Sewage and climate: Middlebury has a choice

Using gas to dry sludge would bust our greenhouse gas goals.

ACRWC is getting ready to plant trees and shrubs at a riparian site along Otter Creek in Weybridge and is eager to share the experience with volunteers.

For more than 25 years, the North American Steamboat Association (NASBA) has been gathering in Otter Creek for their annual steamboat meet-up in Vergennes, with River’s Edge in Ferrisburgh as their elected homebase.

Middlebury officials have given a Beverly, Mass., company permission to explore the feasibility of re-establishing “a low-impact hydroelectric power facility” at the Otter Creek Falls.

Since last week’s heavy rainfall and disastrous flooding across the state, the bridges above the Otter Creek Falls have been occupied by walkers pausing to peer over the edge and snap a few photos of the raucous rapids. 

The Agency of Transportation informed Vergennes that the city-owned bridge over Otter Creek needs work, and it’s the city’s responsibility to arrange and pay for it.

“It is the lowest water flow that I have seen in all my time here,” said Fred Dunnington, who was Middlebury town planner from 1981 to 2013.

The feds will cover more of the $25.5 million city sewer upgrade than perviously expected.

The old Stow Cemetery has been giving up its dead to the at-times ferocious and unforgiving Otter Creek.

BRANDON — The Vermont Agency of Natural Resources is taking public comment on its 2019 Draft Otter Creek Tactical Basin Plan. The agency seeks public feedback on the plan at an informational meeting in Brandon next week and will take written or electronic … (read more)

In the third of a three-part series examining the historic and current role of the Otter Creek in Addison County, and its current status as the heaviest conveyor of phosphorus pollution into Lake Champlain, we turn a sympathetic ear to the burden placed o … (read more)

This is Part III in a three-part series. Alongside pressures like falling milk prices and increasing production costs, farmers are charged with the financial, physical and emotional task of remediating Otter Creek’s water quality. What does this mean for … (read more)

About this series:   Week 1 (Sept. 5) — The Otter Creek, Vermont’s longest river, runs through the state’s most heavily cultivated land, and thereby contributes more non-point source phosphorus pollution to Lake Champlain than any other source in Vermont, … (read more)

This is Part II in a three-part series. Vermont’s Clean Water Act (2015) has established regulatory and incentive-driven programs to address the web of nuanced water quality issues in the state. Here, we’ll discuss the Clean Water Act as it applies to the … (read more)

ADDISON COUNTY — At 7:15 a.m. on May 1, a member of the Addison County River Watch Collaborative stretched a long pole with a plastic cylinder into the water of the Lemon Fair River, a tributary to the Otter Creek that runs through Orwell, Shoreham, Cornw … (read more)