CARIBOU, Maine — The Caribou City Council gave its public works department the go-ahead to begin repairs to River Road on the east bank of the Aroostook River. The street, which winds along the edge of the water, has been eroding for the past several years as the river moves beneath it.
The repairs would target a particularly dangerous, roughly 900-foot section of road, where the pavement is crumbling and the guard rail has slid almost entirely down the receding embankment.
To avoid further road slippage, Public Works Director David Ouellette recommended a temporary realignment of the road significantly away from the bank. The new road would reroute through adjacent properties, which the city owns.
Ouellette also said the Public Works Department would likely bury the new guardrails deeper in an effort to reinforce the river bank as much as possible. He estimated the total costs of the project to be roughly $35,000.
“I once sat here in a meeting and I remember a council saying we don’t need something that looks beautiful, we need something that works,” Ouellette said. “I can tell you, that’s what we can do.”
Caribou City Council approved the measures in a unanimous vote at its July 12 meeting.
The alignment follows plans set out by an engineering firm to improve River Road, but the public works’ fix would likely only be for the short-term as a more permanent and extensive response to embankment erosion is considered further.
The idea of moving the road arose out of a July 8 meeting between the Highway Protection Committee and public works. Councilor Joan Theriault, who sits on the HPC, said that the committee hopes this solution will be a temporary one to abate some of the danger the road currently poses to travelers.
Ouellette was unsure exactly when the work would begin, but said he was hoping to start soon and be done by winter.
During the meeting the council also heard a presentation from the Nylander Museum Board of Trustees as well as one from Code Enforcement Officer Ken Murchison, who updated the council on his department’s progress on addressing several dangerous buildings in town.
In executive session, the council discussed a poverty abatement as well as the search for a new city manager. No decision was made on either subject.
