Weathersfield gets federal grant

Weathersfield gets $631,000 grant to reconstruct Maple Street, which serves the recreation areas associated with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' North Springfield Lake.
http://www.rutlandherald.com/article/20120807/NEWS02/708079926

Published August 7, 2012 in the Rutland Herald Weathersfield gets federal grant for Maple Street By Susan Smallheer Staff Writer WEATHERSFIELD — The federal government taketh away and sometimes it giveth. In the case of Weathersfield, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers North Springfield Flood Control Dam took close to 1,400 acres of prime farm land and the village of Lower Perkinsville from Weathersfield in the 1950s. Last week, the town got a $631,000 grant from the federal government’s Public Lands and Highways grant program to reconstruct Maple Street, the town road that leads to the recreation areas of the flood control lake and recreation trails on the west side of the North Springfield Lake. The money will be used to grind up the existing surface, rebuild the base and repave it, said Dan Boyer, chairman of the Weathersfield Select Board. The town’s practice in recent years is to let a rebuilt road sit for a year before repaving, to let the new road surface settle. Boyer said that there are about 20 homes on Maple Street before it leads to the recreation areas, and he estimated the repaving job would treat about two to three miles of road. Boyer said it would probably be 2014 before Weathersfield has the money in hand from the federal government and is able to start the project. The federal funding has more conditions attached to it, including a requirement that only federally-approved construction firms do the work, he said. Tom Snow, manager for the U.S. Army Corps’ North Springfield Lake, said Monday that the corps had plenty of clean up work to do on its network of dirt roads and trails after Tropical Storm Irene. The North Springfield dam held back millions of gallons of water during last August’s flooding, submerging the roads under 30 feet of water, according to Boyer. “There was a lot of damage down in the flood plain,” said Boyer, who said the area was one of his favorites places to ride horses with his wife. Snow said the corps removed more than 1,000 cubic yards of silt from the roads, and had to add 1,500 cubic yards of gravel to bring them back to passable condition. “We had a lot of clean up work,” he said. “We had anywhere from 2 inches to 2 1/2 feet of silt to remove.” The road was washed out near the Towles Hill Dam, a small hydroelectric dam no longer in service on the Black River, that is part of the Army Corps’ recreation area. It is a popular area for swimming he said. Snow said Weathersfield was able to access federal funding about three years ago to repave Stoughton Pond Road, another town road that serves the North Springfield Flood Control property, in this case, Stoughton Pond. Boyer said the project would start at Route 106 and go all the way to the U.S. Army Corps’ gates, in the vicinity of Drumlin Road.