PATTEN, Maine — It’s official.
Just after the Patten Pioneer Days parade rolled through town Saturday morning, Patten celebrated the official dedication of its newest addition. A ribbon-cutting and crowds of visitors christened the new Patten Gateway to the Katahdin Woods and Waters Scenic Byway in a special Aug. 12 ceremony.
Surrounded by pavers near the Patten park, the site includes a kiosk with a map of the scenic byway and space for a calendar of community events. Four granite seats sit near the kiosk which also is flanked by a pair of storyboards sporting local history.
“It’s a good addition for our park area,” said Reggie Porter, chairman of the Patten board of selectmen, who added that the town gave the project its endorsement at a special town meeting earlier this year.
Actual work on the project, he said, has been about a month or so in progress.
“I think they’ve done a good job with this. It ties in good with the rest of the park,” Porter said.
While the estimated $115,000 in funding for the Patten Gateway came from the Federal Highway Administration and the Maine Department of Transportation, the project relied on a whole crowd of state and community resources to come together. Katahdin Tourism Partnership and MaineDOT coordinated the Gateway site as part of their efforts to market the region, promote safety and enhance visitor experience.
The Patten Gateway is the first of the Katahdin Woods and Waters Scenic Byway gateway projects to be completed over the next few years along the 89-mile Katahdin Woods and Waters Scenic Byway. Designed to improve safety along the byway and enhance the visitor experience, these projects are the outcome of a six-year collaboration between the Katahdin Tourism Partnership and MaineDOT.
“We believe this will strengthen tourism in the area,” Christine Theriault, Katahdin Tourism Partnership president, said at the ribbon-cutting. “And it’s because all these groups came together that this became a reality.”
Theriault went on to credit and thank officials with the town of Patten, and members of the Patten Area Women’s Club, Patten Recreation Department, Patten Historical Society and the Veteran’s Memorial Library for their help.
The 89-mile long Katahdin Woods & Waters Scenic Byway “offers breathtaking views of Katahdin and the Appalachian chain, and provides a mix of pastoral farms, meadows, recreational trails, and working forests filled with wildlife and significant natural areas,” according to the Katahdin Scenic Byway Facebook page.
The byway begins at the southern entrance of Baxter State Park and “winds its way through Millinocket along Route 11 and the Penobscot River to Patten, ending at Baxter’s northern entrance at Grand Lake Matagamon.”
With funding support from the Elmina B. Sewall Foundation, other noteworthy byway projects include four downtown kiosks situated in the towns of Patten, Mount Chase, Sherman, and East Millinocket and the pending Millinocket Heritage Park project that is being developed on the corner of Penobscot Avenue and Central Street in downtown Millinocket. This project will open the view of the downtown commercial district to passersby, create a community green space in a key location, and dovetail with additional efforts at renewing the heart of the community.
All that hard work seemed to have paid off this past weekend. Crowds lingered around the hub Saturday, reading the signs and swapping stories.
“I’m in this picture,” said Sharon Howes McPhee, a member of Patten Academy’s Class of 1957, who was spotted checking out the storyboard with a history and pictures of Patten Academy.
The school, that once stood near the park area, closed in 1967, but the memories aren’t far thanks in part to those new storyboards.
“They did do a nice job with this [site],” confirmed McPhee.
Patten is one of the primary entry points for the new Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument. From Interstate 95 Exit 276, proceed west to Patten on Route 159 for about 8 miles. At the junction of Routes 159 and 11, follow the directions for access to either the Swift Brook Road and the Katahdin Loop Road or the Grand Lake Road to the North/Matagamon entrance.
For more information on the byway, visit the Katahdin Scenic Byway Facebook page. For more on the Katahdin Tourism Partnership, visit katahdinpartnership.org.
