BERLIN – Harrison Avenue will remain closed as the stalemate between the Adkins Company and the Town of Berlin continues.
Berlin Mayor Gee Williams this week reaffirmed his refusal to pay the price the Adkins Company is seeking for the small section of road it owns in front of its building on Harrison Avenue. The company closed that section of road to the public in June.
“It’s going to create some inconvenience for a while but I swear to God we’re not going to be extorted for $400,000, if Hell has to freeze over,” Williams said.
That statement came during Monday’s meeting of the town council after resident Jack Orris asked for information regarding the closed road. The portion of the road in front of the Adkins Company has been off limits to vehicles since June. It was then that the Adkins Company’s Richard Holland said that if it was to be used as a public street the town would have to buy it. While the town did offer $60,000 for the piece of road, which measures 535 feet long by 50 feet wide, the Adkins Company set the price at $400,000. Holland says the price is set at $400,000 because the company’s four-acre parcel will be worth significantly less if it’s split apart. He maintains that unless the town buys the road it will remain closed.
“If they want it as a road, they have to come to the table,” he said this week.
Williams believes that the street closure will cost the lumber company business in time. He says residents who are upset about the street being closed — which has forced traffic onto West and Baker streets — have the Adkins Company to blame.
“If people don’t like that, they need to talk to the Adkins Company because they’re the ones that put up the blockade, not the Town of Berlin,” he said.
Residents of Baker Street approached the council last month asking for improvements to the old road now that it’s seeing much of the traffic that previously used Harrison Avenue. While the town can’t afford to completely restore the street, Williams said it would be undergoing maintenance work this fall. That work had been scheduled since the spring when town officials prioritized street projects in Berlin. Williams said the street, which is made of oyster shells, would be stabilized and the asphalt on each side of it would be overlaid. Slightly more than $28,000 has been budgeted for the work.
“This is primarily maintenance but it will stabilize that road until we can meet their requests,” Williams said.
He said in the future the town would look for grants that might help restore the historic street. The commitment by Gov. Larry Hogan to restore highway user revenues to municipalities throughout the state should also help, Williams said.
“That’ll help us accelerate our improvements,” he said.
In the meantime, as long as Harrison Avenue is closed, Baker Street and the portion of West Street between Broad Street and Main Street will continue to see increased traffic. Police Chief Arnold Downing says little can be done to deter drivers unfamiliar with the area from turning down Harrison — and thus being detoured down Baker Street — particularly when their GPS advises them to, but that his department has asked Adkins Company trucks not to use Baker Street. Downing said The Bay Club, the golf course just outside town, had also been asked to revise its practice of giving patrons directions to the course via Harrison Avenue.
“That was one of the biggest issues,” he said.
Downing’s department worked with Maryland State Highway Administration officials to put up signs and flags advising motorists that Harrison Avenue is closed to through traffic.
“It’s something we’re working through,” he said, adding that he hoped to see the situation resolved eventually. “We’re just going to do our best.”
