MAIN STREET PROJECT

May 2006

The Main Street Project is back and we apologize for our long hiatus from the web! This is Andres Perez-Charneco, the Community Development Coordinator, and along with the MSP Field Representative, Gerry Welliver, and the Deputy Village Clerk, Tammy Morse, I assume some of the responsibilities previously held by Sue Henninger. My job is to keep the village informed of happenings on Main Street during construction. Yes, you heard right! Construction is slated to start in mid-June and everyone should be excited to see the fruition of all these years of dedicated civic involvement.

Aside from myself and Jerry, there are few another new facets to the MSP. The first is our very own blog! The blog is designed to serve as an immediate web resource for any Main Street updates.

You can check out the blog today

Blogs and websites are only two of the communications vectors you can expect from the MSP during construction. Look for the return of the Lately on Main Street fliers, columns in the Trumansburg Free-Press, and posters around downtown.

If you have to know right away what is happening on Main Street then sign-up for our Construction Alerts e-mail list. This near-daily e-mail will announce expected construction on Main Street and what areass will be affected. We especially encourage local organizations (schools, churches, clubs, teams, etc.) to have at least one contact on the list. That way we can inform a group of people with only one e-mail.

If interested in being a part of the Construction Alerts e-mail then send an e-mail today.

June 2006

Welcome to the second month of the updated Main Street Project website and to the last month in the long wait to rebuild Main Street.

YES! If you have not heard, then the wait is over. Construction on Main Street will be happening this summer and we hope to get started as soon as possible.

In gearing up for construction there are three important, yet tentative, dates that you should mark down. The first is June 21st. That is the earliest that we can see construction materials and a contractor presence to appear on Main St. This is a mobilization date and not a groundbreaking date.

The next date is July 8th. That is day our the Main Street Project's groundbreaking ceremony on Main Street. Currently members of the MSP are helping to plan this event. More details will be provided as they come, but you can help plan this event! More on that below.

The last date is the date that only five years ago seemed so far. No one could have expected that the project would face such long delays in the Department of Transportation and State Historic Preservation Organization, but the efforts of the MSP and the residents of Trumansburg are not easily dismissed. All those efforts helped you bring July 10th 2006. July 10th is the earlist possible date for actual construction on Main St.

Please remember that these dates are still just tentative, but that they do serve as good guide posts for the changes to come along Main Street.

Construction only marks the end of one phase of the Main Street Project. We still need the same kind of volunteers and energy that helped us get to this stage! If interested in helping out the MSP groundbreaking ceremony then please attend their next meeting on June 3rd at 8am in Ellie's Restaurant. There you can get the meeting dates for future MSP activities as well as help plan the groundbreaking.

As more details come in, please keep refering to this website and all other MSP communications for the latest buzz on Main Street!

July 2006

July brings formality to all the events surronding the Main Street Project. The work that began on June 28th will only intensify throughout the next few months.

The biggest news around the MSP in July is the July 8th Groundbreaking Ceremony from 9am-5pm all along Main Street!

The groundbreaking ceremony will celebrate the 15 years of civilian committment to revitalizing Main Street with free ice cream, live music, art, speeches, and community dig

While the event lasts all day there are two phases two it. First, everyone is encouraged to participate in the Community Art Crawl. Created by MSP volunteers, Q. Cassetti and Paula Horrigan, the art crawl allows registered participants to artisitically caputre Main St. before construction gives it a new look.

To participate in the art crawl all that one needs to do is register on the Village Office Porch on the 8th from 9am-5pm. At registration, participants will get a sketch pad and drawing untensil and then be encouraged to go up and down Main St. recording their favorite places in their own hand.

Art crawl participants will be asked if they wish to have their work displayed later during the day and over the sourse of the summer as part of MSP events. This is up to the artists themselves.

While artists roam Main St., MSP volunteers will begin preparing for the 3:00pm groundbreakin ceremony in front of the Tompkins Trust Company bank office on Main St.

The Village DPW has leant the MSP its backhoe which will be decorated in honor of its role in the ceremonial dig. The DPW also plans to narrow the street in front of the bank to the new dimensions stated in the plans.

There will be live music from 3:00pm to 4:00pm and then at 4:00pm MSP volunteers and representatives from Cayuga Creamery will hand out free ice cream! 4:00pm also marks the beginning of our speakers series.

Speakers include former-Tompkins County representative, Marty Luster, Trumansburg Chamber of Commerce/Tompkins Trust Company representative, Tracy Vanderzee, C&S Engineers representative, Greg Fehrman, and Paula Horrigan, a member of the MSP Advisory Committee.

After the speakers are done, the backhoe will come to life and take the first swipe at the ground! After that, audience members are encourages to come and help dig up the groud. So remember to bring a shovel!

As always, please make sure to keep checking out the website and all MSP communication pathways for the latest updates.

August 2006

August looks to be a busy month with the MSP and construction. August will see the completion of the water main work and the arrival of sidewalk crews.

All sidewalks within the Village's downtown area will be refurbished and so will the utility lines underneath those sidewalks. Economy Paving crews will also extend the sidewalk on the south side of Main Street from the Methodist Church all the way to the Village Fairgrounds. Looking at the big picture, by the end of construction there will be new/refurbished sidewalk running from the Post Office to the Village Fairgounds on the south side of Main Street and from Ron Don's to the Masonic Temple

Both Economy Paving and the MSP realize that the sidewalk renovations downtown will represent the biggest construction related disruption for residents. In preparation for the sidewalk renewals it is important to note the following list.

