Mainebiz

V O L . X X I I I N O. X X V O C T O B E R 1 6 , 2 0 1 7 22 I t's an impasse in all senses of the word: Wiscasset business owners worried about losing storefront downtown parking are growing more vocal as the Maine Department of Transportation presses on with a con- troversial, taxpayer-funded $5 million plan to ease traffi c congestion. e biggest bone of contention is the planned removal of all park- ing spots on Main Street, which is also U.S. Route 1, and is home to Red's Eats and a dozen or so art and antique shops and the cornerstone of a historic district. e plan calls for removing 51 spaces during peak season, July through mid-September, including 25 diagonal spaces on Main Street, and creating 84 new ones on neighboring streets. Despite the net gain in spaces promised by MDOT, a number of shopkeepers don't want to lose park- ing at their doorstep. "For us it would be terrible," laments Keith Oehmig, co-owner of the Wiscasset Bay Gallery with his wife, Cordelia, for more than 30 years. "It would be the end of downtown." MDOT's Wiscasset Route 1 Downtown Pedestrian Safety and Mobility Improvement Project aims to alleviate bottlenecks on U.S. Route 1, the midcoast's main artery. A well- frequented route especially in summer, it traverses the Sheepscot River and is known as Main Street in Wiscasset. Besides shifting parking away from Main Street, the Maine Department of Transportation aims to widen sidewalks and upgrade them with new bricks, dis- abled-access ramps and amenities still to be decided from bollards to benches, install traffi c lights and turn-out lanes at intersections. Much to the ire of historic preservationists, it also plans to tear down Haggett's Garage, an early 20 th -century building on Water Street currently occupied by the Midcoast Conservancy, to put up a parking lot. Citing eminent domain, DOT bought Haggett's from Coastal Enterprises Inc. earlier this year for $403,500, preventing Midcoast Conservancy from exercising its option to buy the building. at brings to $768,000 what DOT has spent to date on a project that's the subject of pending litigation brought by a local property owner, has been rejected twice by the town's selectmen despite their initial approval, and prompted a group calling themselves Citizens for Sensible Solutions to run an angry full-page ad in early October in three local newspapers. e ad demands that the MDOT open an "honest" dialogue with all Wiscasset citizens, support small busi- nesses by keeping storefront parking, return Haggett's Garage to the commu- nity and fi nd solutions that don't waste tax dollars. "MDOT, citizens run the government," says an orange roadblock. "Come back to the table and talk. Let's make a better plan." e debate could turn ugly, and polit- ical. Selectmen voted unanimously Oct. 3 to request a meeting with Gov. Paul LePage and David Bernhardt, Maine's transportation commissioner, while legislation introduced by state Sen. Dana Dow directs MDOT not to remove the on-street parking and work with citizens to come up with "less destructive and less expensive" solutions. Ron Phillips, CEI's former president and CEO who lives in Waldoboro but is a regular at Wiscasset town meetings, says that while there's more hope now the agency can be stopped, it would be unprecedented. Much ado about parking With DOT proposal, Wiscasset is at a crossroads B y R e n e e C o r d e s M I D C O A S T A N D D OW N E A S T F O C U S P H O T O S / J I M N E U G E R R E N D E R I N G S / C O U R T E S Y M A I N E D E PA R T M E N T O F T R A N S P O R TAT I O N Marian Anderson, Wiscasset town manager, with the town's only traffi c light in background. Keith Oehmig, co-owner of the Wiscasset Bay Gallery. MDOT plans call for adding traffi c signals, loading areas, landscaping and amenities, at the town's expense. Both views are from a vantage point just downhill of Red's Eats.

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