A future for
Rockport’s
Green Jewel…
The Campaign to Restore
For two years, a group of people in
Rockport have been on a campaign to save what they call “Rockport’s Green
Jewel”.
Millbrook Meadow and Mill Pond, a
beautiful four-acre spot right in the middle of Town, is badly in need of restoration.
When the Town finally got a new dam
to replace the one that blew out in a violent rain storm six years earlier, a
few people started to see the clues. The
beautiful Meadow and Pond were slowly slipping away.
The Pond had become filled with
sediment over the years and now it was so shallow that cattails were starting
to fill it, and fish could no longer live in the shallow water.
The willows were losing huge boughs,
and had reached the end of their lives. And the Mill Brook was often flooding
its banks and turning the Meadow into a muddy, sloshy mess.
Millbrook Meadow Committee began a
campaign to restore this precious parkland.
With money from Lura Hall Phillips, a fund left in trust specifically
for the Meadow, they began. Town Meeting
voted more money, and then the people of Rockport voted an additional amount
from Community Preservation funds.
Working with the Department of
Public Works, they hired a contractor, and began the long process to restore
the Meadow and Pond.
Now, the contractor’s engineers and
scientists have poked and prodded, tested and sampled, to find out just what
was needed to bring the park back to vibrant life. They have prepared a Master Plan which
describes the many tasks that will restore the park, and now they are at work
on the actual design to do the work.
The actual restoration of the Meadow
and Pond is planned to begin next year, if the Town can raise the money for the
work.
Millbrook Meadow Conservancy, a
sister organization formed to look after the Meadow and to raise funds, began a
fund drive last fall, and so far have raised over $26,000.
Now a local donor who prefers to
remain anonymous has offered a dollar-for-dollar challenge match of up to
$25,000 for all new donations received between March 1 and September 8, when
Rockport Town Meeting will vote on appropriating vitally-needed Community
Preservation funds for the Meadow project.
If donors respond generously to the challenge,
the Conservancy will raise an additional $50,000 toward the total project cost,
which is now estimated to be just under $1,300,000.
The Master Plan for the Meadow and Pond
This restoration will include
dredging the Pond and rebuilding the granite edges.
Mill Brook will be widened with more of a sinuous path
through Meadow.
It will call for rebuilding the Mill
Brook, making it wider, and making it bend, so that it won’t flood so often,
and will be friendlier to eels, fish, frogs, turtles and aquatic plants.
It will improve the drainage in the
Meadow, build in rain gardens to trap runoff.
It will remove the alien invasive plants and plant new, native species.
It will plant new trees. A gently
sinuous path along the side of the Meadow will be built, with low-level
lighting and water for watering gardens.
It will build a skater’s plaza for
ice skaters to use when they skate on the Pond.
In order for people to explore the
forested parts of the Pond, and look at the wildlife in the wetlands, there’ll
be a path on both sides, and a wooden walkway between them.
There’ll be a new play area for
children, and the Frog Pond will be dredged and rebuilt.
There will
be new plantings around the Frog Pond that make it into a quiet place to enjoy
nature.
For more information about the plans
for the Meadow and Pond, or to donate, visit
www.millbrookmeadow.org
or contact any member of the Conservancy or Millbrook Meadow
Committee.
A boardwalk will allow visitors to explore the wetlands at the head of the Pond
Contact: Samuel W. Coulbourn, Chair,
Millbrook Meadow Committee, 978-546-7138
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