Editor:

    As I watched the re-run of the S.P. City Council
meeting of Monday, December 4, several things struck me about the
discussion concerning the new maneuvers to “dead-end” Edgewood Road at
the Cape Elizabeth line and thereby cut off the legal right to use the
road by the Cape Elizabeth residents who live on Edgewood. These points
are in addition to my immediate reaction, which was: “Is this little
maneuver going to cost the S.P. taxpayers another $750,000, like the
last street discontinuance in this neigborhood did?”

    The Fire Chief of Cape Elizabeth (who formerly was
the Fire Chief of South Portland) told the City Council that South
Portland residents could be confronted with public safety issues if the
street was dead-ended and blocked, because of where fire hydrants are
located as well as other reasons. The Fire Chief of South Portland was
conspicuously absent from the meeting. One has to ask whether the S.P.
Chief was asked to come to the Council meeting and express his
thoughts? Is it possible that he was told to stay away from the
meeting? Did the City Manager ask the S.P. Fire Chief and the S.P.
Police Chief to make written reports concerning any public safety
issues that might result from dead-ending Edgewood Street? Were the
public safety officials asked to make specific suggestions about what
might be done short of blocking the street?

    The only thing I heard said at the meeting was that
the public safety officials of S.P. had “no problems” with now closing
the street. If that is true, it would seem to me that the Fire Chief
and the Police Chief ought to be asked to come to the meeting and
publicly assure South Portland residents that they have no public
safety concerns.

It also surprises me that a dead-end street can be created without
adequate provision being made for a turn-around for public service
vehicles. Just recently the discussion about Bog Road focused on
building a turn-around area at the end of the road adequate to allow
fire trucks, trash trucks and snow plows, as well as the public, to
turn around without having to backup. Why no similar mention in the
discussion of dead-ending Edgewood Road?

    Years ago, in a graduate school course on city
planning, I recall a public safety lecture in which it was pointed out
that the most dangerous operation of a fire truck, a snow plow or a
trash truck is when the vehicle is forced to back-up. More property
damage and more injuries result from public service vehicles being
forced to back up than from any other operation. I did not hear that
discussed at the S.P. City Council meeting. Neither did I see the S. P.
Public Works Director present at the meeting to address such issues.

    What I did hear at the meeting was Councilor Baxter
express anger over his understanding that South Portland residents were
not allowed to speak at, or participate in, the hearing of the Cape
Elizabeth Planning Board when it considered the Blueberry Ridge
project. Perhaps, by now, Councilor Baxter has learned that his anger
was misplaced, that someone apparently had misled him on to the facts,
and that any S.P. resident who wished to participate in that meeting
was given the right to do so, and even the Maine Supreme Court wrote
about that.

    It seems to me that before making a final decision
on whether to cut off Edgewood Road, the City Council needs to get all
the City department heads who may have an interest here - at least the
Fire Chief, the Police Chief, the Public Works Director - into a public
City Council meeting, where the Council and, hopefully, the public, can
ask them direct questions, and let’s all get the same information of
the table. Let’s get rid or the hearsay and criptic comments and let
everyone be on the same page.

    Maybe we can even invite folks from Cape Elizabeth to comment, as good neighbors should do!

Dan Mooers

South Portland