ELLSWORTH, Maine — The first of seven planned deliveries of large trees from a local landscaping company to a waterfront estate on Mount Desert Island has been postponed until next week, according to police.
The first tree delivery via flatbed truck from Atlantic Landscape Construction to Northeast Harbor had been scheduled for Tuesday morning, but snowy conditions bumped those plans until Wednesday morning.
According to the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department, now the first delivery is not expected to take place until next week. Officials with the department, which is providing a mandatory police escort for the oversized loads, have indicated that the deliveries could cause some traffic delays.
Lt. Tim Cote, who is coordinating the escort, said Wednesday that the new departure time and date have not yet been scheduled. He said he is not sure why the deliveries have been delayed again, but that it may be because of an equipment-related issue.
Information about when the deliveries will be rescheduled will be posted ahead of time on the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department Facebook page, Cote said.
Officials with R.F. Jordan & Sons, which is transporting the trees, have declined to comment on the deliveries. Multiple messages left this week for officials at Atlantic Landscape Construction have not been returned.
Public interest in the delivery of the trees has been fueled by an incident in June 2003 when transportation of a large apple tree from the same Ellsworth landscaping company to Northeast Harbor took 10 hours to travel 27 miles and created a monstrous traffic jam. Billionaire Charles Butt, who owns the Manchester Road home where that tree was delivered, apologized for the snafu a few days later in advertisements he placed in several area newspapers.
Cote has said the latest planned deliveries, which are expected to take place every few days over the next couple of weeks, should go much more smoothly than the one 12 years ago. Progress was extremely slow in that delivery because overhead utility lines had to be raised to allow the truck and its cargo to pass underneath. No utilities are expected to be affected by the deliveries this time around, he said.
The trees will be delivered to an unspecified location on Sargeant Drive in Northeast Harbor, according to the Maine Department of Transportation. Who the specific recipient is has not been disclosed, but the delivery is believed to be connected with the construction of a $9.4 million mansion at a waterfront property owned by billionaire Steven M. Rales.
