2021 Update #21
Flowers, Trees & Grass
The Highlights
Green spaces taking shape as construction winds down
Rail platform poured
A new spot for lunch
I’ve been advised by a confidante that the weekly update has spent too much time lately covering concrete: forming it, pouring it, replacing it, etc.
So this week let’s turn our attention instead to the greening of our downtown spaces.
We’ll start in Triangle Park, where on Tuesday St. Stephen’s brought in Joan Lynch and her crew from The Inner Garden to replant the church’s front beds and top-dress the mulch on the new beds planted last Fall by Landshapes alongside St. Stephen’s.
This sprucing up is being done in part to prepare for the upcoming Peasant Market (July 31) and Festival on the Green (August 2 – 6) celebrations.
Standing in Triangle Park these days it’s becoming more difficult to remember the 20-foot-deep rail cut that marked the center of our town for more than 170 years, from the late 1840s until just last summer.
As the St. Stephen’s work was taking place, Ken Hastings of our Dept of Public Works was mulching and watering the maple trees and hanging plants that ring Triangle Park, seen here from the vantage point of the intersection of Main and Merchants.
Across the street on Merchants Row, Landshapes on Thursday afternoon was replacing the honey locust trees whose fate we’ve chronicled the past few weeks and resetting the granite blocks that surround each tree.
And up on the north end of the project, as shown in our final photo, now that the underdrain has been installed and backfilled, ECI began spreading and seeding top soil in the area that runs parallel to the Marble Works side of the U-walls.
Your Weekly Construction Update
This week’s theme notwithstanding, concrete continues to play a significant role in the final weeks of the project.
On Monday, the Carrara pump truck took up position in the Battell drive to pour roughly half of the new south cap wall.
The remaining sections of the wall will be poured next week, following which Kubricky will backfill the U-walls that parallel the upper Battell drive and Landshapes will restore the plantings and ashlar blocks that line the drive.
Kubricky expects to reopen the Battell drive to residents by the end of the month.
This week Waters began installing a concrete curb that will run from the bottom of Printer’s Alley north along the rail corridor, providing a break point between the Marble Works roadway/parking spaces and the new grass areas.
Thursday was a big day up at the rail platform. As we reported last week, A&K mobilized a large crew to manage the pouring of the platform itself. That work will continue on Friday and then the concrete will cure through next week.
Finishing up our weekly tour at Lazarus Park, Lafayette has continued installing the decorative railing along the north cap wall; it now reaches a spot opposite Junebug. Next week, Waters expects to complete the stairs that lead from Main Street down into the Marble Works so that Landshapes can begin work on the labyrinth and the landscaping of both Lazarus Park and the area between the Post Office and the rail corridor.
Hungry?
Have you tried the new lunch menu at Haymaker?
Haymaker, located down Bakery Lane overlooking Otter Creek, started serving lunch in addition to its famous buns and coffee a few months back. You can check out the menu here—the Fried Chicken Sando is a hit in our house—though it changes week to week.
You can eat in at Haymaker and its outdoor deck or order take out. If you go, let Chef Jack know I sent you.
That’s all for today. See you downtown.
Please keep your comments and questions coming. Send me an email at jgish@townofmiddlebury.org and I’ll try to cover it in my next update.