The Green Mountain Club today unveiled the first visual mockup of its planned Long Trail footbridge over the Winooski River while announcing a $50,000 challenge match donation.
‘ It is very exciting to actually see, for the first time, a vision of this historic project. After more than 100 years of dreaming and striving, the Green Mountain Club is very close to finally completing a footbridge for the Long Trail over the Winooski River,’ said Will Wiquist, executive director of the club. ‘ In order to complete this project, we need to raise the remaining necessary funds and this dollar-for-dollar challenge donation will help us reach these goals and, literally, cross that bridge soon.’
The Green Mountain Club has already raised more than $550,000 from private donors to support this historic project. This, in addition to the long-standing support for this project and land protection efforts from the state of Vermont, has brought the club within $115,000 of its fundraising goal.
An anonymous donor has offered to match every project donation between now and the end of August, up to $50,000. In making this generous pledge, the donor said, ‘ Getting a permanent bridge across the Winooski has been a dream of the Club for decades, as it will both reduce the longest remaining road walk and fill the last major gap in the Long Trail. Realizing that dream, by providing the necessary funding to acquire the trail heads on both sides of the River, has been a personal challenge of mine for almost 25 years, and I am excited that the end is now in sight.’
The Green Mountain Club has sought to establish a safe, appropriate and permanent route for the Long Trail over the Winooski River in Bolton since 1912 when the club established the first stretch of the trail from Mt. Mansfield to the river. At that time the Vermont General Assembly appropriated $500 for the project. While that did not result in a bridge, the club has continued this effort into the present day. Over the years, the Long Trail has utilized a farmer’ s row boat as a ferry, the railroad bridge, and, today, a 3 miles road walk and a busy road bridge in Jonesville.
The Green Mountain Club’ s Long Trail Protection campaign has purchased land and secured four easements from landowners to assure a permanent right of way for the trail between Camels Hump State Park on the south side of the river and Mt. Mansfield State Forest to the north. The club’ s partnership with the Vermont Department of Forests, Parks, and Recreation has played a key role in this conservation achievement.
The Green Mountain Club expects to have shovels in the ground on this project by this June with completion in autumn. The club has hired a professional engineering firm, Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc. of Ferrisburg, Vt., to build off of excellent preliminary design work done by civil engineering students from Norwich University. The more than 220-foot bridge will be built by the special projects team of the club’ s Long Trail Patrol.
Source: www.greenmountainclub.org WATERBURY CENTER, Vt., February 1, 2013
Photo and a conceptual drawing courtesy of the Green Mountain Club.