A week after state officials said relief for River Road motorists was still years away, the Windham Town Council voted unanimously to send a message to the Maine Department of Transportation: Help us with our dangerous road.

The council approved an order Tuesday night to ask the transportation department to review speed limits on the road. Since River Road is a state road, Windham has no control when it comes to setting speed limits.

Asking the state for the review is no guarantee for a lower speed limit. But in light of last week’s news that the transportation department cannot complete the road reconstruction until 2015 at the earliest, the council felt its best option was to ask for the speed limit review.

Counselor Elizabeth Wisecup offered an amendment, which was later unanimously adopted, that added emphasis to the council’s request of the state. In it, the town will ask the state to take the condition of the road into consideration when performing the speed review.

“It may just underscore the issue. Anything we can do to put the pressure on here,” said Councilor Robert Muir, who seconded Wisecup’s amendment.

“We want to be a squeaking wheel. We want Augusta to listen to us,” Councilor David Tobin added.

Businesses bristle at road closure proposal

Last week the message coming out of town hall was a little different. Councilors Donna Chapman and Carol Waig, seeking ways to curb speeders and dangerous drivers on the road and frustrated by the lack of response from the state, proposed a possible closure of River Road to anything but local traffic.

The idea was dismissed as highly unlikely and possibly illegal by state transportation officials, but the mere suggestion irked businesses that rely on River Road traffic for their livelihood.

“We’ve been here since 1917 and we don’t appreciate even the thought of closing it,” said Judy Quimby, owner of Thayer’s Store, located near the road’s intersection with Route 202.

Quimby said her store sees a severe slowdown during inclement weather because of the road conditions. If the road were closed, the drop-off in sales would be permanent.

“This is a bad road and we see a slowdown in business in a snowstorm because they don’t go the River Road because it’s too hazardous,” she said.

As evidenced by the council’s consideration of closing the road to thru-traffic, Quimby said she and other businesses on her end of River Road are apparently “on the bottom of the totem pole,” compared to businesses located on Route 302.

“Do you think they’d ever consider closing Route 302? I don’t think so. But there are probably just as many accidents on Route 302 as River Road,” she said.

Closer to Westbrook, Ron Winship, owner of Winny Knoll farm and the adjacent Windy Hill Farm Market, thought the councilors’ proposal of closing the road was “totally ridiculous.”

“We need the traffic on the River Road. I can’t imagine closing it,” Winship said.

Enforcement posed as solution

While the condition of the road is dangerous, Winship said closing the road isn’t the answer since so many people rely on the road as a route to work.

“They talk about the condition of the road, but everywhere you go the conditions are terrible,” Winship said.

Instead, Winship said a better way to solve dangerous driving conditions is a greater police presence.

“I see police go by here everyday. They should do some speed checks. It would help a lot,” he said.

Councilor Donna Chapman, during Tuesday’s meeting, said the state’s answer to the council’s request for a speed limit review will likely focus on law enforcement. Speaking of the speed limit change, Chapman said, “Nobody does it. I think (the state) will come back to us and say it’s an enforcement issue.”

Fix it, close it, just do something

Not everyone who works on River Road thinks closing the road is a bad idea. Cheryl Page, who works at the Puffin Stop at the northern terminus of River Road in North Windham, lives and works on the road and said local-only traffic is a viable alternative, especially since the state has recently claimed poverty and reneged on promises to reconstruct the roadway. Beginning in February, Page led a petition drive that netted 900 signatures, which she submitted to state transportation officials at last week’s council meeting.

“If they aren’t going to fix it, then yeah, I agree it should be closed. Parts of it are just falling apart,” Page said. “In winter, the plow can’t even touch the blade to the road since there are so many ruts.”

Customers at the Puffin Stop were equally frustrated with the road. Jerry Croteau, a mailman in Windham since 1993, said he avoids River Road whenever possible.

“I got permission from my supervisor to use routes 302 and 202 to get from North Windham to South Windham,” he said. “The very first storm I encountered working here, I saw three to four cars in a ditch on that road. They were probably going too fast, but that made me think about it.”

John Buckley, of Linnell Road in Windham, said he was in a bad accident 22 years ago on River Road that left one person dead and put him in a coma for three days.

“The road was bad to begin with. Then they put a coating on it a few years ago, but they didn’t do anything to the underlay. So, it’s done nothing but make the high points higher and low points lower,” Buckley said.

Buckley said tire ruts and potholes, along with 6-inch drop-offs and loose sand at the edges, combine to make a treacherous commute. Add in excessive speed, which he says is often the case, and Buckley sees River Road as a recipe for disaster.

“All the worst driving habits are magnified on that road,” Buckley added.

Wintertime is worse

Brett Knowlen, of Otisfield, said he often travels River Road but asked his wife to seek alternative routes in winter.

“You come over a hill and the road just dips out of sight. It’s just too dangerous in a snowstorm,” Knowlen said.

Doug Fortier, Windham public works director, said the town uses more salt and sand on River Road to compensate for the plow trucks’ inability to scrape snow and ice off the crowned roadway. Trucks also have to drive slower so as not to damage their equipment.

“Just because of the condition of the road, you have to go at most 15 mph. On a good road, you can go 20-25 mph,” Fortier said. “Our trucks take a beating, too. The wing takes a pounding, the frame twists, hydraulic tanks crack and need to be replaced. And it’s bad for the road, too. We take chunks out. You can’t help it.”

With the council’s decision Tuesday night, Town Manager Tony Plante will draft a request for a speed limit review. State officials will then study the road in the near future. Possible outcomes include lowering, increasing or keeping the posted speed limit unchanged.

River Road in Windham, though resurfaced a few years ago with a layer of pavement, is back to being a rutted, crowned road that has curves and hills that frustrate drivers. Winter plowing, according to the Windham public works director, is getting harder as the road deteriorates. On Tuesday, the Town Council voted to send the state Department of Transportation a request for a speed zone review. (Staff photo by John Balentine)