Highway Department

Main Office: 99 Cameron Road, Plainfield, VT 05667
802-454-7166

Welcome! The Town of Plainfield is pleased to welcome Michael Bingham as its Road Foreman effective July 1, 2022. And many, many thanks to Road Foreman Mike Nolan who retired at the end of June.

The Plainfield Highway Department is open Monday through Friday except for Summer Hours where the regular work week is Monday through Thursday from 6 am to 4 pm. The Highway Department maintains town roads, which includes sanding and plowing, grading, culvert maintenance and replacement, tree trimming, and whatever else we need to do to keep the roads safe.

Adding a driveway to your property, or changing the existing use of a driveway (for instance, from Agricultural to Residential), requires a Road Access Permit approved by the Road Foreman and by the Select Board. The form is available here and must first be submitted to the Road Foreman for his approval

Highway Department Contacts

Michael Bingham, Road Foreman

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Brook Road Bridge (in the Village) - Status and Plans

As everyone in town is aware, our Achilles heel, when we are deluged with rain, is Plainfield village’s Brook Road bridge. In a little over a decade, we have had three instances of severe damage to the road and neighboring houses due to log jams at the bridge. The combination of an undersized structure, sitting below a 90 degree turn in the path of the brook, creates havoc with heavy rain events.

What has the town been doing to address this problem?
The May 2011 flood event, just prior to Hurricane Irene, spurred the town to create a Hazard Mitigation Committee (originally named The Flood Advisory Committee). There is a direct link to the website with a great deal of information about the history of the flooding on the brook: PlainfieldHazard.com. The site isn’t up to date as the committee was disbanded a couple of years back. It was reconstituted at Monday’s (7/17/23) Selectboard meeting.

Here is a link that shows local resident and Great Brook expert, Gerge Springston, taking one of his many surveys: https://floodadvisory.wordpress.com/2019/10/21/studying-the-great-brook/
Here is a link to George’s 2014 report on landslides on the Great Brook:
https://floodadvisory.files.wordpress.com/2019/09/greatbrooklandslidereportfinal03172014a.pdf

There were years of discussion with many different remediation measures considered including: removing the bridge, clearing woody debris from the stream, building debris-catchers upstream in the Great Brook…. After much discussion with many different experts weighing in it was decided that replacing the bridge with a larger structure was the best approach. The cost of completely replacing the bridge would be approximately 3 times our annual budget for the highway department. Ironically the funding mechanisms for bridge replacement favor structures that completely fail. Strangely the solid cement bridge in the village survives, forcing the town to spend on palliative solutions.

In order to achieve a permanent fix the town must follow current funding guidelines that require study by qualified experts. The Committee retained the services of such a group and in 2015 a report was issued recommending the type of structure needed to lessen the probability of a catastrophic log jam. Here is a link to that document: https://floodadvisory.wordpress.com/2016/01/05/milone-and-macbroom-bridge-report/

The Town is ready to replace Town Highway Bridge on Brook Road between Creamery and Mill St if we get the funding. All the studies (Milone & MacBroom) and design work (vhb) have been completed. Town has applied to FEMA’s Hazard Mitigation Program to fund the construction and project we will hear the outcome this fall/winterConstruction is scheduled for the 2025 Construction Season. The total project cost is $1,733,646 and the Town’s match is only 10% ($173,364). The SB obligated some of the Town’s ARPA $ to pay for the match.The town is also continuing to map and study the problem. We are always open to further discussion. Below is a photograph from the UVM Spatial Lab group. Their drone flights have provided extremely valuable information in assessing the problem. They continue their surveys. This photograph was taken Monday a few hours before our Selectboard meeting. The intersection of Brook Road and Upper Road is on the left, the town garage is on the upper right.

Keeping the town safe is our top priority as government officials. We understand the frustration with the continuing bridge failure and are doing our best to come up with a solution that protects the taxpayer… both physically and fiscally.