LEWISTON — It started with black and white hot dog cartoons, but local artists say they don’t want to stop there.

“Come the fall, we want to open up a contest for local artists,” said Sheri Withers of the Union of Maine Visual Artist’s Lewiston-Auburn branch. “We have a bunch of area businesses that want to sponsor their own crosswalks.”

Withers, owner of Downtown Handmade and Vintage, joined Simones’ Hot Dog Stand owners Jimmy and Linda Simones and other area businesses to dedicate Lewiston’s first creative crosswalk, a series of white hot dogs painted on the black pavement crossing Chestnut Street from Kennedy Park.

It’s a great advertisement for the hot dog stand, a longtime downtown Lewiston icon.

“We didn’t even know it was happening, but it really is cool,” Linda Simones said. “It’s a novelty. If you were from another place, it might spark your interest and convince you to come down here.”

City councilors approved the idea in May. A stencil for the hot dogs was drawn on plywood by Melanie Therrien of Wicked Illustrations and carved out by Stanley Hollenbeck, co-owner of Downtown Handmade and Vintage, with Withers.

City Public Works crews used the stencils to paint the crosswalk June 22.

Simones said he often sees people at the corner of the lot contemplating the crosswalk.

“It denotes an area, you know, Kennedy Park at the hot dog crossing,” Jimmy Simones said.

And Withers said she and other artists can’t wait to do more. They’d originally planned to paint scissors and shears across Adams Avenue in honor of the city’s fabric-manufacturing history, but it’s a state-controlled street.

“The state is taking a pretty serious stance, that they don’t want creative crosswalks on their roads,” Withers said. “We can’t cross Canal or Lisbon street, but we can go parallel, across the streets that cross them.”

So that has Withers and other artists looking for other city intersections. Therrien would like to put paintbrushes in the crosswalk by her 140 Canal St. address.

“Paul’s Clothing would like to have boot treads by their store, a bookstore would like to have books across their street,” Withers said.

She’s heard interest from a group in New Auburn, she said.

Alan Manoian, the former economic development specialist for Auburn, said the idea is catching on across New England because of the Lewiston group. Now the director of Economic and Community Development in Ayer, Mass., Manoian said he expects to see more creative crosswalks.

“Lewiston has shown it’s safe for other cities to take the leap,” Manoian said. “Others are watching and trying to emulate what Lewiston is doing, so I think it’s really great.”

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