HIGHGATE-- Machia Road in Highgate is desperate for reinforcements.
The Missisquoi River is eroding the bank it sits on and endangering vehicle traffic that cross it, and the fix town officials have been seeking for four years is an expensive one.
The project would cost approximately $2.7 million, town administrator Heidi Britch Valenta said, adding that the amount has grown over the years since the town first started looking into it in 2017.
“We need two concrete walls with spikes driven into the bank to stabilize it,” Britch-Valenta told the Messenger. “When we started getting into preliminary design, we started realizing it was a harder fix than we thought. We previously fixed one in 2004 near this site and it was difficult to construct, but not like this.”
This year voters approved $411,000 for the Capital Improvement Plan, all of which will be raised by taxes and $131,000 of which will go toward the Machia Road Stabilization Project, according to Town Clerk Wendy Dusablon.
“We have a road that’s falling into the river,” Dusablon said of the project.
The town will be required to match 20% of the total budget for the project, amounting to around $500,000, Britch-Valenta said.
Two VTrans grants -- one for $734,800 and one acquired last year for $660,000, are already helping to fund the project. But Highgate needs more to fully fund the project, Britch-Valenta said, and a third grant for $789,716 has been applied for. Results are anticipated next month.
The hope, Britch-Valenta said, is that the heavily-trafficked road will receive support from neighboring communities in terms of its revitalization moving forward.
“We as a town of 3,600 can’t keep fixing this road at that price tag,” Britch-Valenta said.
