VT Gas discusses pipeline benefits

Vermont Gas has scheduled an "open house" meeting tomorrow night (May 8), 5 p.m. to 8 p.m., at Otter Valley Union High School in Brandon. (Link) Company employees will be available to meet one-on-one with local residents at "topic tables" to discuss various aspects of natural gas efficiency and the plan to bring natural gas service to Rutland County.

Vermont Gas says the pipeline project will reduce reliance on oil and propane and could result in an energy cost savings of up to 50 percent for Rutland County homes and businesses. Phase I of the project, approved in December, is designed to transport natural gas from Colchester to Middlebury. Phase II is planned to extend the pipeline from Middlebury to the west, through the towns of Cornwall and Shoreham and under Lake Champlain, to provide service to the International Paper mill in Ticonderoga, New York. That phase is strongly opposed by residents of the affected towns.

According to the gas company, an agreement with International Paper will provide $45 million toward the construction of an additional length of pipeline in Phase III, allowing Rutland County to be served by natural gas by the year 2020. Without the extension to Ticonderoga, the company says it will take about 15 more years to connect to Rutland.

Whiting Census of 1800

I pieced together the few pages of the U.S. Census of 1800 that were related to Whiting. They are shown below.

The U.S. Census of 1790 showed about 247 residents in the Town of Whiting (I believe the official count was 249, but I could not find the other two people in the document). Over the following ten years, the population grew considerably. The 1800 Census shows a total of 404 residents in the town (roughly what the population is now). For comparison, in 1800 the neighboring Town of Leicester had a population of 522 (less than current population), while Cornwall had 1,163 (close to current) and Shoreham had 1,447 (more than current).

There were many youngsters in Whiting in 1800 - 77 boys under age ten (19% of the population), 58 girls under age ten (14.3%), 36 girls between ten and sixteen (8.9%) and 28 boys between ten and sixteen (6.9%). The total number of minors was 199, accounting for just under half of the total number of residents. There were relatively few older adults - just 22 men and 23 women aged forty-five and over. These comprised about 11% of the total population. Just one resident of the town was designated as not "white."

FYI - Whiting's age-group statistics looked very different for the 2000 U.S. Census (the most recent for which already-crunched numbers are available). At that time, children under 16 accounted for just 17.4% of the town population (somewhat lower than the state and national percentage), and adults 45 and older accounted for about 37% (about the same as the state figure but higher than the national figure). The largest age block was adults 25-44, with 31.6% of the population falling into that category (a bit higher than state and national figures).

The final column in the 1800 census contains no information for Whiting or for any other town in the State of Vermont. That column was used to track the number of slaves in each household. Slavery was always prohibited in Vermont.

Possible pipeline paths provoke public protest

Two of five potential routes for a 24-mile Vermont Gas natural gas pipeline project pass through the Town of Whiting. Those two routes would also take the pipeline south from Middlebury through Salisbury and Leicester, and then west through Whiting, Orwell and Shoreham, on its way to an underwater crossing of Lake Champlain to the International Paper mill at Ticonderoga, NY.

According to a grading system used by project planners, those two routes affecting Whiting are among the more expensive being considered, though they would put Vermont Gas in a favorable position for expansion southward to Rutland.

Three less expensive options would send the pipeline immediately west from Middlebury, crossing through the center of Cornwall and the northern portion of Shoreham. While those options appear to face significant community opposition, two of the three trans-Cornwall routes have highly favorable rankings in terms of construction, permitting process and cost and a somewhat favorable rating for connection to Rutland. Those options have informally been designated as the "most feasible scenarios."

According to a story by John Flowers in the Addison County Independent, the routes under consideration would be part of Phase 2 of a Vermont Gas expansion into Addison County. Phase 1, a 41-mile pipeline from Colchester to Middlebury, is current under review by the  Vermont Public Service Board.

The prospect of access to natural gas (Vermont Gas appears to be planning to service Shoreham village and may add service to the center of Cornwall), has not increased the attractiveness of the project to local residents. Cornwall residents along Routes 30 and 74 have placed lawn signs opposing the pipeline routes.

Vermont Gas officials have been meeting with a multi-town planning group.

Newspaper's fall foliage road trip cuts through Whiting...

...but doesn't mention us

Whiting has reason to feel a bit honored and a bit slighted by the Addison Independent's fall foliage road trips. Five trips were mapped out in the newspaper's special "Fall Foliage 2012" edition. The 3-hour trip cuts right through the center of Whiting, yet the newspaper did not mention the town's name. Also neglected in the same writeup were our neighbors to the north in the pretty town of Cornwall.

The road trip description begins as follows: "From Middlebury, take Route 30 south to Sudbury, [see, no mention of Cornwall or Whiting, just POOF you're in Sudbury] where you pick up Route 73 and travel west to Larrabee's Point on Lake Champlain. You may want to cruise the lake at Mount Independence leaving from Larrabee's Point, which is home to the Fort Ticonderoga ferry. Continue north on Route 7A passing through historic Shoreham..."

From there, the three-hour road trip heads north on Route 22A to Bridport, then west on Route 135 to Chimney Point, north and east on Route 17 to the West Addison General Store, north on Jersey Street along Lake Champlain nearly to Basin Harbor, east and south on Basin Harbor Road into Vergennes, south on Route 22A into Addison, back on Route 17 east and then Route 23 south back into Middlebury.

(By the way, the Independent recently ran an editorial describing the problems it has had with the printing of its late-week broadsheet edition. Those were apparently related to the switching of printing companies. One week, the newspaper was printed with large white margins at the top and bottom of the pages. The next week, the pages were noticeably shrunk, with some type becoming virtually unreadable.)

Glorious evening sky follows storms

The area experienced some severe storms yesterday (Saturday), though we fared considerably better than our friends in southern New England and the New York City region. There were tornado warnings around our old home in Connecticut and a couple of tornadoes touched down briefly in eastern New York City.

I had just parked the car in a Middlebury parking lot a little after four-thirty in the afternoon when the skies opened up. It was like being in a car-wash gone haywire. What must have been 50-60 mph winds were forcing the torrential downpour into a horizontal direction. The wind bounced my car around considerably and seemed intent on flipping it over. It began gusting from what I perceived to be the south and continued for about ten minutes, though it seemed like forever. The wind direction then changed dramatically. It seemed to be coming from the west for a few minutes.

By five o'clock, the heavy winds and downpours were over. About an hour later, we went out to dinner at Rosie's Restaurant (it was prime rib night, but none of us ordered that) in a light rain. After dinner, as we drove through Cornwall on our way home, a spectacular double-rainbow emerged over the Green Mountains in the eastern sky. People pulled their cars over along Route 30 to look at it and photograph it. The kids were mesmerized. I was shocked to hear children of the video-game era remarking, "This is the coolest thing I've ever seen!" I didn't have my camera with me - I must learn to bring that thing wherever I go - and the cameras in our cellphones just weren't equal to the task. We reached home in Whiting with just enough life left in the rainbow to take a bunch of photos and a short video.

The rainbow vanished as the sun set behind the Adirondack Mountains. But Mother Nature was not yet finished with her colorful evening display. She treated us to this dramatic sunset.

And, this, photographically explains our greatest problem so far living in Whiting: We never know which direction to look! The views in every direction are simply spectacular. We are almost fearful of the natural beauty that awaits in the Vermont fall and winter ahead.