Construction of a contentious 60-unit housing development in Bangor will be allowed to resume after the city’s planning board was forced to reconsider the project it incorrectly approved in 2022.
The housing development, which the Bangor planning board unanimously rubber stamped on Tuesday, will sit on about 12 acres between East Broadway, Essex Street, Lancaster Avenue and Interstate 95. It will hold 30 two-story duplexes, each with three bedrooms and two bathrooms.
Approving a development that will add 60 new units to the city’s housing stock aligns with the city council’s broader goal of expanding and improving housing in 2024. Bangor has struggled for years with not having enough housing, continuously rising rent and purchase costs, and an aging housing stock, which bleed into the city’s other major challenges.
Emily Ellis, a real estate broker with Team Properties in Bangor, applied for site plan approval for the housing development, known as the Maine Woods project, in June 2022. The Bangor Planning Board approved it in September 2022.
Neighbors opposed to the project, however, asked for a judicial review of the decision in October 2022.
A year later, in October 2023, the Penobscot County Superior Court ruled the Bangor planning board incorrectly approved the development, which halted construction. The ruling forced Ellis to resubmit the same development proposal and restart the process with the planning board in November.
The weeks-long revision process included impassioned public comment from more than a dozen community members and neighbors both for and against the project.
Opponents feared the development would increase traffic, erase habitats for wildlife and exacerbate issues the surrounding community has experienced for years, such as lackluster water pressure and poor stormwater drainage.
“There are only 16 homes that surround that field, so 60 new homes is a 300-percent increase on our infrastructure in that one area,” said Melissa Bolduc, who lives on Lancaster Avenue. “Our stormwater and sewer systems are 100 years old, so when you put a 300 percent increase on them without any plan of how to maintain what we have, that’s a concern.”
Advocates for the project, however, pointed to the lack of available and adequate housing in the city and the difficulty they’ve had in finding a place to settle, raise their family and contribute to the community.
“If you want young people to come to Bangor and stay in Bangor, there have to be safe, affordable options for housing,” said Micaela Ellis, a local teacher who spoke during a November planning board meeting. “Don’t wait for people to stumble upon our beautiful city. Invite them in and offer them a home.”
