this is then a snake man and welcome to positively vermont today we're going to be exploring the essex junction train hop and tree lighting of a very interesting event that's taking place in esse junction for a month and with us to discuss it is darby mayville the community relations and economic development assistant for the village of essex junction welcome darby thank you for having me and  sand for the program director and community relations person from the essex junction recreation and parks the park good to be here excellent welcome to positively vermont and before we get into the events tell us a little bit about if you would the village or the town or the area of essex junction vermont words located this program goes at various parts of the state maybe a little bit of the history and geography and points of interest sure  extension is located and shouldn't county north central shouldn't county we have about ten thousand residents and just under six square miles so it's a very compact village we have a famous intersection called five corners where five major routes intersect and that is going to be the heart of where this event is and tell us about the road back around to the to the place sure well we do have the station in the state of vermont in essex junction and railroad has always been a significant part of our history so it seemed like a natural choice to bring in trains and the concept of a train hop and let's be honest who doesn't love a train and the play says the norm is a major over the course of possibly one hundred fifty years of an intersection for the when railroads were very very big a great  it with my husband and my son and i came to vermont by way of connecticut because i wanted to go to the two you have and i met my husband there and here we are that's  i am new to the chin in county area but i did grow up and rochester vermont so familiar with vermont as a whole and i lived over upstate new york for quite a while with my fiance at the time and then we just got married and came back over so i've been he works year round constructing tracks working on different trains and making sure that each location has the perfect model train in fact a couple of years back i brought him this old train set from the one nine hundred thirty s that needed a lot of t l c and he worked on it dedicatedly for a few months and it was been running at the train hop ever since it's great well this is going to be december the eighth and it's a on the tape starting at six o'clock i take it and what's going to happen on the sunday tell us all the events that's going to happen and where so the first thing that's going to kind of kick off the evening is the tree lighting village tree lighting which will happen around six six fifteen and that'll be over it like jerry said right in five corners and then right at six all of these businesses that are hosting model trains will also be opening so from six to eight kind of go to different businesses that are participating both on main street and railroad av and visit them and see their model train hopefully everyone will have a model train on display both some that we provide them and some get really into it and provide their own they'll be a little goody to take home true train or holiday related and then hopefully some cookies or some different drinks hot chocolate fact kind of thing just really festive holiday type mood will also be expanding the maple street park performance because we have th trees lighting in the park which is the whole park lit up with different different trees lit up and then also christmas music will be playing and will have a trackless train running through the park that you can ride on and they'll be a trolley that takes people from downtown center five corners to the park and then back again so you don't even have to worry about parking meter place you can just catch the trolley that's grown in the the lights in the park are absolutely amazing i went last year and i was floored by how beautiful it was and they are not a one night only thing they are if they happen from the day after thanksgiving until january first so those will be available all season only true soap is what you were you know we have to wait for the so the lighting will be right at one so it'll show what businesses are participating in and have a spot where you can collect a stamp from each of the different participating businesses or organizations and then they'll also be lots of information on what each businesses is doing what train is there  maybe just going to give you an eye over view of what the layout is because at six o'clock on a december friday it's going to be a little dark so we want to give a an idea of what's happening as best we can so people can take full advantage of it are they going to go in a group of people who just go with individual of the different locations i had last year as my first time experience of the train up and i did see a lot of family groups going together but maybe do you however you'd like to do it is fine up you know it is more fun with a group but i think one or two people on their own would have a great time anyway thoughts about these conductor sure so it's a volunteer position we've had we've had state reps we've had village trustees you'll see them wearing their big hats and they're there to greet people provide information and step tickets just generally be host and hostess of are about three and what about music for this community musical on i would guess that each individual business will be having some kind of holiday themed music i know we do at the park but otherwise there's not a specific spot where we're going to be performing but anybody is welcome to bring in so it's a little motor in the front and they go around various parts to have a route there's any one near the fire station in downtown and then also one at the park going through on the pathways the laws are not too much snow through the later tr going to be weather permitting i think the event itself will happen whether bernard list we have found obviously better participation with better weather but overall it will happen even if it is snowing and it's honestly a lot i think it's kind of more fun without rebelliously the whole place is just starting to get a great buzz on this you know the posters are out there very nice poster very nice designed to tell us about what types of businesses you know what any of the businesses are going to provide some kind of discount whether it's a food type thing we have a few restaurant partners and then some local organizations and then it's just some of the businesses that lined those particular roads we're not looking for a specific type of business is really just locale so making sure that you're within the five corners area but i know darby has a better handle on