Wrapping up the Week & Looking Ahead The day may have arrived wet and a little dreary, but downtown saw a lot of activity on Thursday. Here’s what took place and what we can expect next week. Quick catch-up from Tuesday’s post: Kubricky completed installing chain-link fence around Triangle Park and Printer’s Alley on Wednesday so that work could begin in these two areas. And begin it did. As planned, on Thursday subcontractor ECI mobilized a second excavator into Printer’s

The Week in Progress So far this week things are playing out pretty much as I outlined in my weekly look ahead on Friday. Yesterday, to manage soil erosion, subcontractor Donnelly Construction installed silt fences in Triangle Park and in the Riverfront Park section of the Marble Works (see photo). Both a silt fence and a barrier fence have been installed along the rail corridor above Otter Creek. This morning, ECI mobilized an excavator into Printer’s Alley. A second excav

Busy Week Ahead The talk in town this week was, no surprise, the weather. Seeing these Road Work Ahead signs at all the approaches to town the past week also reminds us that the 2018 phase of rebuilding the rail line and our two bridges downtown is moving into gear. Next week we’ll see a noticeable uptick in activity in Printer’s Alley and Triangle Park. These two pieces of land sit at the center of our downtown. They are also key locations for the planned rebuild of the ne

Storyboards Now Online, Building Inspections Wrap Up, Looking Ahead After I announced earlier this week that we had installed two project storyboards in front of the Post Office, a reader reminded me that not everyone can get downtown. So you can now view both storyboards online at the following links. Bridge & Rail Project Overview Storyboard 2018 Construction Plan Storyboard Building Inspections Wrap Up As the week draws to a close, Kubricky and subcontractor Geocomp are c

Parking Alert: GMP To Set New Utility Pole on Merchants Row Thursday, April 12 A quick heads up that on Thursday, April 12, Green Mountain Power plans to set a new utility pole in place on Merchants Row. The new pole will be located outside Bourdon Insurance several feet to the left of the current pole, which is shown in the photograph below. GMP will cone off several parking spaces on Merchants Row during installation, which is expected to take a few hours. The work is we

Project Storyboards Debut in Front of Post Office Have you noticed the two storyboards now standing just outside the Post Office on Main Street? On Monday morning Highway Division Chief Matt Cram and our Highway Division crew took time off from their usual work maintaining Middlebury’s 87 miles of paved and unpaved roads to install the storyboards in the center of downtown. The two boards are designed to provide locals and visitors with a visual overview of the Middlebury Bri

What April Holds in Store and the Newest Store in Town The first phase of our 2018 construction season got underway in March with the clearing of trees along the west side of the rail corridor between Cross Street Bridge and the Marble Works. We’ll see more activity downtown the rest of this month and so I thought I would share what’s in store. Next week general contractor Kubricky and its subcontractor Geocomp will inspect and document the condition of our historic downtown

Printer’s Alley Will Remain Open to Pedestrians I want to reassure everyone that Printer’s Alley will remain open to pedestrians throughout the entire Bridge & Rail Project. As reported on the front page of last Thursday’s Addison Independent, the VTrans project team presented the 2018 construction plan to the Selectboard on March 27. The article highlighted this quote from the presentation: “Construction will at times halt pedestrian flow through Printer’s Alley and thus t