Bennington/Manchester economic report: County worries its gains will be lost to property tax reform

Vermont Business Magazine, Oct 01, 1997

This downhill flow of growth has produced some very scenic aspects, such as the Deer Park and three red covered bridges near each other over the Walloomsac River -- one of which is closed and the subject of local debate over restoration strategies. The bridge repair costs have to compete with trying to solve one of the less attractive aspects of Bennington's pattern of growth: The irrationality of trying to funnel the traffic from one US highway and one major east-west shipping route through one intersection at the center of downtown Bennington. Initially this was feasible, but with modern tandem tractor-trailers and rising traffic volumes, it has become like trying to pound two square pegs at once through one round hole.

A complete bypass of downtown Bennington is not practical, because Old Bennington and Mt Anthony occupy the southwest quadrant. The northwest quadrant, scheduled to be completed in 1999 or 2000, would help traffic between New York's Capitol District and northerly Vermont, observed James Sullivan, a planner with the Bennington Regional Planning Commission. But it wouldn't do much to remove the "astounding" number of trucks that are roaring; puffing and pounding through downtown.

But to business leaders like M John Storey of Storey Communications in Pownal, it seems that the entire state of Vermont is losing by not completing the bypass.

Route 7 is in good shape between Bennington and Rutland, Storey noted, and Bennington is the gateway that will allow people in Massachusetts to access that route in far greater numbers. "It's a very natural channel," he said, providing the bypass is completed. Sullivan expressed similar views.

Meanwhile, Bennington County is seeking to take pan in the resurgence of rail transportation that has included Amtrak service to both sides of the state, a pass-through arrangement that has boosted east-west traffic between Bellows Palls and Rutland along the Green Mountain Railroad, thriving tourist trains, and an upcoming commuter rail project in Chittenden County.

The problem for Bennington County has been the Boston & Maine Railroad's historic neglect of the section of track linking southwestern Vermont with New York, continued by new owners Guilford Transportation Industries, leaving Vermont Railway with a cul-de-sac line terminating in North Bennington. That in turn has decreased revenues and the incentive to upgrade the tracks between Bennington and Rutland, which by one estimate would take about $28 million to bring up to passenger traffic standards.

But regional hopes got a big boost in late August, when Senator James Jeffords came to North Bennington and announced that he sees better rail service as an alternative to building bigger and bigger highways. Flanked by such local notables as state Senator Richard Pembroke of Bennington, a key figure in the Legislature's transportation deliberations, Helen Whyte, Bennington's community developer director, and Leslie Keefe, executive director of the Manchester and he Mountains Chamber of Commerce, Jeffords said he was "deeply confident" that Amtrak's Ethan Allen Express could be switched from its present New York City-Albany-Whitehall-Rutland route to the geographically more direct route via North Bennington.