By Tom Walsh;
Part 2 of 4 Parts

For Bar Harbor and other must-see destinations Downeast, the seasonal gridlock is a blessing, representing money waiting to be spent in local economies heavily reliant on tourism.

The complete series of Bypass stories will be archived here on www.ellsworthamerican.com Part 1: Examined the 70-year history of the bypass debate in Ellsworth. Since 1933, a familiar theme has been downtown businesses’ resistance to plans to divert traffic — and potential customers — from the commercial district. Part 2: Recounted the debate, misgivings and advocacy that preceded the creation, in 1962, of bypasses around downtown Belfast and Damariscotta. Bottom line today: It was painful at first but proved to be the right move. Part 3: Examined the situations in Camden and Wiscasset, two towns that missed out on opportunities for bypasses. All agree that downtown traffic is thick and slow as a result — but there's something less than consensus about whether that's a bad thing. Part 4: What Does the Future Hold for Ellsworth?

Vote Now! What do you think about the Bypass Issue? Should Ellsworth build a bypass? Have you got more on your mind? Send us yours thoughts! Be sure to include your email address so we can contact you. Email        Belfast Mayor Michael Hurley Two bridges over the Passagassawakeag River through downtown Belfast. Two bridges over the Passagassawakeag River were instrumental in routing Route 1 traffic through downtown Belfast and, 40 years later, routing it away. The Veterans Memorial Bridge built in 1921 was converted to a footbridge after a new high bridge was opened in 1963 as part of Route 1 bypass construction. STAFF GRAPHIC BY CATHERINE MCKINNEY   Despite a bypass, downtown Damariscotta still faces gridlock in summer. According to the Damariscotta Region Chamber of Commerce, businesses in the coastal community have continued to thrive since the bypass was built. Indeed, the entrance and exit on either end of the coastal community has seen record growth in the last five years. STAFF PHOTO BY STEVE PAPPAS       Readers’ Responses to Bypass Series Here’s a sample of e-mailed comments received the past week after the publication of Part I of our four-part bypass series. •           I go through Ellsworth every day and don’t stop, as once you get out of line it takes forever to get back in. This is hurting Ellsworth businesses. Get the through traffic out of there so the local traffic can get around. •           Build a highway over Ellsworth from Falls Food Mart to Wal-Mart, directly over High street. No need to purchase land. Just build up. •           Heck with High Street, what about Water Street? At 5 p.m. Water Street is lined up to the town pier from the Main Street intersection. •           A bypass should be rerouting traffic from downtown by having a new bridge to eliminate congestion coming from Blue Hill, Surry and Bucksport. This would be a good start. •           The bypass would be a great thing for Ellsworth and the area. I think it may be a thing called greed that makes some of the shop owners and such vote against this. You people need to get a life. It’s called progress! •           I would spend more time shopping in Ellsworth if the traffic would ease. I, instead, go to Brewer, where there isn’t so much driving hassle. I live in Mariaville. •           Just an idea from someone who has been overseas and seen most of America: if Ellsworth residents don’t want to build a bypass, then has anyone ever thought of the possibility of tunneling under and around Ellsworth? Expensive, yes, but it would keep the city undisturbed and landmarks in place. Just my two cents worth. •           I suggest a toll highway to parallel US Route 1. Yes, it means cutting through the forest but here on the mid-coast we’ve done things backwards. We’ve placed a major artery through the heart of residential areas forcing homes to sprawl out into the countryside where the major artery should be located. This toll highway would terminate on the east side of Ellsworth with a parking garage. Tourists and locals could drive up the toll highway, park in a garage in Ellsworth and take a bus to Mount Desert. Once on the island they can use the highly successful Island Explorer. •           The Ellsworth merchants need to understand something: I shop LESS because of the traffic, not MORE! I hate going into town so much that I would rather pay more to go to the small mom and pop stores for what I need daily, with a monthly trip to Bangor (or maybe Ellsworth) for larger items. Shopping is no longer a pleasure in Ellsworth. •           North Conway, N.H., has a wonderful bypass. It has a limited-development regulation and a number of logically placed exits so those familiar with the town can pull off near their desired destination. It has virtually eliminated in-town congestion on the main drag. •           I think Ellsworth has the making of being a “destination” for shopping, restaurants and services. It has all these resources very well represented. However, it is a real nightmare doing any business in Ellsworth because of the traffic. I have lived on MDI for 27 years and find my trips to Ellsworth, instead of being an enjoyable expedition for shopping etc., are now a fight with traffic. I can’t bear to stop and then have to fight to get back in the lines of vehicles. If we had a bypass I think the tourists would love Ellsworth — all those foggy rainy days on MDI — often the sun is out in Ellsworth. I imagine outdoor cafes, pretty parks for sitting, play areas for kids, etc. The good shopping is already there, and if Ellsworth were a “destination” for people, more exciting businesses would come. I don’t like the way Ellsworth is turning into a town with a giant highway through the middle. It’s beginning to look as if Ellsworth is just a huge road. I think a bypass is a fantastic idea. All the gas stations could be lined up along it.

