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March 2, 2011

State pulls plug on Gateway 1

By The Mainebiz News Staff

Gov. Paul LePage and the Maine Department of Transportation have suspended a years-long transportation initiative aiming to guide development along Route 1 in the midcoast.

DOT Commissioner David Bernhardt yesterday sent a letter to Gateway 1 Implementation Steering Committee Chairman Don White, in which he said that "while Gateway 1 has been a very worthy effort, it does not correspond with the immediate priorities of this administration," according to the Herald Gazette. Bernhardt cited "growing fiscal constraints" and the need to put funding toward immediate infrastructure needs. The DOT launched the Gateway 1 initiative six years ago along with planning groups representing 20 towns along Route 1 between Brunswick and Stockton Springs to develop a regional land use and transportation plan that would preserve the region's rural character and also allow for coordinated growth. The initiative has been heralded as an innovative, community-led project, but ran into opposition in some communities, where residents worried it would impinge on their property-use rights.

White told the paper the decision to suspend the project could impact some towns that were still developing their own action plans and had planned on receiving Gateway 1 startup funds for that process. White said he hoped towns would "see the worth of continuing the principles" of the project.

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