Gravel Quarry
Is Unacceptable

I consider the Bowens of Rochester friends. I buy manure for my garden from Mike's North Hollow Farm, and have enjoyed Ethan's many performances with the White River Players.

But unfortunately, I find the Bowens' plan to bring a massive gravel mining operation to the Upper White River Valley utterly unacceptable. The Upper Valley is one of Vermont's last utterly unspoiled scenic gems. It's a place, as Larry Plesant of Seasoned Books and Bakery puts it, which has nothing more to sell than peace and beauty.

There are no ski resorts, no museums, no big cities to attract visitors. But the tourists come anyway. In summer, bicyclists, motorcyclists and motorists throng Route 100 and visit the quaint shops and scenic pull-offs found along the rural byway.

But the quarry will bring dump trucks: one every ten minutes, all day long, totaling thousands of trips every year. One has to ask, will the tourists still come? Will they want to eat the dust and diesel of all those trucks?

No doubt, the quarry plan does benefit Mike and Ethan, and that's good; we like to benefit our neighbors. But all those trucks are bad for business, bad for the health of our families, bad for the valley. They provide virtually no benefit to the merchants and residents of Rochester, Hancock, Granville, Warren and Waitsfield.

And fighting the quarry is going to cost a lot in headaches, wasted time, divisiveness, and lawyers' fees. I hope Mike and Ethan will take the massive public opposition to their project to heart, reconsider, and abandon their plan. It would be the neighborly thing to do.

Glenn Scherer

Rochester