For other Route 1 communities along the way, the congestion is a curse, bringing months of long delays, short tempers and worse.

“The traffic that comes through a community like Wiscasset is not only a time delay but a terrible health issue,” said Lincoln County Planner Bob Faunce. “When you’re sitting in traffic for an hour, which is not unusual in Wiscasset, you’re sucking up exhaust gases.”

For nearly 50 years the Maine Department of Transportation (DOT) has been working with Route 1 communities to address their summer congestion concerns.

 After intense and sometimes contentious local debate, Belfast and Damariscotta opted for Route 1 bypasses designed by the DOT to move seasonal traffic along the fringes of their communities instead of through their central business districts.

 Other Route 1 communities in which bypasses were considered but not built — Wiscasset, Camden and Ellsworth among them — remain mired in seasonal congestion, still in search of elusive and increasingly expensive solutions.

“Bypass planning is very contentious,” said Fred Michaud, a DOT land use planner now working to address Ellsworth’s seasonal bottlenecks. “It’s a tough public process as you address where it should start, where it should stop and where you go through rural areas because of its potential for affecting the rural character of an area. There’s a lot of ‘don’t put it here, put it there.’

“You have to work long and extensively over years to try to resolve the differences and to try to prevail by consensus. And that consensus has to be homegrown and come from the bottom up. DOT needs buy-in from the communities involved. It can’t be imposed by us as The Big Dog.”

Belfast

Now 54, Belfast Mayor Michael Hurley was only 22 when he arrived in the Waldo County coastal community from Massachusetts in 1972. By then, Belfast’s Route 1 bypass had been in place for 10 years after being first proposed in 1955 by Lewis Greene, another Massachusetts native serving as Belfast’s mayor 50 years ago.

“The bypass is now viewed as a great savior, but it was very harsh medicine at the time,” Hurley said. “But, without the bypass, our downtown, in terms of traffic, would be like Camden or Ellsworth.

“People look at it now as one of our saving graces. Kids can ride their bikes downtown and not have to worry about cars being driven by people pissed off because they’re trying to get to the next town but are stuck in Belfast traffic.”

Traffic had been an issue in Belfast since the 1930s. Known originally as “The Atlantic Highway,” Route 1 was routed through Belfast in part because of a bridge built in 1921 over the Passagassawakeag River to honor the veterans of World War I.

 By Summer 1937, a one-day traffic count in downtown Belfast logged 3,761 autos from 31 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and Canada, as well as six horse-drawn vehicles.

When the Maine Turnpike reached Augusta in 1953, Route 3 became the quick link to Route 1 and points Downeast. The two highways converged in downtown Belfast at Main and High streets.

By 1956, City Manager Laurance Dow declared summer traffic to be Belfast’s biggest problem. Despite intensive lobbying within state government, it would be six more summers until the 3.5-mile, $4 million bypass would provide relief.

Land acquisition for the Belfast bypass cost Bryant Dutch his home and took much of the property surrounding his parents’ home. The project also claimed some of the vehicle display lot at Dutch Chevrolet, which the family relocated to the edge of town from downtown in 1961, a year before construction of the bypass.

 Nonetheless, Dutch now considers the bypass a blessing, not a curse.

“For Belfast, the bypass was the smartest move we ever made,” said Dutch, now 70 and retired. “If anything, it helped the downtown.

“It used to be that, when you came through Belfast between Memorial Day and Labor Day, you didn’t get out of traffic because you couldn’t get back in. There was no place to park downtown. Between the railroad tracks that were in use back then and the bottleneck at the bridge, it was a jammed-up mess.

“I know Ellsworth pretty well, and it’s the same way in terms of being so busy with traffic in the summer that, unless you have to stop, you don’t.”

Dutch said he wouldn’t be concerned about a bypass around Ellsworth if his family’s Chevy dealership were located on Ellsworth’s High Street.

“A business like ours relies on local people,” he said. “And a lot of the local people don’t like having to drive through congested areas to get to you.”

Other types of businesses, Mayor Hurley contends, are more likely to be affected by a bypass.

“If people think building a bypass isn’t going to have a huge impact on business, they’re dreaming,” he said. “Belfast was both devastated and saved by the bypass. It put dozens of businesses out of business. They didn’t go out of business on the first day it opened, but struggled along. If your business was dependent on cars going by your business, you were in trouble.

“If I had a small business, like a gas station, restaurant, garage or anything that deals with itinerant travelers, I would view construction of a bypass as a big deal.”

Brian Horne bills his Colburn Shoe Store on Belfast’s Main Street as “Maine’s oldest shoe store.” It’s a business that endured downtown commercial turnovers related to the bypass.

