New bridge gains voter's approval

Author: Katherine Doorley

Middlebury residents have voted to approve plans for a new bridge across Otter Creek. At the recent Town Meeting, the bridge proposal asking, "Shall the Town support the Cross Street Bridge location and conceptual intersection design and circulation as recommended by the Bridge Committee and the Select Board?" passed affirmatively by a margin of approximately 3-1, allowing town planners to take the next steps toward building the new bridge.

Building a new bridge over Otter Creek has been discussed frequently throughout the town's history. In fact, every independent traffic engineering analysis conducted for the town over the past 50 years or so has recommended building an additional bridge over the Creek in order to improve traffic conditions. Among the motivations for a new bridge across the Creek are the relief of traffic congestion that builds up in downtown Middlebury and an additional route around town for emergency vehicles. Furthermore, it could act as a detour, allowing Battell Bridge and the railroad bridge in town to be repaired. The need to make repairs to the Battell Bridge and the railroad bridge on Main Street and Merchants Row was often cited by town officials and supporters of the bridge proposal, as a motivation for passing the proposal.

The new bridge across Otter Creek will be located just north of Mr. Up's at Cross Street. In addition to building the bridge, the proposal also contained a plan for a new roundabout to help traffic circulate at the intersection of Cross Street, South Main Street, Main Street and College Street. The two proposals combined will reduce traffic congestion by an estimated 50 percent.

While some residents of the Cross Street area raised concerns about the increase in traffic circulation and the safety of pedestrians in their neighborhood, the town residents voted 695-203 to support the proposal to build a new bridge, keeping with their votes on past proposals.

Town Planner Fred Dunnington said, "In my time with the Town, this was the third time Middlebury voters supported the Cross St. Bridge [the bridge was previously proposed in 1983 and 1992]. Actually, the voters have always strongly supported an in-town bridge. There has never been a negative vote."

In a related proposal, town residents voted 666-226 to "appropriate $75,000 for preliminary engineering, design and planning for the proposed Cross Street Bridge." This money will most likely be used as initial matching funds for State and Federal grants.

Now that the bridge has been approved, town officials are beginning to seek out funding for the bridge, which will be paid for through a combination of State and Federal funds as well as local bonds.

"Although a donor would be wonderful, we do expect to work on securing the funding through the State and Federal government sources with a local bond vote. We are exploring some creative (for government) ideas on financing," said Dunnington. "If a donor offered to pay for it tomorrow, we would retain a design-build firm and move to final design and engineering with simultaneous property acquisition and the Bridge could conceivably be completed as fast as about two to three years."

However, since finding a donor to pay the entire $16 million the bridge is estimated to cost is unlikely, the town will need to hold off on finalizing design and construction plans until the funding is secured. Dunnington summarized the final process: "There is strong community interest in the final design details and all this will mean more time and bringing it all back for an ultimate local bond vote. How soon depends on how soon the State and Federal agreements can be reached - which under their current backlog of projects could be a few years."

Despite the fact that the Bridge was strongly approved by town voters, there is no indication that it will be completed any time in the immediate future. However, the recent Town Meeting vote means that once funding is definitively secured, future Middlebury students and town residents will hopefully spend less time in their cars waiting to cross Otter Creek.