which trains go where because there are some specific trains that are really popular to go to different businesses also about this is sure we have had some trains that have really grown with location for example we have a local lawyers office has participated for many years and every single year they have the john deere train and their location and they love that train they decorate it they do all kinds of things with that and that's their train so it's really wonderful to see certain locations really hitch on to different trains and i know you were asking about specials in the past we don't want to give away things too early but in the past we have had specials at many different village businesses for example the poly kitchen six grill have always offered pretty significant discount for train offers so that may be another reason to come by and have some dinner and i believe is right here right near the road itself exactly right across the street from the station that's a very exciting area of christmastime i know this is why amtrak train comes in at night and it's kind of siding with that you know  that night no the snow is going down is fantastic it is what about put this official by schools and going on with the schools nothing specific most of the people that we see coming through our local families that are have lots of kids in the schools and we'll be doing a special flyer home with school kids to promote with the families because it really is it is a family winter a vent they were just trying to provide an opportunity for people to come out and celebrate community both good for themselves and good for the businesses so organizing this how many people on wall right now well kind of one at a time darby was really the head honcho for the past couple of years and she's helping me pick up the pieces now and it's really just mostly a one one woman show he's going through yes volunteers are great to have both of the businesses have been really wonderful about stepping up and  certainly but there does get to be a long line really yes but he's a patient man where's he going to be he'll be upstairs in the teen center all that's great and that's near the fire station yeah so that's right next door to the fire station and actually speaking of the fire station santa is going to be at the fire station the weekend before on december second so he's going to arrive by fire truck at ten am that morning case anyone's interested in seeing him again that's great  how many people does that you know it's always difficult to tell that as because there's not really any one way of counting people i've asked me it's somewhere between one thousand and three thousand last year was bitter cold the year before that was beautiful was probably fifty's sixty's and we had probably closer to three thousand people that year so it's really weather dependent you know it's a great time either way it's  and it sounds like it's for men this is just an atmosphere type of thing that's why you know this this show gets around to various parts of you know the state and so well and by watches it that we're going to post the information about the were like involved in the initial ones over the years just as just whose idea was this so this idea was brought up by a group of community volunteers i thinking nine years ago possibly even ten and they saw that essex junction there were a lot of vacant storefronts and increase in crime and things were really not going as well as they are now so there were people who are working to get people into essex junction and really get people always interesting to read when people post on the facebook pages to see where they're from people seem to i noticed people are coming from rutland from highgate really all over the place flash there and you have a facebook page we're going to post that you know and there's you know the town and village anybody contributions were like that work it's more of a participation based contribution i would say so are happy to have lots of places to contribute their time and opening their doors maybe at a time when they wouldn't necessarily have that open that's really the biggest contribution for us i would say there are some new businesses in the last year as you know well there this could be a great opportunity for them to show their stuff exactly get some people in there  be pretty flexible and keep it open to whoever wants to participate so if there's somebody that wants to participate a business organization that feels like they're ready to go we're happy to entertain that and figure out a space for them to be in or able to open their own space that's great too it is not limited to having a physical storefront which is the great part i don't know if that's something you implemented or not but there are some organizations that are coming in that are that are you know such as some common and de sac and they're coming in and they're and this is this if you want to cover the whole thing how much territories is going to be embraced from the the edge of it to the end of it probably about four blocks or so it's not terribly big the biggest track out would be to be able street park and again there is a trolley that takes you back and forth so yeah four blocks probably walking distance and then you can also take the trolley and go walk around the park for some movie a little bit more but that's library has really been the focal point of this event brownell library i've been in there some years where i've had trouble getting through that door it is packed they have a goodie they have had in the past lego train they had a cake train last year which was fabulous but not you many people cite because it got eaten so quickly so brownell has really been the hub of activities for the train up i think you were asking how did they find out about this it was posted in out to have kiosks i know last year we had united way y w c a son common so we really have really done a really good job of bringing in different aspects of the  what i'd really like to tell people is to make sure that they come out rain or shine no matter what you have a great time and there's always new things every single year so even if you've been last year it'll be just a little bit different and just a little more exciting for you this year excellent they did take a minute to describe the event as it was described to me that that really resonated with me someone described it as something that you would have seen when there was more department stores and everybody had this really festive holiday decorations in their store front window and you'd see the kids faces pressed against the glass so watching that model train we're trying to recreate that feeling so if you resonate with that definitely come by and see the different model trains get some goodies and have a good