Waitsfield is working on a Village Master Plan – with goals to increase housing, build climate resilience and improve natural resources. The plan will also have a particular focus on the Irasville Village area.
Work on the plan started last spring after the town updated its zoning bylaws to allow for increased housing development. It also follows a successful $15 million bond vote in June to create a municipal wastewater system for Waitsfield and Irasville Villages.
Waitsfield Planning Commission vice chair AnnMarie Harmon gave an update on the village plan work at an August 20 meeting of the commission. Harmon also sits on a nine-member steering committee that focuses on the plan, which recently had its first working session with consultants from the Burlington-based design firm SE Group.
Harmon said the committee discussed the idea of redirecting Route 100 in Waitsfield Village. They reviewed sample master plans of Waitsfield and Irasville created by students of local architect David Sellers, with most of those plans rerouting Route 100 through Slow Road and the shopping plaza, creating more street parking and theoretically slowing down traffic.
The current linear design of Route 100 is “terrible for business,” Harmon said. “What we have now is a speeding ramp. People just drive right through and don’t realize there are businesses on both sides of the road.”
Commissioner Becca Newhall suggested constructing a small traffic circle at the intersection of Slow Road and Mehuron’s, while commissioner Beth Cook said that if the town can’t redirect Route 100, it might be able to help local businesses advertise in the meantime.
Commissioners talked about the need for public facilities in Irasville – including an indoor pool. Chair Jonathan Ursprung said that while Valley residents may have been opposed to building a facility with a gym and pool in past decades – because “the prevailing mindset is, you just go outdoors” – that may be changing.
Newhall said that many Valley parents are frustrated with driving to Stowe for kids’ swimming lessons. She said admittance to the pool at Sugarbush Resort in Warren is too costly for families.
Newhall said if the town can’t afford to build public facilities, it could think about hosting a commercial space.
Commissioners also discussed the need for a local pharmacy – especially as such a large percent of The Valley’s population is seniors. Harmon questioned whether it should be included in the Village Plan.
Ursprung said that in identifying parcels for potential development, the town is not just interested in housing development, but in commercial real estate that could serve unmet community needs.
Newhall wondered whether Shaw’s would be interested in opening a pharmacy with limited hours, or whether the store could stock items in their pharmacy aisle that local residents are currently driving to Kinney Drugs in Waterbury to get.
Harmon also said the steering committee is learning about how wetlands are functioning in Irasville – given the way that wetlands are currently limiting development in the area.
SE Group consultants are currently drawing on a map that includes 36 acres of Irasville wetlands that another consulting firm, Arrowwood Environmental, made in 2021. That map, according to town planning and zoning administrator JB Weir, showed both high- and low-functioning wetland areas.
The town is trying to enhance the absorptive capacity of land in Irasville while also enabling its growth, according to a municipal planning grant application filed by Waitsfield and Fayston last year. Weir called it a “delicate dance.”
Work on the Village Plan will continue through at least November 2025, with funding from the municipal planning grant totaling $45,000 with a $5,000 local match.
The next meeting of the steering committee for the village plan is Tuesday, September 24, from 10:30 a.m. to noon.
