Rural Banter

Author: Erica Goodman

No need to lose anymore sleep. The snow is finally here. Let J-term begin.

For the avid skiers and snowboarders around campus, I understand your previous concern. The weather outside has been less than frightful so far this winter. With the thermometer during most of December ranging in the 40s and 50s and a very mild first week in January, it looked as if the semester was off to a rather green start.

Unprecedented warm weather has kept the Green Mountains plush and budding with photosynthesis. But I offer to you this - Are the mountains themselves the cause of global warming forces?

Drive along any roadway in Vermont and you will see the source of our environmental problems - long driveways of loose gravel that twist and turn in steep, narrow threads. Add a few inches (or sometimes feet) of snow, a dash of ice and a pinch of freezing rain, and voilà! You have yourself a slippery slope of wintertime disaster. Since someone has yet to install a crane or a ski lift to carry his car from the base of his driveway to his front door, many Vermonters have invested in SUVs and other four-wheel drive vehicles.

Is the solution, then, to take a Goliath size bulldozer and flatten the frosty peaks? Alright. Maybe blaming global warming on the environmentally-conscious inhabitants of the sparsely populated Green Mountains is not the correct course of action. In fact, the hilly landscape is vital to the livelihood of thousands. Catering to winter sports enthusiasts is an economic way of life for thousands of Vermonters.

One out of every five visitors to Vermont arrives and vacations in the winter, whether to hit the slopes, ride the trails or patiently wait on a frozen lake for the fish to bite. According to a tourism study conducted by the University of Vermont, winter tourism spending provides over $220 million in personal income to Vermonters with a total impact of more than 21,000 jobs. From the man who sells the lift tickets at Sugarbush to the restaurant owners in Stowe to the ice skate sharpener at Forth n' Goal, men and women across the state carry their livelihood in the heart of the Green Mountains.

The fluffy white precipitation that we crave for its aesthetic and entertainment value is for them detrimental to keeping their businesses up and running.

And so with rain once again in the weather forecast, I urge you to take a moment from your sulking that you will be unable to ski for every day of J-term and remember what the snowy heights mean to our neighbors.