A preferred multi-use path that runs roughly 90 miles from Ellsworth to Pembroke could possibly be prolonged all the best way to the Canadian border, if officers in Calais get their method.
The Calais Metropolis Council has requested the Maine Division of Transportation to think about using 12 miles of state-owned, unused rail line to attach downtown Calais with the Down East Dawn Path.
The council voted final week to petition the division to create an advisory group to have a look at the potential of changing the railroad to a multi-use path and abandon a freight easement for the road.
The thought has been tossed round through the years however by no means got here to fruition when the path was constructed alongside the outdated Calais Department rail hall in phases between 2008 to 2016.
However metropolis and state officers in Calais are hoping the state will rethink the venture and see extending the jap terminus previous Ayers Junction in Pembroke as a possible financial enhance to the world.
“You’ll be able to’t understate the impression that this might have,” mentioned Mike Ellis, the Calais metropolis supervisor.
The path is a favourite amongst bicyclists, walkers, horseback riders, cross-country skiers, snowmobilers and ATV drivers in Hancock and Washington counties. Ellis mentioned he’s seen it deliver the ATV crowd to Machias and hoped it might do the identical for Calais.
There presently isn’t any rail service alongside that stretch of the rail line, although Maine Central Railroad does maintain an easement for freight service.
State Sen. Marianne Moore, R-Washington, has been working to increase the path to Calais for years and mentioned it might additionally profit folks on the opposite finish of the path who wish to go someplace with facilities that the present terminus doesn’t provide. Individuals can use the path to get from Ellsworth all the best way to Ayers Junction, however then it abruptly ends on Route 214.
“They arrive alongside to Ayers Junction, and there’s completely nothing,” Moore mentioned. “Only a car parking zone.”
Moore put forth a decision in 2019 that might have directed the Bureau of Parks and Lands to develop a path linking the Calais to Ayers Junction, nevertheless it died on the finish of the legislative session in 2020.
Whereas the thought enjoys a variety of native help, there are some who don’t wish to see the railroad torn up, denying any future potential for service to the world. However Ellis mentioned the tracks are in such a state that they’d possible have to be changed anyway, and changing it to a path would set the muse for any future railroad.
“The present rail traces must be pulled up anyway,” he mentioned. “We’re simply making ready it and utilizing the house till it does come.”
Securing easements to get the route from the top of the railroad line, which is a few mile from Fundamental Avenue, all the best way into downtown Calais and getting agreements with the Moosehorn Nationwide Wildlife Refuge — which the railroad runs by means of — could possibly be different potential hurdles.
The thought continues to be within the preliminary levels, and Ellis mentioned there isn’t a concrete plan at this level, nor a value estimate.
