President’s Letter

On June 19th two dozen riders including Dept. of Energy and Environmental Protection Commissioner Dan Esty met near the plaque commemorating bicycle inventor Pierre Allemande at Chapel and Church Street in downtown New Haven. They pedaled away with the intent of highlighting both the successes and the remaining gaps in the Farming- ton Canal Heritage Trail. I personally think it was the single best day for public relations that the FVTC has had. Channel 8 News was there filming and getting interviews for that evening’s news, and we got a lot of great press, not the least from Tom Condon of the Hartford Courant, who did the ride and wrote on July 3rd: “Let’s Close the Gaps in the Canal Trail”. Thanks Tom.The whole thing was also being filmed for a college project. We held press conferences in Cheshire and Plainville with Dan’s wife U.S. Rep. Elizabeth Esty showing up in their hometown of Cheshire telling the story of how their daughter learned how to ride on the trail. She’s genuinely interested in completing the trails and highlighting them at the national level. Arnett Talbot from the Town wel- comed us and reminded us that Cheshire was one of the first towns to build a section of trail, and the subsequent ups and downs of trying to finish it. Commissioner Esty himself was an earnest speaker on marshalling forces to close these two remaining gaps.

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