A slender wooden footbridge is the only direct connection between Rangeley and Eustis. Locals, however, are finding a way through by “pioneering.”
FRANKLIN COUNTY, Maine — A small wooden footbridge forms the only direct link between the towns of Rangeley and Stratton, after a section of Route 16 washed out in Monday’s storm.
“We really are stuck, we’re in our own little island over here,” Jennifer Kent said. She had to use two different cars—each on opposing ends of the footbridge—to buy her groceries.
“I drive to the other side of the bridge, walk over and hop into my son’s car and go to town to get our groceries,” she explained.
Kent is not alone in this arrangement of necessity. Impromptu parking lots have sprung up on either side of the natural roadblock, many of them full of cars left by their drivers to cross the bridge on foot for everything from …