in Watervile on March 16, 2018. Since the interchange with I-95 was built, traffic, including trucks, has increased on the road necessitating its reconstruction. Morning Sentinel file photo by Michael G. Seamans
The city’s share of the $4.3 million project to reconstruct Trafton Road is $500,000, according to City Manager Michael Roy.
“We’re getting a good deal out of this,” Roy said Thursday. “It’s very much needed and we’re very appreciative of what the state of Maine was able to do. I think they’ve gone above and beyond in helping the city with that.”
The DOT in July 2017 completed a $5 million interchange at Trafton Road, at mile 125 of Interstate 95. At the time, funds were not available to reconstruct Trafton Road itself, though the city and state’s contract stipulated the road would be reconstructed at some point.
Roy said the work to reconstruct the road will start this year. The project has not yet gone out to bid, he said.
Waterville Police Officer Timothy Hinton was wounded in an altercation with a shoplifting suspect on Dec. 22, 2019. Courtesy of Waterville Police
In other matters Tuesday, the council will recognize Waterville police Officer Timothy Hinton for his bravery Dec. 22, 2019, when a person he stopped in connection with a shoplifting incident shot the officer and led him on a chase that ended in Canaan and included law enforcement from various agencies. The Waterville Regional Communications Center dispatchers who were on duty at the time, Brandy Stanley and Sarah Nelson, also will be recognized Tuesday, according to Roy.
The council will consider approving the purchase of a new police cruiser to replace the 2018 Ford sport utility police vehicle that was riddled with bullets during the incident. Roy said it received 21 bullet holes. The new cruiser will be $47,000, $37,000 of which is for the vehicle itself, and $10,000 for transferring equipment into the cruiser and adding new equipment, he said.
The council also is scheduled to consider leasing out space for an aircraft in the city-owned Robert A. LaFleur municipal airport’s north hangar.
The appointment of members to a new Parking Study Committee also is on the agenda. Roy said emails were sent to members of the most recent parking committee and some responded that they want to be members of the new one.
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