CLARKSBURG, Mass. — The state is shutting down the Red Mills Bridge on River Road for two months. 

 

Select Board Chair Daniel Haskins said he, Town Administrator Ronald Boucher and Road Foreman Kyle Hurlbut had a Zoom meeting a few weeks ago with the state Department of Transportation to express their concerns.

 

"They're going to put a temporary bridge over the top of the existing bridge," he said at Monday's Select Board meeting. "They're going to shut down the road for about two months, which is our main artery going through town, which 

we weren't too excited to hear that."

 

The temporary bridge is expected to serve until MassDOT installs a new one in five years. 

 

Surveyors had been at the Route 8 bridge, at the intersection with East Road Extension, and at the bridge over Hudson Brook on Middle Road, which the state also plans to replace. 

 

"It's still up in the air right now if we can even keep East Road still open, going up that way, because ... the temporary bridge that they're putting in the way has to kind of come out past the [existing] bridge," Haskins said. "It may block off East Road, so we're hoping to maybe at least keep it one lane for getting up there, for one-lane traffic."

 

Blocking off the bridge causes several issues: it blocks off East Road and Daniels for emergency services and buses, closes the main highway into Vermont, and forces large trucks to detour over narrow residential roads.