Letter to the Editor

Winchester Star
May 22, 2006

Four years ago, I had the good fortune to move into a beautiful house right on Main St. here in Middletown.

While taking an after dinner stroll around town the other night, I started to think about all the things I have been reading regarding the quarry expansion in the paper and all of the things I have been hearing and talking about with my neighbors. With all of that in mind, I began to look around me, and realized, if this expansion goes through there will be a lot of things that will change. In the recent past I have seen a beautiful bride, on her way to her wedding, stepping down out of a horse drawn carriage in front of the Wayside Inn. I have heard the wonderful sounds of music, and the mouth watering smells drifting out of the Irish Isle. I have stopped in and seen what “wonderful” things Anita had to offer. I have gotten up in the morning and gone outside and smelled the aroma of Route 11 potato chips in the air. I have taken my friends to the Wayside Theatre. If this expansion does go through, I don’t think we will be able to enjoy any of these things anymore, not if they are gone. Why would they stay? What bride wants her wedding guests to strain to hear over the noise of the constant trucks? Who will want to come to a mining town to see a play? Who will want to shop along Main St. with all of the dust and the noise and the pollution? Who will be able to smell the fish and chips with the smell of diesel exhaust drifting through the air?

As I looked at our town, I saw the future, businesses packed up and gone because of the quarry and its mess, people packed up and gone for the same reasons. I saw a deserted Main St. and the only thing coming down it was a never-ending line of trucks and with them they brought an ill wind, one that you can almost smell today.

Members of the Planning Commission, I urge you to preserve what we have here in Middletown today, don’t be the ones who open the door on that bleak future that I saw on my walk. Thank you.

Elizabeth Hickman
Main Street
Middletown