The Newcastle Board of Selectmen reaffirmed its decision to place at least one seasonal speed bump in the village of Damariscotta Mills, despite the Nobleboro Board of Selectmen’s recent reversal of its decision to install two bumps on the Nobleboro side of the village.
Maine Department of Transportation Regional Traffic Engineer David Allen visited both boards during separate meetings in August to discuss the speed bumps.
Nobleboro was to have two speed bumps and Newcastle was to have one. The DOT would purchase the bumps, which would slow vehicles in an area with high pedestrian traffic, particularly due to the village’s swimming hole.
During their respective August meetings, both boards of selectmen voted in favor of installing the speed bumps.
The Nobleboro Board of Selectmen unanimously voted to reverse its decision Aug. 31 after receiving feedback opposing the speed bumps from Bobby Whear, a resident of the Mills on the Nobleboro side of the village.
Whear told the board he had polled his neighbors and the majority of residents he spoke to were not in favor of the bumps.
During the Newcastle Board of Selectmen’s meeting on Monday, Sept. 12, the selectmen said they were still in favor of the speed bumps.
“We made the decision to do it, and we should stick to it,” Selectman Ben Frey said.
Newcastle Road Commissioner Steve Reynolds said he had spoken to Allen about the placement of the speed bumps. If Nobleboro sticks with its decision not to place the bumps on their side of the bridge, there is a potential for Newcastle to have two speed bumps on its side of the village.
“The recommendation is to put two in a series,” Reynolds said. “(Allen’s) still in favor of doing it in succession.”
The speed bumps will not be installed until spring 2017, Allen previously told the board.