1. No businesses and/or residences will ever be told to close or empty because of sidewalk work or any construction work in general.
2. The longest a business might be inacessable is the time it takes for crews to pour the new concrete and prepare access ramps. John Jenison estimates this time between one and one-and-a-half hours.
3. Sidewalk crews will work one side of the street at a time. This allows for there to always be a pedestrian corridor along Main Street.
4. If crews do rip up a sidewalk they will lay down a temporary gravel path until the fill the area with concrete. This path would be similar to the one you can see running past the Elm Street/Main Street intersection.
5. The concrete used by Economy Paving dries overnight so concrete poured on a Wednesday afternoon, for example, will become a new sidewalk by Thursday morning.

August also brings a new volunteer effort to the MSP. Village resident and amateur archaeologist, Bill Kappel, is interested in rescuing the bricks pulled up from underneath Main Street. Main Street used to be paved with heavy-duty bricks in the days before asphalt. These have been covered up by blacktop, but the current construction along Main Street is pulling them up. Currently, Bill Kappel leads a volunteer intiative to rescue these bricks from the construction dump site by the Village Fairgrounds. He and his team have salvaged over 1,500 bricks for future use in a later Main Street construction project. If you don't mind getting your hands dirty and want to help get these historical bricks back onto Main Street then you can contact Bill Kappeldirectly or the MSP for more information.

The long awaited Morning on Main Street meetings will begin in August. We got a great response to our first one on Tuesday August 8th and hope that you can come to future meetings. The meetings take place every Tuesday in August at 8am on the porch of the Village Office building. While currently only scheduled for August if we keep getting the same response as the first meeting then the project will continue the meetings until construction's end. All the meetings feature complimentary coffee and doughnuts! Hope to see you there!

September 2006

While it might be a bit hackneyed to say so, it really does feel like it was only yesterday when the website first mentioned that crews were to mobilize! However, now it is September and the project only has about a month-and-a-half to go. September brings the end of some phases of the project and the start of those last changes. While the project might be winding down please keep checking out the website for information and updates.

Economy Paving's water main crews made the final connections and filled in the last trenches on Friday September 1st 2006. As you are reading this, the Village of Trumansburg enjoys municipal water delivered by a brand new water main! Economy Paving thanks all the residents and commuters of Main Street for their patience with this, the biggest, phase of construction. The MSP and Village also want to thank Economy Paving for their hardwork. Special thanks to water main superintendent Stu Doty for his expertise on what looks like to be his last construction job!

With water main crews gone, John Jenison's sidewalk teams can really pick up the pace and start to finish the actual surface of Main Street. Crews from the New York State Electrical and Gas compnay (NYSEG) began to refurbish utility lines on Tuesday September 5th. They plan to finish their brief, but important, phase of the project by Friday September 8th 2006. In order to keep on schedule both NYSEG and Economy Paving asked the Village if both sides of the sidewalk could have thier sidewalks opened up. This give crews easy access to the sidewalks no matter what side they plan to renovate. Mayor John Levine granted this request on August 23rd 2006. The MSP understands that this represents a change from the sidewalk information provided above in our August 2006 entry. While both sidewalks on both sides of Main Street will be opened up and feature temporary gravel path ways the change does not mean work will happen on both sides of the street simultaneously. The contractors cannot have crews on both side of the street due to traffic management issues; crews on both side of the street would creat too narrow a bottleneck for effective traffic management. The MSP apologizes for any incovenience this may cause, but stands behind this decision in order to avoid the extra costs and times required for a work extension. All the other sidewalk information remains the same.

Bill Kappel's brick recovery project drew many volunteers from across Trumansburg! All throughout August Bill and his volunteers picked at the brick piles at the construction dump sites. Together they rescued over 3,000 bricks that now have a chance to see the surface of Main Street once more. Bill Kappel still needs volunteers to help him clean the rescued bricks (temporarily stored at Maguire Chevrolet) as well as any cleaning equipment (hammers, chisels, brick saws, etc) people can donate. Feel free to contact Bill Kappel directly or give the MSP a call for more information.

The Morning on Main Street meetings drew a steady, albeit small, stream of visitors througout August. The MSP plans to continue holding the meetings and bringing free coffee and doughnuts throughout September and into August. Thanks to Gimme! Coffee, Word of Mouth Catering, and Trumansburg Shur-Save for sponsoring the meetings and to MSP Volunteer Dolores Higareda for bringing in those sponsros. The Morning on Main Street meetings are every Tuesday at 8am on the porch of the Village Office building.

October 2006

Here we are, the last month of Main Street construction! The last four weeks of construction will bring the most activity to Trumansburg and the most progress. The entire south side of Main Street is ready for sidewalk pours and awaits completion at the hands of concrete subcontractor, A & K Slipform. The MSP recognizes that leaving a handprint and/or initials in the wet cement is an iconic image of Americana, but must urge Village residents to resist marking the wet cement as this is vandalism! Construction crews have a right to protect their work and will report any culprits to the Village Police! If you are interested in leaving your permanent mark on Main Street then consider buying a brick as a part of our second wave of bricks. Order forms are available on this very website and are due December 31st 2006.

The north side of Main Street still awaits to have all its utility connections completed by NYSEG subcontractor Dekatherm. As Dekatherm progresses then can crews install curbing and the new sidewalks on that side of the street.

The MSP released a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) flier in late September and distributed it around town. The FAQ compiles all the most common questions brought to the MSP during construction. While print copies are scattered around town the FAQ does update regularly and the best way to keep abreast of it is through electronice mediums like this website and our blog.

For more details on what is happening day to day in the MSP, please check out the Newsflash section of this website and/or our blog. Feel free to give the MSP a call at 607-387-4471. While the MSP Office now has regular office hours (Tuesdays and Thursdays from 8am-4pm and Fridays from 8am-12noon) feel free to call anytime as the phone is voicemail equipped and an MSP representative checks the voicemail every day, including weekends. The MSP office is in the same building as the Village Office.