Are we any closer to a solution to the Vergennes truck traffic dilemma? 

Thirty-five years ago, Vergennes citizenry conducted a 36-hour vigil to determine the number and nature of the incessant, oversized, often tandem, trucks barreling through the Vergennes downtown. The traffic volumes were stunning and the documented codes on the sides of many of the trucks indicated hazardous materials that, according to Ralph Jackman, the longtime Vergennes Fire Chief, would prove disastrous should an accident or explosion occur in the city’s midst. 

Taking its dilemma to heart, over the years the community conducted innumerable studies and charettes. Upon resulting recommendations, and with extensive community input, an alternative truck route was proposed and extensive in-city traffic-calming measures were implemented. 

Located entirely within Vergennes city limits, the alternative route proposed at the time was offered to divert truck traffic off the Vergennes Main Street while protecting in-city commerce. Well-designed signage would direct travelers to the historic downtown commercial district by contrast to the trucks required to travel the alternative route. 

The route was carefully considered at the time.  There were many advantages: The residential nature of the community would be reestablished with safety and quality of life as a priority. School children would no longer have to navigate the traffic onslaught making their way to the city’s in-town elementary and high school.  

Without having to traverse the city streets, outlying areas of the greater Vergennes community in Panton and Ferrisburgh would benefit by having greater ease in traveling north or south of the city for work and/or for pleasure. And when an in-town visit was preferable, the greater community would benefit by its calm, restored historic district with its architectural attractiveness, cultural riches, verdant landscape, and charming commercial enterprises. 

Importantly, with two routes to the outlying areas, the fire department and rescue squad would have necessary and improved access in emergencies. 

Trucks would no longer have to navigate the dangerous in-city bridge over the Otter Creek with its steep incline in violation of state regulations. 

Serving as an economic corridor, the commercial/industrial businesses along Panton Road would use the truck route to provide an improved, safer, option for employees traveling to work and to expedite deliveries without adding to in-town traffic congestion. With direct access to the alternative truck route, the current Job Corps property could be repurposed to provide an expansive commercial/industrial complex, with professional offices and incubator spaces, as well as needed multi-generational housing.   

As a result, the Vergennes City Council resolved to approach Addison County Regional Planning to advocate for assistance, and ultimately the Vermont Agency of Transportation to remediate the traffic dilemma. 

Exacerbating the situation, the Federal government declared Route 22A a federal interstate truck traffic byway, with downtown Vergennes the logjam as traffic converged onto Route 7.  

Shortly thereafter, the Vermont State Transportation Board surveyed statewide truck traffic and found Vergennes’s burden to be, by far, the State’s most extreme. 

A generation later, options are still being considered, once again. More studies, more surveys. 

Each option currently under consideration has its advantages and disadvantages, its advocates and contrarians. Only one option is unacceptable and that is to do nothing and to not provide long-overdue relief to a traumatized community. 

Despite the community’s best efforts, thirty-five years later the truck traffic and the dangers have increased exponentially, and meaningful solutions remain elusive. 

It is truly time to come to a decision. 

Faith Terry 

Middlebury

For over 35 years, Faith Terry lived across from the historic Vergennes Opera House in her 1795 home on the Main Street/Route 22A. She spent much of the time seeking solutions to the truck traffic dilemma.