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Food Drive
The Pine Bush Area Chamber of Commerce is collecting for the New Prospect Food Pantry...
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Town of Crawford Sign Law
We are looking for input from the Town of Crawford Business Owners and residents.
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Shawangunk Byway
Byway group unveils tourism and preservation plans.
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Festival of Lights Business and Game Sponsors
The Pine Bush Chamber of Commerce would like your participation in this year's Festival of Lights.
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Positions available at the Boys & Girls Clubs
The Boys & Girls Clubs are now hiring for a variety of positions within the organization for the 2010 – 2011 school year.
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Around Crawford Book
Fritz Meier has been working on a book about the Town of Crawford titled "Around Crawford". It will be published by Arcadia Publishing and it will be available at the end of March. All of the proceeds from this book will go to the Pine Bush Area Library.
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Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep
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Remembrance photography to parents suffering the loss of a baby with the free gift of professional portraiture.
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10 Ways to Reduce Your Summer Utility Bills
Now that the summer heat--and summertime utility bills--are making you sweat, you might want to consider making a few changes to cut your energy consumption.
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Pine Bush Area News...
Shawangunk Byway
Shawangunk Mountains Region – Plans for economic growth through tourism and preserving open space were unveiled today by the Shawangunk Mountains Regional Partnership of the 11 municipalities participating in the State-designated Shawangunk Mountains Scenic Byway.
Web site features attractions of the Shawangunk Mountains Region.
The tourism plan features a new 19-page web site, now up and running at www.mtnscenicbyway.org. The site presents photographs and descriptions of the scenic, natural, recreational and historic attractions of the Shawangunk Mountains Region.
“We’re very proud of the web site,”says Al Wegener, executive director of the partnership. “Linda Engler and her creative team at Ad Essentials in Gardiner have done a super job of presenting the beauty and activities of the Shawangunk Mountains Region.
“But it’s not just for tourists,” he adds. “People who live here should check it out. I think they’ll gain an even greater appreciation for their town, the towns around them, the towns on the ‘other side’ of the mountains, and for the entire Shawangunk Mountains Region.”
The heart of the site is a map of the region, showing the 88-mile route of the Shawangunk Mountains Scenic Byway, including a 4.8-mile section through the Gardiner hamlet to be designated this summer. The route encircles the northern Shawangunk Mountains and tours the Rondout and Wallkill valleys, visiting the towns of Crawford, Gardiner, Marbletown, Montgomery, New Paltz, Rochester, Rosendale, Shawangunk, Wawarsing and the villages of Ellenville and New Paltz.
Shorter trips are also described: a northern loop with Rt. 299, Rts. 44/55 over the mountain to Rt. 209 and Lucas Tpke in the Rondout Valley, and then Rt. 213 and the Springtown Road section of Rt. 7; a trip along Rts. 44/55 from Rt.208 through the hamlet of Gardiner and over the Shawangunks to Rt. 209; a southern route from Rt. 209 in Wawarsing, through Ellenville and over the mountains on Rt. 52 into Pine Bush and then south on Rt. 302 into Bullville; and a Wallkill Valley tour from Pine Bush east along Rt. 52, north on Rt. 14 in the town of Montgomery and then Rt. 9, east on Bruyn Tpke. through Wallkill and then north on Rt. 208 to New Paltz.
A Regional Guest Artist section showcases artists in the region, starting with the landscape photography of the Shawangunk Mountains by award-winning professional photographer G. Steve Jordan, who has a studio at the Water Street Market in New Paltz.
Maps showing how to get to the byway, street maps of various communities, hiking and biking maps and information on public transportation are included along with links to the towns and villages, the tourism web sites for Ulster and Orange counties, and to other relevant sites in the region.
Information on the Shawangunk Mountains Regional Partnership is included on the web site along with the complete Byway Corridor Management Plan
The site is made possible by grants awarded to the NYS Scenic Byways Program through the Federal Highway Administration’s National Scenic Byways Program and by the NYS Department of Economic Development arranged by State Senator John J. Bonacic.
In addition to the web site, the regional tourism plan also includes a guide to the region in magazine format, which will be published in June, poster-size maps of the byway, publicity of byway activities and presentations to community and special-interest groups.
“The program expands next year to include portable kiosk visitor centers, a guide to our historic sites and antique shops, and a guide to the farms and farm markets in the region. We’ll also have signs, which are in the works with the DOT,”says Wegener
Byway partnership also issues regional open space plan.
