(rshsdepot) Fair Haven, VT

["Jim Dent" <james.dent_@_itochu.com>]

=46rom the Rutland (VT) Herald...

Fair Haven: The little train stop that could
June 22, 2001

(from the Front Page section)
By GORDON DRITSCHILO Herald Staff

FAIR HAVEN - The dirt parking lot with a boarded-up building off Depot
Street doesn't look much like a working Amtrak station.

Amtrak even overlooked it once.

"I saw we were passing the station by and I said to the conductor, 'We're
going through Fair Haven,'" said John Clement of Poultney. "He told me th=
at
all the towns look alike and we weren't there just yet."

When the train crew realized its mistake, Clement said, they let him use =
a
phone to call someone to pick him up in Rutland.

"I like this stop, though," he said. "It's very convenient."

Clement, who is about to retire from a teaching position at Bergen Commun=
ity
College in New Jersey, has a house in Poultney and an apartment in New Yo=
rk
City. He said he makes the trip back and forth as often as twice a month.

He said it costs $350 a month to keep his car in New York, so he leaves i=
t
in Vermont and takes the train.

"My son lives in Middletown Springs, and he picks me up and gives me a ri=
de
home," he said. "I'm really glad they have this line running through here=
."

It costs $54 to $59, depending on the day of the week, to ride the rail f=
rom
Rutland or Fair Haven to New York City. The short ride from Rutland to Fa=
ir
Haven costs $8.

The station, surrounded by tall grass and weeds, has been a stop for the
Ethan Allen Express since 1997.

While nobody got on or off at Fair Haven on Wednesday, and Clement stood
alone in the rain waiting for the train Thursday, more than 100 people us=
ed
the station each month from April 2000 to March 2001.

The Ethan Allen departs from Rutland each day at 1:15 p.m. and arrives in
New York City at 6:35 p.m. The northbound train arrives in Rutland at abo=
ut
8:40 p.m. The stops in Fair Haven are scheduled for 1:35 and 8:05 p.m.

Of the 21 people who boarded the train in Rutland Wednesday, at least two
were from towns near Fair Haven, but they chose to drive to Rutland to ca=
tch
the train.

Ann Berezowski lives in Hubbardton, but spends three days a week in New Y=
ork
City, where she coordinates special events at Columbia University's
Complementary and Alternative Medicine Center.

She said she alternates weeks taking the train and the bus.

"The train is much nicer, but the bus is easier on my budget," she said.

While the Fair Haven train station is closer to her home, she said she
prefers coming into Rutland.

"It's desolate and I don't want to leave my car there," she said of the F=
air
Haven station. "I'm just more comfortable here."

Berezowski said the one time she got off at the Fair Haven station, she h=
ad
a bad experience.

"I had arranged for a taxi to be there and it didn't show up," she said. =
"I
was the only person who got off there and I was stranded."

With no phone at the station to call for a ride, Berezowski said she woun=
d
up walking along the road until a passing motorist stopped and gave her a
ride home.

When the train began stopping in Fair Haven in 1997, town officials
discussed building a platform there with a shelter and a pay phone. Selec=
t
Board Chairman John Lulek said he didn't remember why the plans didn't co=
me
together.

"I don't really know," he said. "It was discussed, but it just never
happened."

Edith Austin of Castleton was going to New York City Wednesday to visit h=
er
children. She said she never uses the Fair Haven station.

"I'm used to this place," she said, sitting in the waiting lounge in
Rutland. "I can do a little shopping downtown before I go."

Conductor James Rasmuson said the train typically takes on three to five
passengers at the Fair Haven station, sometimes more depending on the day=
 of
the week and the weather.

"Sometimes we won't be expecting people and there will be two or three
standing there," he said. "A couple weeks ago, we picked up 23
schoolchildren at Fair Haven and took them into Rutland."

A committee of state and town officials spent the summer of 1996 studying
possible sites for a stop between Rutland and Whitehall, N.Y. Originally,
the committee only looked at Castleton, but a group of Fair Haven residen=
ts
lobbied to have their town included on the list of possible stops.

"Usually, if I'm meeting somebody there or when I take the train, there a=
re
other people there getting on or off," said Betty Allen Barnouw of Fair
Haven, a member of the group that pushed for the station to open in her
town.

Barnouw said she and her husband often took the train to New York before
health problems forced them to cut back on their travels. And, she said, =
the
Fair Haven station is much more convenient for visiting friends and
relatives.

"It's been a good thing for the town," she said.

Amtrak spokesperson Cecilia Cummings said she didn't know what future pla=
ns
the company might have for the stop.

"We're always looking at various lines," she said. "We run a lot of train=
s."

Cummings said she didn't know if the usage numbers were favorable for
Amtrak, but it sounded like the stop was working out well for the town.

"We're serving a community need there," she said. "The only profitable li=
ne
Amtrak runs is the Metroliner from Washington, D.C., to Boston."

=A9 2000 Rutland Herald and Times Argus

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End of RSHSDepot Digest V1 #96
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