by Thaddeus Flint
On a cold autumn night last week, some of the good citizens of New Lebanon decided it was worth heading down to the elementary school to see what they could do about fixing up their town.
“So many memories are here,” said Jagat Pandey, as he sat in the school’s library his own children learned to read in. Pandey was waiting with about fifty of his fellow townspeople to see what Behan Planning, a Saratoga firm hired by New Lebanon last spring for $20,000, had to say about keeping their little town a genuine little town, but maybe one with food and more jobs.
[private]Behan Planning uses the word hamlet instead of town. Some people looked up the word hamlet before they came to the meeting. It didn’t mean much to them. Behan is looking first at what some call the Miracle Mile. Hamlet Revitalization Strategy is what they were calling it, but that didn’t seem to catch on. “I don’t see 20 and 22 as a hamlet,” said Jeannine Tonetti of the Historical Society.
“We are trying to foster change,” said Michael Allen, a Senior Planner at Behan.
Foster was probably the right word. Change won’t come over night. “Everything takes longer than you hope for,” said Councilman Doug Clark. It was Clark’s idea to bring Behan into the picture. “We are on more of a downward spiral than an upward spiral, and I would like to change that,” Clark said back in April when he made the proposal. The firm’s $20,000 fee was to be split evenly between the Town and the Lebanon Valley Business Association.
The first thing you need is a plan, pointed out Clark. And that’s just what this crowd of people was there for.
“It’s not easy work,” warned Behan’s top planner, John Behan. “It’s like raising a family. But the rewards are huge.”
Behan outlined the basic problems. New Lebanon is a pass through town. There isn’t a lot to do, and the Route 20-22 corridor could look more attractive. There’s also no place to stay if people did stop. It does, though, have plenty going for it – the agricultural landscape, its history, its nearness to other attractions and its swamp.
Swamp
Swamp? The Town is located in the Shaker Swamp, and it turns out that that’s not actually such a bad thing.
“It could be an eco-tourist destination,” said Behan. People would come just to see the swamp. The J. N. “Ding” Darling National Wildlife Refuge in Florida was one example Behan provided. The difference is that the Darling Refuge has boardwalks in place so people can walk through it without disappearing into the muck. Right now the Shaker Swamp is only completely accessible in winter when it’s frozen over. Clark said he explored it on snowshoes and, “It was really another world.”
Besides walking through a swamp on a boardwalk, Behan had some other ideas that could pull New Lebanon out of its downward spiral. Sidewalks could help. A few people grumbled at the word “sidewalk.” That plan had already riled people up enough this summer. Broadband? Nobody had anything against fast internet. Adding Town water and sewer systems were other projects that would help bring in businesses and housing. Sites could also be pre-approved and made “shovel ready” to make supermarkets and restaurants want to come to New Lebanon. And, by having a design guideline along with enforced zoning, the Town could force new businesses to adapt the look they wanted.
Disguise Equals Success
Allen showed some slides of success stories. There was a Dunkin’ Donuts that didn’t look like a Dunkin’ Donuts. In Rhinebeck, there was a Mobil filling station that didn’t look like a Mobil filling station. Over in Manchester, Vermont, there was a bank that doesn’t look like a bank. Disguise seems to be key. In New Lebanon the bank looks like a bank,, and the filling stations look like filling stations, and the Town is on a downward spiral. New Lebanon doesn’t have a Dunkin’ Donuts yet. But if Dunkin’ Donuts wanted to come to town, and the Town had an enforced design plan, New Lebanon could have a Dunkin’ Donuts that looked like a bank in Vermont. “You can tell them what you as a Town want,” said Allen, instead of just accepting some “concrete box.”
That all seemed pretty good. There was hope. With that, the townspeople were broken up into three random groups and sent off to one of the elementary school’s classrooms to brainstorm.
“I feel like a little kid,” laughed Joanna Johnson Smith as she walked down the hallway with her husband. “Is this our room?”
“No holding hands now,” joked Allen, ushering his group in.
Behan was in another room talking about the stars. “Did you guys see Jupiter tonight? Wow!” he said as residents got seated around a map of the Town. Behan was easy to like, and his firm’s attempt to see what the people really wanted was completely opposite of how the sidewalk firm, Creighton Manning, had behaved. Nobody seemed to like Creighton Manning.
And then around the room he went. What were the top three things you would like to see improved in town? And what were the top three things you would like to see stay the same?
The discussions were interesting. The need for a supermarket was most notable. It came up again and again. However Greg Hanna of the Planning Board wondered why, if everyone so wanted a supermarket, nobody in the three years the Town had been without one hadn’t opened a Co-Op? One resident felt that the supermarket wasn’t going to save New Lebanon since all the jobs were now gone. And to improve the Town for tourists? “Most of us don’t care about the tourists and don’t want them to begin with,” he said.
“It’s not Lenox, and it never will be Lenox,” said Deborah Gordon. Which is just as well as it’s impossible to park in Lenox. Gordon, though, wouldn’t mind some tourists as long as they are interested in the real history of New Lebanon. “Don’t sanitize it,” she said. She brought up the old Showboat dance hall as an example. The Showboat was one corner of an almost mythological Bermuda Triangle of drunk driving, the other two corners being Woody’s Roadhouse in Washington, MA, and The Lodge at Brodie Mountain in New Ashford, MA.
Hillsdale was also brought up. This was a town, similar in size to New Lebanon, which had spiralled down, according to Clark who often talks of spirals, to the point where nobody would have “even opened a coffee shop.” Today it thrives, and mainly because they put in an affordable municipal sewage system which allowed businesses and housing to grow. Clark felt housing was key. “How great would it be to have housing for Seniors right in the Town which would allow them to walk to a supermarket?”
Pretty great, but you need water for this, not to mention a supermarket. Buildings of any decent size now are forced by code to install sprinklers. Which means municipal water. Which requires more money.
“It’s not impossible,” said Behan. “There are grants.”
After about an hour the three groups returned to the library. Each group presented its desires. A supermarket seemed to be the greatest want. But it certainly wasn’t the only want. New Lebanon really seemed to want New Lebanon to stay kind of like New Lebanon. They wanted to protect the farms and landscapes that make it so beautiful. The Route 20-22 corridor could certainly use some work. Some wanted it slimmed down to two lanes. The Rail Trail was important. It seemed like more people were into the Rail Trail than the sidewalks. The Swamp was brought up again. If you live in a swamp, embrace it.
Behan seemed impressed with the results of the night. The important thing was to start a plan. Once a plan exists grants could be found. “It demonstrates support. It shows you did your homework,” he said. “Our economic world has changed,” he added. “We are losing our towns. But for you, it’s about saving your town.”[/private]