Lyme — The Superior Court judge presiding over an eminent domain case holding up Lyme’s attempts to reroute River Road has stepped down from the case, further delaying efforts to reopen the eroded road, which has partially cut off some residents from town.

Lyme officials are attempting to take 5.6 acres of private property via eminent domain in order to reconnect River Road. A 600-foot stretch of the residential road has been blocked off since 2015 because of structural concerns stemming from Connecticut River erosion.

Court officials declined to provide a reason for Judge Lawrence MacLeod’s sudden recusal, issued just hours before a scheduled hearing in Grafton Superior Court on Monday, and River Road residents expressed dismay at the added delay after years of waiting.

“Now, all of a sudden, the day of the hearing, he recuses himself,” Selectwoman Sue MacKenzie, also a River Road resident, said on Monday. “This is very distressing to all of us on River Road, I can tell you that.”

“We’re very upset,” Marianne Alverson, another River Road resident, said by phone the same day. “We’ve waited for two years and now, finally, we get our day in court and now, suddenly, the judge has recused himself.”

Even the landowner fighting the eminent domain case, Arend Tensen, an attorney and farmer, said he had wanted the case to go forward.

“We wanted to keep it moving,” he said. “We’re disappointed as well.”

Instead, Tensen and the town officials said, the case is likely to be delayed at least another month as the court finds another judge and reschedules a hearing.

Court spokeswoman Carole Alfano on Monday declined to make MacLeod available for an interview or to explain his removal from the case.

“It’s court policy not to comment on the reason behind a recusal,” she said in a telephone message.

Meanwhile, town officials and residents still are feeling the effects of the roadblock, which divides River Road into two segments. One shorter piece runs north from the obstacle to East Thetford Road, and another longer segment runs south to Route 10.

“It’s been a long two years of not being able to drive to our own town,” said Alverson, who lives on the southern segment and must drive nearly into Hanover to run errands.

Often, she said, residents on her portion of the road simply go to Hanover rather than take the roundabout route to Lyme. “The post office, the restaurants, all the things we had enjoyed in connection to driving in that direction, we all now do in the other direction,” she said.

Alverson noted that elderly residents also had concerns about the increased wait time for emergency services. MacKenzie, for her part, noted that similar problems existed for nearly all town services along that part of the road: snow plowing, salting, and school bus service, to name a few.

“It’s costing the town money,” MacKenzie said — $35,000 extra in the school budget alone.

Lyme officials, along with leaders in many nearby towns, blame a good part of the erosion that has weakened this and other roads on water level fluctuations on the Connecticut River allegedly caused by the Wilder Dam.

Lyme has repeatedly sought compensation from the dam’s past and current owners — TransCanada Hydro Northeast and Great River Hydro, respectively — without much success.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission currently is handling the facility’s relicensing, and Lyme and other area municipalities have asked the energy authority to include requirements that the dam owners take responsibility for erosion and pay for repairs.

MacKenzie also noted that more sections of River Road could give way soon, effectively trapping residents who live between the faulty parts and the main road network.

Town residents in March voted, 161-148, to appropriate $755,000 for a bypass project that would take about 5.6 acres of Tensen’s River Road farmland in order to reconnect the road.

Tensen objected, raising concerns about the potential effect on wildlife and agricultural soils, including the land he farms for corn. His objection with the New Hampshire Bureau of Tax and Land Appeals brought the case to Superior Court.

“I do not want my property split in half,” Tensen said of the roughly 40-acre parcel, adding of the bypass plan, “It’s adverse to my property, it’s adverse to my farm, it’s adverse to wildlife.”

Tensen, who runs a nearby farm on East Thetford Road and lives elsewhere in Lyme, expressed sympathy for the residents of River Road and said he shared their desire to reconnect the road, perhaps via a shorter bypass or in-place repairs.

“I absolutely want to see the road opened as well,” he said. “Just not in the manner that’s proposed.”

Rob Wolfe can be reached at rwolfe@vnews.com.