The executive committee of the Shawangunk Mountains Regional Partnership of the 11 municipalities participating in the scenic byway have approved by unanimous vote the final draft of the Shawangunk Mountains Regional Open Space Plan and the plan is now available for viewing and downloading from the new web site at www.mtnscenicbyway.org.
The plan is illustrated with aerial and landscape photographs of the region and includes several interpretive maps. In summary, the plan calls for the partnership to be supportive of the work of land trusts in the region; to explore the ways suggested to finance conservation of open space resources, to guide development in a manner which is resource-friendly; to advocate for changes at the State level that will facilitate the preservation of open space in the region; and to track progress by the partnership in carrying out the plan.
“The plan has taken us nearly three years to complete, and people in all of the towns and villages have participated,” explains Al Wegener, executive director of the partnership. “It was originally approved in December. But then Elliott Auerbach and Vin Martello moved to the Ulster County government. Now Ellenville Mayor Jeff Kaplan and Marbletown Supervisor Brooke Pickering-Cole are representing their municipalities on our committee and they have approved the plan. So we feel good now about issuing the plan on our new web site and moving forward with it.”
Wegener points out that approval of the plan by the partnership’s executive committee does not constitute official approval by any of the municipalities. He says: “The plan is not intended to take the place of any town, village or county plan for preserving open space. The idea was to explore what we could do from a regional perspective, as a partnership of local towns and villages. And we found that there’s much our partnership can accomplish by working together to preserve the incredible beauty of our region. But, of course, it’s going to take people-power to do it.”
The area considered in the plan covers the region outlined by the route of the Shawangunk Mountains Scenic Byway and related areas, such as historic districts. In all, the region encompasses some 134,000 acres. Of these, 60,000 acres are in the mountains and the 320 farms in the region cover about 28,000 acres. About 33,500 acres are in a protected status, with around 89 percent of this in the mountains, leaving only 11 percent of the land in the valleys in a protected position.
The economic importance of agriculture ranks #1 in the region, and the plan points out that the contribution farms, orchards and vineyards make to tourism generates growth for many other businesses.
While the mountains are the centerpiece of the region, the plan emphasizes the importance of scenic views of the mountains across farmland and open space and includes specific strategies for preserving farmland and scenic views and for maintaining healthy forests.
The important role of land trusts is recognized and the plan suggests ways the regional partnership can work cooperatively with the six land trusts in the region, particularly to help preserve land in the valleys.
Strategies for financing conservation are also discussed. Among these is the idea of gaining State permitting legislation for town residents to be able to vote on a real estate transfer fee when the market turns around. Such a fee could be used for financing open space conservation.
The plan offers ways land can be developed in a manner friendly to the resources which are important to the well-being and character of the region, such as the connections between our mountains and other natural areas. The plan also outlines how the partnership of 11 municipalities can advocate for changes at the State level which would improve the ability of the region to conserve land and resources, such as gaining an appreciation of the value of scenic views to the tourism industry and having that reflected in the State’s Environmental Protection Fund.
Consultant for the project was Behan Planning Associates, LLC. The plan was funded through a collaboration of the NYS Department of State Qualities Community Program; the Federal Highway Administration’s National Scenic Byways Grant Program administered by the NYS Scenic Byways Program of the NYS Department of Transportation; the municipalities of the Shawangunk Mountains Regional Partnership; the Mohonk Preserve and the Shawangunk Ridge Biodiversity Partnership.
“We’re very pleased to be able to unveil our tourism and open space plans at the same time,” says Wegener. “It just came out that way. But they really do go hand-in-hand; at least, that’s the perspective our partnership has had from the very beginning.”
For more information, contact Al Wegener at 845.399.0002 or aweg@earthlink.net or
John Valk, Chair and Shawangunk Supervisor at 895-2900
Carl Chipman, Vice Chair and Rochester Supervisor at 626-3043
Toni Hokanson, Vice Chair and New Paltz Supervisor at 255-0604
Phil Jamison, Chair of Crawford Planning Board at 361-5892
Jeff Kaplan, Ellenville Mayor at 647-7080
Joe Katz, Gardiner Supervisor at 255-9675
Brooke Pickering-Cole, Marbletown Supervisor at 687-7601
Mike Hayes, Montgomery Supervisor at 457-2600
Terry Dungan, New Paltz Mayor at 255-141
Patrick McDonough, Rosendale Supervisor at 658-3159
Ed Jennings, Wawarsing Supervisor at 647-6570
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