Norwich is a talkative community 鈥� on sidewalks, in the Post Office, around kitchen tables, and especially on the town鈥檚 email listserve, where thorny issues get thrashed out in public on a daily basis. This summer, what鈥檚 got people riled up is a plan to install two sets of solar-powered blinking lights that pedestrians could activate with buttons, at busy cross walks. They鈥檇 be the only traffic lights in town.The selectboard is planning to use funding from the Vermont Agency of Transportation to help pay for the installation. Town officials cite Vtrans statistics estimating that about 1,800 cars a day drive down Main Street, and they鈥檙e worried that pedestrians, including elementary students, are increasingly at risk.
Not so fast, say opponents on the listserve.
Sure, some admit they鈥檝e had to dodge a car or two while running an errand, but they insist that lights would spoil Norwich鈥檚 down-home village character. They say cars and walkers should just learn to get along, and point out that collisions are rare, even in front of busy Dan and Whit鈥檚 general store, where the motto is 鈥淚f we don鈥檛 have it, you don鈥檛 need it.鈥�
The anti-lighters say, in effect, that if Norwich doesn鈥檛 have it, maybe Norwich doesn鈥檛 need it.
The tone of this online argument has been pretty civil, despite some grumbling about not having been adequately informed about the plan before it was inked. It has, in fact, been under discussion at selectboard meetings for almost two years. But of course, public attendance at those evening sessions can be sparse - which leads me to wonder how the very existence of town listserves may affect turnout in town halls.
On the one hand, online debate about local issues may spur engagement in municipal government. While on the other, people may think that they can skip selectboard meetings, if they pay attention to the local listserve - a 21st-century version of the town crier.
Of course, what does seem clear is that both pedestrians and drivers need to follow the rules as they navigate Main Street and turn off their phones. Pretty ironic to risk injury while reading emails about how dangerous it is to cross without looking both ways.
