The Newcastle Board of Selectmen authorized a 10-ton load limit for Lynch Road after receiving a complaint from a resident about increasing truck traffic.
Frequent heavy truck traffic will “shorten the life of the road,” said Newcastle Superintendent of Roads, Buildings and Grounds Steve Reynolds.
Newcastle officials said Hanley Construction Inc. trucks weighing as much as 80,000-100,000 pounds have been using the road to transport gravel from a Mount Hunger Road pit.
Mark Hanley of Hanley Construction said his trucks don’t use the road, so the posting won’t affect the company.
He said his employees might have mistakenly used Lynch Road on rare occasions, but have been informed not to. He said he expects them to use Dodge Road in Edgecomb, which is closer to the pit and closer to Rt. 1.
Dodge Road and Lynch Road meet at the Edgecomb-Newcastle town line.
The selectmen voted 4-1 to post the road. Selectman Ben Frey cast the dissenting vote.
Frey said road postings restrict business owners who depend on the roads. “I don’t think we should just be doing it willy-nilly,” he said.
Chairman Brian Foote said the posting will protect Newcastle’s recent and significant investment to rebuild the road.
Selectman Pat Hudson said Reynolds’ recommendation and the wishes of residents all speak to the necessity of the action.
“I don’t think we’re posting it willy-nilly,” she said.
“That’s a residential area over in there and there are some nice homes and I’m sure they aren’t any happier than the people in Sheepscot who have all this heavy traffic,” she said, in reference to a complaint from a Sheepscot resident earlier in the meeting.
The resident, Angelo Pappagallo, a recent transplant to the area, attended the meeting and read a letter to selectmen outlining his concerns.
The quality of life for Sheepscot residents suffers due to the “unwarranted number” of dump trucks and semitrailers that use North Newcastle and Sheepscot roads as a detour to avoid Federal Street in Wiscasset and its three-ton weight limit, Pappagallo said.
He said the Department of Transportation allows Wiscasset to post Federal Street – the stretch of Route 218 in the village – in exchange for Wiscasset’s agreement to maintain the road.
“The present arrangement is an unfair burden to the town of Newcastle and to the community of Sheepscot,” he said.
Pappagallo said the trucks speed and jake brake, creating danger for motorists and “intolerable” noise for residents.
He said he is prepared to “form a committee of residents against trucks on Sheepscot Road, contact state legislators and do whatever needs to be done to achieve equity, because right now it’s just plain unfair and unnecessary.”
The building permit for the project expired in May.
Town attorney Peter Drum noted that the project remains unfinished before asking the selectmen to go into executive session.
Town Administrator David Bolling said the selectmen did not take any action following the executive session.
In other business, the selectmen re-elected Foote and Ellen Dickens chairman and vice chairwoman, respectively. They elected Frey and Hudson chairman and vice chairwoman of the Board of Assessors.
The selectmen appointed Lee Emmons to the Land Use Ordinance Review Committee and Mary McGrath and Paul Somoza to the Veterans Memorial Park Committee.
Town Administrator David Bolling and Reynolds met with Dept. of Environmental Protection officials July 24 to walk a municipal property on Mills Road.
The town plans to apply for a grant to determine whether the former dump site needs brownfield remediation to address pollution issues.
“We don’t think there really are” those type of issues with the site, Bolling said.
The selectmen approved a one-year contract for payroll services with Payroll Management Inc. for $2318.10, a savings of more than $600 in comparison to their current expense.
The contract will also allow for weekly paychecks, a change that has “overwhelming support” among the town’s employees, Bolling said.
Hudson voted against the contract. She expressed support for an alternative option that would save almost $800 more by contracting with the same company but maintaining biweekly payroll.
