NH DOT proposes $17 million Route 101 overhaul, including Branch River bridge replacement

New Hampshire Department of Transportation staff on Feb. 12 presented a federally funded plan to rehabilitate about 1.10 miles of Route 101 east of Opti Labs, replace the deteriorated Branch River bridge and add 5‑foot shoulders and intersection improvements, officials said.

Dave Smith, a New Hampshire DOT project lead, told the Swansea Select Board the project runs from near Marlborough/Marble Street east past Branch Road and includes work at the Swansea Factory Road and Branch Road intersections. “We want to come for you tonight just to give a presentation for our project load 1 0 1,” Smith said.

The nut of the project is pavement rehabilitation and safety upgrades: designers will remove a roughly 20‑foot‑wide concrete slab under the pavement, provide formal 5‑foot shoulders on both sides while maintaining 12‑foot travel lanes, correct drainage and stormwater treatment, and replace the Branch River bridge, which staff identified as being on the state’s “red list.” The preliminary construction estimate presented to the board was about $17,000,000.

Ellen Mosher, project manager for CHA (the DOT’s design consultant), said nondestructive testing of the existing Branch River structure found alkali‑silica reaction in concrete cores — a form of deterioration sometimes described as “concrete cancer” — and that the team is…