Lecturer skeptical of town plan for bridge Says history, finances pose obstacles to transportation development

Author: Ian Schmertzler

Owen Gutfreund, a Barnard professor and author of "20th Century Sprawl," delivered a lecture last Thursday entitled "Bridges and Bypasses: A historical perspective on a century of traffic and town planning in Middlebury." During the talk, Gutfreund used the history of automotive transport and national trends to explain why the construction of new bridges in Middlebury any time soon would be unlikely.

Over the course of the hour-long lecture, Gutfreund discussed the history of automotive transportation, focusing on what he called "corporate lobbying masquerading as consumer advocacy." However, Gutfreund was careful to say repeatedly that "this isn't a conspiracy, this is a story of good business… the more roads there were, the more cars would be sold. It was that simple."

Gutfreund argued that a rural emphasis on road spending led to roads being built where no one had previously lived; this, in turn, led to sprawl. As an example, Gutfreund provided the story of George Wallace, a man who moved to and then created the first commercial development outside of Denver thanks to new highways. "Federal and state highway spending consistently provided plenty of money to build the roads between the cities, but did not provide money for road development within the cities," he said. "The result was cities faced the stark choice of either paying for roads to connect to the highways, or slowly dying."

Gutfreund posited that small local governments were practically powerless to shape their transit situations due to a lack of federal support for road development within town limits. The case study the professor provided was the town of Middlebury. "Eighty years ago, traffic congestion made it on the meeting agenda in Middlebury; since then, it hasn't left," he said. With Vermont having to provide funds in conjunction with the federal government for all construction, Gutfreund explained how the state was gradually forced to push more of the financial burden down on the towns, which were usually unable to raise the funds.

It was at this juncture that Gutfreund tied in the current bridge proposal. While reading the town minutes for Middlebury, Gutfreund had discovered that "the 'new' bridge proposal had been a 'new' proposal since 1955." Gutfreund provided instance after instance in which the state was prepared to pay for the construction of the bridge only to be met with protest by dissenting members of the town. "One of the problems with all of these plans was that none of the plans had enough support," Gutfreund explained, leading politicians in Montpelier to direct their meager funding only to those towns with greater concensus.

Gutfreund closed by saying, "So here we are, 50 years later, and the State has said 'go plan it.' This happens every decade, but I doubt anything will happen." Most of the students appeared to agree, though some adults clearly did not like what they heard. In answer to a town member's question regarding what he viewed as a solution for the country, the professor replied was, "In the 1920s cities didn't work: they were too dense, they bred crime and there was immense poverty. Back then it made sense to get people to spread out. It doesn't any more. We are too spread out, we need density."