We all love the Mad River and love to swim in it, lie by it and watch dogs, kids and people play in it. The Mad River at Bridge Street in Waitsfield is a great gathering point, a public park, an area with shops and food and libations and plentiful parking and river access.
It is also home to Waitsfield’s historic covered bridge where this year, due to a construction issue from the bridge work done last year, there’s a large (kid-size) gap between the pedestrian walkway and the travel lanes of the bridge. That gap runs the length of the bridge and is also visible on each end.
It’s that gap that has allowed very creative and energetic kids to devise multiple ways to hurl themselves into the river from beneath the bridge. Kids popping up unexpectedly into the gap or disappearing down into the gap often startle drivers heading through the bridge.
Kids are jumping from ropes under the bridge, jumping from the sides of the bridge, jumping from bungee cords under the bridge and using planks to lever each other up to the top of the bridge so they can jump off the roof.
Town officials are receiving complaints from drivers and as well as people who live and work near the bridge. No one wants to see people refrain from enjoying the river in the summer, but there’s a very real concern that someone is going to get seriously hurt during all the play on, in and under the bridge.
We want to see people enjoying the river and our plentiful access to it, but we share the concern about safety, particularly with kids popping up and down in the gap inside the bridge. Fixing the gap will go a long way toward fixing that particular attractive nuisance.
Kids jumping off the roof and sides of the bridge is a time-honored tradition and one that the town prohibits and one that thousands upon thousands of kids have survived. The town is considering replacing the cedar shake roof with a standing seam metal roof and that may act as a deterrent on its own.
We share the concern over kids in and under the bridge and hope that fixing the gap fixes that problem.
