LIVERMORE FALLS — A broken sewer pipe underneath Route 17 in the downtown business area was repaired Tuesday and the road was  expected to reopen in the evening, Sewer Department Superintendent Greg Given said.

Town Manager Stephen Gould advised the Maine Department of Transportation last week of a depression in the road and getting worse near Stretch-It body shop and Livermore Terrace apartment complex.

On Monday, state highway workers patched the hole, but the material sank, prompting an investigation that showed a storm drain under the pipe washed away the fill, causing the pipe to collapse, Given said.

On Monday night, sewage was pumped from one manhole to another to keep it from going into the Androscoggin River.

Traffic was detoured around the area.

“The Sewer Department is the lead on this fix, but we are helping,” DOT spokesman Paul Merrill said Tuesday. “We already had plans to reconstruct a little more than a mile of Route 17, but that project is likely a few years out.”