EDDINGTON POST OFFICE - PARKING LOT TO BE PAVED

Anyone who picks up her/his mail at the Eddington Post Office is well aware of the pothole dilemma that has plagued the place for the past two years. The land owner has chosen to fill in the holes to China with cold tar for who knows how long, only to see the holes re-appear each spring. (For those who don't know, the Postal Service leases the land from someone and doesn't own the land. Lee, the Postmaster who retired this past spring had urged the Postal Service to buy the land at one point but that idea went nowhere.)

Our new Postmaster (for who knows how long) really got on the issue this summer. And yesterday, the 15th, some people showed up to evaluate the job, take measurements, etc. Sometime next week bids are due and the entire parking lot is expected to have a Bona Fide re-paving. Hooray! Something nice to go with the newly paved Route 9/Main Road that goes right by the Post Office.

The Plan, according to this writer's source, is to have half of the lot done first (to allow drivers to gain access to their mail, etc.) and then the second half. As long as the job is completed before the first frost, it will be a Good Thing.

Now, if the DOT contractors working on Route 9 can get these asphalt curbs in place...because you have to wonder how well they're going to hold up with the snow plows... Not just the DOT snow plow doing Route 9, but the individual homeowners plowing their driveways. Snow has to go somewhere when it gets to the end of the driveway at Route 9. Plow to the right or left and there's a good chance the plow blade is going to hit up against those curbs. Something will have to give, either the plow blade or the asphalt, or the snow is going to get plowed straight out into the road, the "law" be danged. Where else can the snow go for heaven's sake?

I just hope someone on one of the two DOT crews I talked to takes the water runoff problems I showed them into consideration. I'm tired of having to repair my driveway every time we have a big rain. Those of us who have gravel driveway do have problems with rain. But we don't have the ice problems people with asphalt driveways have in the winter.

On the other hand, I have neighbors who are tired of having full grown trees uprooted on their property from the water erosion because of the water runoff coming down from Route 9. It's enough, living on shoreland property, to be paying a higher rate of property taxes. But when the state is destroying the value of the property that is paying the bills.... What's that about biting the hand that feeds you? The hand has been known to form a fist, you know.

I do love the new road. Don't get me wrong. But what's is so strange about correcting a problem that wasn't there before the road got paved the LAST time. Or correcting problems that have been identified to be existing now? Repeating current and existing problems is no way to get ahead or achieve the best use of tax money being spent. Just a thought. Because - when will Route 9 get this kind of attention again? So why now do it right now? I know - that's radical.