Horse farm subdivision criticized A local developer and a local farmer this week spoke out at a Stowe Planning Commission meeting against a proposed horse farm in a meadow along Luce Hill Road. Parking has always simmered as a problem in Stowe village but recently it seems to be boiling over. The biggest developer downtown, Ampersand Ltd., is suing the town over parking, and the owners of the Malt Shoppe have been barred from expanding the eatery's seating until they come up with more parking, something they simply don't have the land to do. To make matters worse, the establishment is now being told it had too many seats to begin with, and has to scale back its seating. The new owners say this could kill their business.
Parking is a problem virtually every place that was built and designed at another time.
From lower Manhattan, to Nantucket to Salida, Colo., builders in the 19th century were making spaces for people and horses and buggies, not automobile traffic. Narrow streets and tightly built houses are what makes these places interesting and attractive and hard to get around. As Town Planner Brian Frazier has suggested, parking rules should reflect the fact that public parking is a premium downtown and that Stowe is by its nature a walking village. Existing rules have encouraged the development of a scattering of private lots, which neither satisfy municipal needs nor encourage appropriate pedestrian traffic. Some businesses, the Malt Shoppe among them, have virtually no parking.