Run for your lives!
Posted on 05/24/2004 9:26:24 AM PDT by Straight Vermonter
WASHINGTON (AP) - Famous for its fall foliage, quaint towns and covered bridges, the state of Vermont - and its charm - is threatened by a corporate behemoth, a nonprofit preservation group warned on Monday. The alleged culprit: Wal-Mart.
Because of plans for several new Wal-Mart Supercenters across the state, the National Trust for Historic Preservation has placed the entire state of Vermont on its 2004 list of the most endangered historic places in the United States.
The 10 other sites on the list include Nine Mile Canyon in Utah, with its 10,000 Native American rock-art images; the Ridgewood Ranch in northern California, the home and final resting place of legendary racehorse Seabiscuit; and Pennsylvania's Bethlehem Works steel plant.
Vermont is the only state ever to make the annual list in its entirety.
Richard Moe, president of the trust, said Vermont's "special magic" would vanish with the onslaught of the giant stores.
"Vermont is uniquely a state of small towns, and many of these downtowns would be decimated by this," Moe said. "A lot of small businesses just disappear in the face of a huge Wal-Mart."
Moe fears one giant retail store will attract others to the Green Mountain State. "It will totally change the character of Vermont over time, and that would be a tragedy," he said.
The state is making a rare reappearance on the trust's list. It was first listed back in 1993, when Vermont was the only state without a Wal-Mart, and the trust worried about impending plans for construction of several stores.
"We're not telling any communities that they shouldn't have a Wal-Mart," said Moe. "We simply want communities to have their eyes wide open when they make these decisions because it's within the ability of a community to affect the location, size and design of these stores."
One alternative, said Moe, would be to persuade the retailer to build smaller chains in existing buildings that have been abandoned or are otherwise not being used, saving rural landscapes and not having quite the devastating impact that a superstore would have.
Run for your lives!
"We're not telling them what to do. We're only telling them how to think."
The sentence was correct like that and it should have been left like that. Vermont is the leftovers nobody wanted.
So what if Wal-Mart raises the standards of living of "poor" people?
It's the government's job to give welfare to poor people.
We don't want them getting uppity and independent on us.
Make them shop at the mom and pop stores at twice the price.
When the interstate system was being built, Vermonters petitioned to have all entrance ramps and no exits. There is room for Wal-Mart in VT. If you flattened all those hills, the state would be bigger than Texas.
Let's give Vermont to Canada then, it sure isn't doing much for us.
We were stunned last night at one of our first grocery-shopping trips to the Amherst, NH Wal*Mart to find that we could buy enough fixings for six crock-pots full of chili for a party this weekend for under $100.
Bwaaahaaahaa.
Maybe if groups like this didn't constantly oppose our property rights Vermont wouldn't be all Ben and Jerry types.
Most of my conservative friends have moved to more politically sensible (and warmer) locales.
Vermont once was, is not now or the foreseeable future.
It is red China puke haven of grass grazing Deano freakos. Please don't put a Wally world there, they don't deserve such improvements
Vermont was just across the river where I grew up; Vermont, where the farmland is really rocky and the rest is kind of barren. You could hardly live slower.
First it's horseless carriages, and before you know it, flying machines. Let's be careful out there!
Hi, from sunny Florida! :-}
It IS pretty though. You should see some of my pictures :-}
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