The grand opening this week of the new Shaw's Market on River Street in Lower Mills culminates many years of a long, hard and often-times torturous process to bring the new facility to the neighborhood.

Lower Mills has been the scene of a Byzantine battle between two rival grocery chains, Stop & Shop and Shaw's Markets, the company which acquired the Star Market chain. Some six years ago, the two companies went about acquiring adjacent parcels of land along River Street and squared off in a contest to win neighborhood support. At first, Stop & Shop proposed to build a huge superstore, but residents in that village objected to the size. Then Star/Shaw's moved in to acquire the old Berger Instrument building at the corner of Washington Street, and revealed plans to convert the property to a more modest, yet still contemporary complex.

It was that proposal that won local support, and it was the Shaw's plan that won city approval to move ahead.

The new building is owned and developed by a local company, Trinity Financial, headed and staffed by several Dorchester residents. Trinity's head, Jim Keefe, deserves accolades for his patience in negotiating a solid development plan with neighbors and the city, and for his tenacity in seeing the plan through to completion, despite many obstacles.

The final product opens on Friday morning, replacing the obsolete Star Market, which has been a fixture nearby for almost 40 years.

The Reporter was invited to an advance tour of the new market last week and it is good to report that the new market appears to offer everything in the way of contemporary amenities for local shoppers. It's new, it's bigger, and it's well-designed, and it's likely to become a compelling neighborhood attraction in Lower Mills. -Ed Forry

Taming Traffic in Lower Mills

Even while neighbors look ahead to the new market, there remains much concern that the bad traffic problem in Lower Mills is about to worsen.

The chief problem in that village is the long delay in the rebuilding of the historic Adams Street bridge, the span that links Dorchester Avenue over the Neponset River into the town of Milton. Work on the bridge seems to move along at a snail's pace and the detour causes motor vehicles to be diverted along River Street, right past the new Shaw's Market.

Traffic conditions are at their worst in late afternoon, during the commuter hours, the same time for peak traffic for supermarket patrons as well. There is the concern that an expected heavier flow of shoppers to the area could result in gridlock for the neighborhood.

The Trinity developers have invested heavily in state-of-the-art traffic signals and the intersection of River and Washington streets have been upgraded to mitigate some of the problems. But more needs to be done.

One suggestion has been made to reverse the traffic flow over the Adams Street bridge, allowing vehicles to travel south into Milton, rather than northbound from Milton into Dorchester. Such a change would result in diverting much unnecessary traffic away from River Street, and it makes a lot of sense. A variation of that proposal is to alternate traffic flow on the bridge- allowing northbound traffic to use the span in the morning, and reversing the flow after noontime each day. The ideas deserve to be considered.

Additionally, the state contractor working on the bridge should be encouraged to speed-up its timetable, a long-delayed project which now remains a full year away from completion.

City, state and town planners should get together soon and resolve these conditions. - E.F.