A committee is preparing for a new phase in the mission to protect and in some cases restore the rural character of Island roads. Planners from McCormick Taylor, a consulting and engineering firm, and Lardner/Klein Landscape Architects, will help develop a manual.
It was a unanimous vote by the Martha's Vineyard Commission to create a manual to preserve the Island roadscapes.
A Vineyard Haven resident pitches a plan to Island selectmen to develop a rural roads manual. Other places have done it successfully, including Nantucket.
“The preservation of the road, its bordering hedgerows and walls, its overhanging limbs, its vistas of rolling countryside, is a matter of dollars and cents. Visitors come to the Vineyard for just such enjoyments as this noble old road offers....What it represents is what we need to keep and cherish, and when we are troubled we may well drive up and down the Middle Road and clear our thoughts to the proper order of the natural world.”
Members of the Martha’s Vineyard Commission heard last week about a comprehensive new effort to lessen the number of cars on Island roads and make sure that those roads maintain their rural character.
In order to solve the Island’s traffic troubles and preserve its country feel, the MVC must embrace a plan and aggressively seek federal funds for two goals, they were told: establishing a system for reducing the number of cars on Island roads and rewriting government standards for road construction, at least as they apply to the Island.
