Meredith to see new traffic pattern as part of Route 3-25 road project

By THOMAS P. CALDWELL, LACONIA DAILY SUN

MEREDITH — Improvements taking place to ease traffic problems at the intersection of routes 3 and 25 in downtown Meredith will result in some lane shifts next week, according to Town Manager Phil Warren.

R.M. Piper Inc. of Plymouth is the general contractor for the $2.58 million project which is overseen by the New Hampshire Department of Transportation. The project includes eliminating one of the northbound lanes on Route 3 to allow for wider left-turn lanes coming from Route 25 East. The signal for the intersection will be replaced with one that includes cameras and detection devices to optimize traffic flow.

The plan also will eliminate the crosswalks at Dover and Lake streets, replacing them with one 12-foot-wide crosswalk in the middle, leading to the Town Docks, with ramps compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act and signals that are timed with the lights at the intersection, according to Ed Sperry, the Department of Transportation’s on-site contract administrator.

There will be new curbing and raised islands, along with upgraded drainage and realigned culverts. Utility poles on the curbline of Route 25 will be removed, and the Pleasant Street intersection will be realigned ahead of repaving the entire stretch of highway.

Finally, the project will provide new guardrails and repaving for the Town Docks parking lot.

The early portion of the project involves bridge work at the base of the Mill Falls Marketplace which requires the closing of half of the roadway, Sperry said. In order to keep traffic moving, it will be restricted to one lane each way.

“Once we have one lane heading south, we can’t feed two from Route 25,” Sperry said, “so one of the left lanes will be taken out.”

Bill Boynton of the Department of Transportation’s public information office said he has already heard from a trucker who is concerned about the ability to make the turn with a single left-turn lane. Large trucks typically use the right lane in order to meet the turning radius required to make the left turn.

“It’s just a temporary condition to allow for bridge repairs,” he said. “The normal traffic pattern will resume by Motorcycle Week, on June 9, and the project will resume on Sept. 4.”

Work crews began mobilizing last week and, this week, they were working on temporary traffic signals and signs to warn of the new traffic pattern, as well as doing some exploratory digging, Sperry said. The traffic shift will take place on Monday.