ST. ALBANS – Look out Newport and Burlington! There’s a new contender for this year’s “Vermont’s Top Pit” competition. The city of St. Albans has thrown its hat into the ring for the best downtown gaping holes.
City officials say they were inspired by Burlington’s pit, which has festered for years with no signs of upcoming activity. Newport has a bigger pit, but there is a feeling that the southern pit has become a bit stale at this point. Competition judges say they may be looking for something fresh this year.
St. Albans’ pit, located across from the Welden movie theater, is certainly the most current of the pits in the state, although the construction equipment located around the area may hurt its chances. Any filling in of the pit would likely disqualify St. Albans, as the addition of new buildings over existing trash holes is not the Vermont way.
Judges have until midnight on the 31st to decide on this year’s winner. Technically, with some creative demolition, the field is wide open for other towns and cities to get in on the fun. Whether St. Albans wins or loses this year, no one can say they didn’t try to make their downtown as much of a pit as the other places on the list.
Seems like there is an opportunity here to link the Newport pit to the St. Albans pit to the Burlington pit and into Lake Champlain creating a Grand Canyon of the east. Since Lake Memphremagog is 584 feet higher than Lake Champlain, we could have our own “Colorado River” (Vermont River, I guess, as I don’t think the name has been taken yet) to kayak and white water raft. Other Vermont towns along the route could add pits of their own, creating calm resting areas and encouraging tourists to stop in for a maple creemee or quaint local handicrafts. The state needs to do something to attract tourists who can no longer enjoy Lake Champlain due to increasing incidents of cyanobacteria blooms
Ha! You can take Saint Albans right out of this competition as the so called “pit” is nothing compared to those other places. I live right next the construction site and I can tell you those construction workers are out there working their butts off very early in the morning until late at night. They’re working on two buildings at the same time and I wouldn’t be surprised if one of the buildings was practically up by the 31st!
Yes, we’ve heard that St. Albans is falling behind in the competition due to excessive competence.