“The bypass happened before I was involved, but my father told me that the reason we survived was because our business base was local people,” Horne said. “Belfast was not a tourist destination. It was a very blue-collar town, and we survived because we didn’t have much reliance on the tourist trade.

“I’ve worked downtown for 32 years, since the early 1970s, and it’s only in the last 15 years that we’ve started to get a tourist base, which makes the winters much more manageable.

“I think we do have a good mix of businesses and services downtown now,” he said.  “Arts in the Park, the harbor traffic, the Belfast Co-op and the new library all bring people downtown.”

Curiously, Mayor Hurley said Belfast is now developing strategies for encouraging more downtown tourist traffic.

“In terms of tourism, our goal now is to get them off the bypass and into downtown,” he said. “It’s a challenge as, when you’re on the bypass, you’re focused on where you’re going, not where you are.”

Professor Per Erik Garder, who teaches transportation engineering and advanced roadway design in the University of Maine’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, said Belfast’s bypass is “ideal” for encouraging motorists to route themselves off the Route 1 bypass and through downtown.

“The ideal bypass is designed in such a way to make it equally easy to go the business route or to stay on the bypass,” he said. “Routing yourself through the town, where there are shops and restaurants, is not discouraged if it’s clear that it’s an easy-off and easy-on situation.

“If it’s equally easy to go the business route as the bypass, a lot of tourists will continue to go through town.

Damariscotta

Like Belfast, the Lincoln County community of Damariscotta relies on a Route 1 bypass as insulation from the congestion, pollution and noise associated with heavy traffic.

“Damariscotta’s little downtown is vibrant and is filled with people who are there because they want to be,” said Lincoln County Planner Bob Faunce.

“It provides the kind of services you would normally expect of a downtown, the kind of services that aren’t available in Wiscasset.”

Opened to traffic in 1962 and built by Department of Transportation at a cost of  under $10 million, the 4.5-mile bypass was largely constructed in Newcastle, across the Damariscotta River.

“The bypass infringes very little on Damariscotta land, but it has a significant impact on making the town viable,” said Dick McLean, Damariscotta’s first selectman.

“Those who want to come to Damariscotta get off the bypass and come to town. Those with no intention of coming to Damariscotta keep on going, which is good for them and good for us.”

Town Manager William Post said downtown businesses benefit from Damariscotta being a gateway to South Bristol, Pemaquid Point and other destinations accessed by Highways 129 and 130, which intersect Main Street at what’s now Route 1B.

“We have a lot of traffic coming downtown to get to the peninsula,” he said. “We’re a service center for the towns around us.”

There’s still seasonal traffic congestion downtown, Post said, but it’s nothing like the pre-bypass era.

“We have only 2,168 year-round residents, but on any given day there are probably 5,000 people going to work, going to the hospital or doing business downtown,” he said. “During the summer that increases to perhaps as much as 10,000, but generally everybody is cognizant of the fact that there are going to be tie-ups and are fairly polite in letting cars turn to keep traffic flowing.”

Post expects a Main Street improvement project scheduled for this fall will improve traffic flow by installing a traffic light at Main Street’s intersection with Highways 129/130.

George Parker, chairman of the five-member Damariscotta Planning Board, said the bypass wasn’t built without some strong opposition grounded in concern about the impact of a bypass on local businesses.

“When the bypass was first proposed there was a huge outcry from the local merchants that it was the end of the world, that it would drive them out of business,” Parker said. “In fact, it’s been a savior for the town. It’s been wonderful.”

Robert H. Reny, who founded the first of his chain of small discount stores in 1949 in Damariscotta, was one of the few local businessmen to support the bypass, his son, John, said.

“It was a very unpopular idea among local merchants, who said: ‘You can’t take traffic away from our front doors; it’ll kill us,’” John said. “My father was one of the few who could see the long-range implications of it as a good thing. At a big meeting, he stood up for it, which was not appreciated by some people here.

“It’s made Damariscotta better than ever,” he said. “Without it, we’d be Wiscasset, with so much traffic that no one would ever stop.”

McLean agrees.

“I don’t think we’re losing business,” he said. “To the contrary; coming into and passing through Damariscotta is a doable process because of the bypass. We would lose more business if people couldn’t get through the town than we’ve lost by the fact that they can get around the town.

Parker suggests that Route 1 communities considering bypass construction make sure the bypass is engineered to keep traffic moving.

“The biggest thing they did when they built the bypass here was to make it a limited access highway, which meant there was no new development,” Parker said. “If you’re going to do a bypass, you need to make it limited access so that you’re not doing anything to slow the traffic down.”

While each Route 1 community presents its own set of issues, DOT Land Use Planner Fred Michaud feels a bypass around Ellsworth could work as well as the Damariscotta bypass, or the bypass the takes traffic off Interstate 95 into the shopping Mecca of Freeport.

“Like Freeport, Damariscotta has been hugely successful in terms of the bypass being a positive influence on local business,” Michaud said. “Now it’s difficult to get into either one, even with those bypasses.”