St. Johnsbury Academy Students Brushing Up Blighted Area
It’s a case where downtown barriers can bring about beautification.
Today, 21 St. Johnsbury Academy students will enhance seven concrete Jersey barriers on Bay Street beneath the Portland Street bridge, transforming what had been unsightly and, in some cases, offensive graffiti into colorfully painted murals.
The school’s art department chair, Michael Chatterley, is leading the student effort, drawing on the Academy’s support together with town officials and Catamount Arts.
Composed of town officials, businesspeople and leaders from local organizations, the stakeholders held their first meeting on Aug. 26 and set goals toward town improvement following a summer marked by incidents of bad and criminal behavior in the middle of downtown.
It was determined that simply covering the graffiti in gray paint was not a long-term solution; the plan is for another “dancing bears” situation.
Eleven years ago, an Academy student made it her capstone project to paint colorful, dancing bears on a portion of the bridge support structure. It has faded over time, but people have rarely tagged it with spray paint.
The hope is that today’s mural effort will achieve that same level of long-term respect for the artistry.
And now it’s time for your Moo92 sports…
Trevor Story’s 3 run bomb in the 8th was the eventual game winner on Thursday night as the Red Sox beat the Texas Rangers 4-3. Sonny Gray with 3 earned runs on 3 hits in 6 and a third. Boston traveled to Tampa to take on the first place Rays tonight. Ranger Suarez takes the mound for Boston. First pitch at 7:10pm.
And in local sports…
The North Country Boys soccer team dropped their first game of the season with a 4-0 loss to Bellows Free Academy on Thursday while the Lady Falcons won their matchup with Montpelier 3-0.
The North Country Falcons Football team will host undefeated Colchester tonight in a battle for State supremacy. Kick off at 7pm.
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Image source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ralston_Purina_Mill_in_St._Johnsbury,_VT.jpg
License: CC BY 4.0 (Quintin Soloviev)