With the new lights downtown about to finish going live, some predictions have been re-emerging, that the new setup, years in the making, will not help and may worsen Wiscasset’s summer backups on Route 1. 

First, let’s hope not. Second, pedestrians crossing Main Street play an arguably big part in the backups, and the changes aim in part to bring an order to street-crossing. Yes, it’s not the first attempt, but this new system of traffic and parking patterns deserves a fair chance. It’s here, the funds have been spent, the streetscape has changed.

Now let’s see what happens.

Remember the rotary being similarly controversial in Boothbay? And yet we don’t hear much about it now. It’s just part of the order of things. Maybe the new setup in Wiscasset will follow suit. And maybe tourists and the rest of us will fill the downtown even more than ever. For now, my main feelings on it are curiosity and hope.

Week’s positive parting thought: Looking ahead to Daylight Savings Time starting Sunday, the later sunset and sunrise are a wash, but the time change makes it at least feel like summer and its long days are drawing near – the opposite sense we get from time falling back in the fall.