RUMFORD — Drivers traveling through Rumford Point in the near future will notice changes in speed limits, Town Manager Carlo Puiia told selectmen and the audience Thursday night.

The speed reductions are required for an impending Maine Department of Transportation project to build a new Route 232 bridge over the Androscoggin River, which will relocate the bridge and road about 600 feet upriver from the current Martin Memorial Bridge location.

“At Rumford Point, right there in the village, what they said are the miles per hour will be posted from 50 down to 40, then down to 30 mph,” Puiia said of MDOT officials.

He said the speed limit will be reduced to 30 mph just before the curve approaching the intersection with Route 5.

“The current 35 mph zone will be reduced to 30 mph, and the 50 mph zone, where drivers can pick up speed after getting out of area, will be located farther out,” he said.

Additionally, MDOT will place more “chevron” (yellow with black directional arrows) signs at curves in the road.

“They’re trying to get all their ducks in a row, because they know where they will be moving that bridge to, but I do anticipate seeing some of this work done in the very near future,” Puiia said.

In other business, Puiia said the MDOT has given Rumford permission to place safety flags on each side of the merge signs on Route 2 at Falls Hill in order to alert drivers that there will only be one lane by the time they reach the top of the hill.

“What we’ll do is place orange safety flags on each sign, much like when you’re going down the turnpike and you see the speed limit drops,” he said. “It just puts your attention on that sign.”

He said that once the town crew gets the flag sockets mounted to the signs, the flags will be set in place soon after.

At a previous meeting, selectmen asked Puiia to meet with MDOT officials to learn how the town could make Route 2 safer for traffic and pedestrians on Falls Hill.

In June, the department rejected a board suggestion to reduce the two uphill lanes to one lane in order to alleviate the problem of drivers speeding up in the passing lane and trying to dart back in at the merge.

Another proposal suggested reducing the length of the two lanes atop the hill to start the merging sooner. But Puiia said that MDOT rejected that idea, too.

“What they said was that would cause a “funnel effect” where the flags would be out, because that’s where people start to get enough speed to get by the trucks or whoever they’re trying to pass,” he said. “They feel it would cause a more dangerous situation.”

Regarding the board’s concerns about speeding drivers near the merge, state transportation officials told Puiia that it is an enforcement issue that local police need to address.

Selectman Brad Adley, who runs Adley’s Auto Sales & Service atop the hill near the merge, said he’s seen Maine State Police troopers doing speed enforcement work there.

Puiia said he and the MDOT officials did talk about putting up a flashing yellow caution light to alert merging drivers to the pedestrian crossing  atop the hill. The caution light installation will be included in the budget this year.

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