The grass at Fox Run Farm in East Montpelier stood up to our thighs. After a day of rain, the stems were stiff—perfect for mowing with a scythe.

Five men, each outfitted with a straight-handled scythe, followed each other through the field. After 45 minutes of quiet and not-very-hard work, with a lot of time spent pausing to talk to each other or show each other tips on how to swing the blade, an impressive portion of the field lay in windrows.

Richard Czaplinski (right) demonstrates scythe technique for Jesse Shapiro.

A scythe is what peak oil writer Richard Heinberg calls a Class B tool—manufacturing it requires external energy, but once it’s made, it operates off of human power. Most of industrial civilization is powered by what he calls Class D tools, which require external energy both to manufacture and to operate. Things like string trimmers, gasoline-powered lawn mowers, and diesel-powered, farm-sized mowers are Class D tools. As oil becomes more expensive after peak oil, and supplies are periodically interrupted, tools that require only human power to use will become more valuable.

That’s a good part of the reason why I bought a scythe and was at Fox Run Farm last night, learning to use it and maintain it with the East Montpelier Historical Society.

A good scythe, in the right hands, can mow grass about as low as a lawn mower. Once the grass reaches a certain height, a person with a scythe can also mow faster, at least than the gasoline-powered push mower we use on our lawn.

Like a lawn mower, a scythe can also be used to keep a path open through a field, or to mow down a cover crop before planting something else.

A scythe can also do much more.

Ben Fried posts a fascinating graph (h/t Ezra Klein) showing how the absolute number of cyclist injuries has dropped by 40% in New York City while the number of cyclists riding each day has more than doubled:

The conclusion Fried draws, based on other research, is that there is safety in numbers. When more cyclists are visible on the streets, car drivers are more attuned to them, and they are more likely to see them. 

My impression is that the same phenomenon has occurred in Montpelier. I see substantially more cyclists on the road, summer and winter, than 10 years ago. In the past, cars regularly pulled out right in front of me or on a collision course with me at intersections or the roundabout, when I had the right of way. And was wearing bright yellow. In daylight.

These days, it hardly ever happens. 

One way for cyclists to increase motorists' awareness of them is to bicycle naked. That's exactly what the organizers of Montpelier's third annual participation in the World Naked Bike Ride are hoping for this Saturday, June 13.  If you want to participate, show up between 1 and 2 at the Freeride Bicycle Collective, 89 Barre Street. The ride leaves promptly at 2. 

More details, and pictures of previous naked bike rides in Montpelier, at www.montpeliernakedbikeride.org

UPDATED BELOW

I wrote last month that Montpelier may end its probable status as the only state capital without a bus station "before the tulips bloom." Well, the tulips have come and gone, and we're further from having a bus station than we were a month ago. If you come to tonight's City Council meeting, maybe we can push things along a little.

Background: The Taylor Street station on the Carr Lot closed in April. Greyhound looked for a local business willing to sell tickets. Rhapsody on Main Street signed a tentative agreement to sell tickets; the restaurant also provides a handy place to wait for the bus for every departure except 3:30 am. 

Since then, the proposed bus stop next to Rhapsody has come under fire as being disruptive of traffic.

Today, Greyhound's area sales representative, Tony Stone, is coming from his office in Hartford, Connecticut to look at more locations and try to find something that the city will accept. City Councilors or city staff have objected to several other downtown locations, I'm told. 

Mayor Mary Hooper says that, after some thought, she's come around to viewing in front of City Hall as being the best location. It's right downtown, it's close enough to Rhapsody that Rhapsody could still sell tickets, and City Hall itself could be a waiting area. When City Hall is closed, the police station is nearby as a back-up waiting area. For this to work, five parking spaces would be taken out--something that some area merchants have objected to.

Long-haul bus service in Vermont has been gradually shrinking, with Greyhound now serving only Burlington, Montpelier, White River Junction, Bellows Falls, and Brattleboro. With world oil production capacity depleting by 4 million barrels per day each year, and new production lagging, bus and trains are going to become more important than ever in the near term. It's important that Vermont's capital city try to hold onto its bus service and get a bus station that serves people downtown. 

I'm told that the debate in Montpelier has been dominated by concerns about short-term traffic and parking issues. 

If you care about bus service, come to the Montpelier City Council meeting right at 7 pm tonight to use the public comment period to tell City Council why it's important for Vermont's capital city to have long-haul bus service. The Council chambers are in the rear of City Hall.

UPDATE: I had a previous commitment. I've heard numerous reports that it went well, with 6-8 people there to speak on behalf of the bus station, and councilors expressing their support. Tom Stone, the Greyhound representative, was very pleased the next  day. He told me he went into the meeting not sure about the bus continuing to stop in Montpelier, and he left convinced that it could be worked out. No specific proposal was discussed; Stone expected to come to the following meeting with a new proposal.

Montpelier has enjoyed a reputation as the only state capital without a McDonald's (never mind the short distance to the one just outside the small city, on the Barre-Montpelier road) or a Starbucks. For some weeks now, it may have been the only state capital without a bus station.

That distinction looks to be coming to an end before the tulips bloom.

The bus station at the Carr lot on Taylor Street closed on April 3, as The Bridge and the Times Argus have reported. The Times Argus also reported that owners of Rhapsody Café were interested in becoming the new ticket office and waiting area.

Lunch customers at Rhapsody today saw a Greyhound representative sitting down with the owners, the Welters family, to hash out the details. They signed no contract, reports Elysha Welters, but they figured out the information that will go into the contract. The bus will stop outside M&M beverage, just next door. 

Though Rhapsody officially opens at 11:30 am, Welters said that Greyhound customers will be able to come into the store earlier than that to buy a ticket for the 11:30 am bus to White River Junction and connecting points. (Customers who want a quiet place with an internet connection and don't mind a little set-up activity have for some time been welcomed in after 11:00 am.) All other departures, except the 3:30 am departure to Burlington, are during Rhapsody's normal 11:30 am - 8:00 pm hours. They plan to extend their Monday-Saturday operations to Sundays (possibly closing earlier than 8 pm), both for café customers and ticket sales.

Welters expects to start selling tickets within a couple weeks. Until then, customers can buy tickets on line or by telephone (1-800-231-2222), and the bus will continue stopping at the Carr lot.

Welcome back, bus station!

How to build stronger community? I went to three events yesterday, at different scales, that put food together with commerce and music to build community.

I went to three events yesterday, all built around food and friendliness, that I thought all illustrated the small but vital gatherings that build community.

I visited the last-of-the-season winter farmers' market in Montpelier around noon, when the gym at Vermont College was filled with vendors, customers, and the sound of bluegrass music from five musicians on stage. I found it easy to spend well over an hour there, eating lunch, buying some horseradish sauce and kraut, and visiting with lots of friends. Among other things, I located another local source of chicks, learned about Montpelier area backyard chickeners I wasn't familiar with, talked to a soap maker who would be willing to teach her skill, and was promised by a vendor promised the titles and author of detailed books on European folk crafts.

The winter farmers' market went to twice monthly this year, and vendor Alan LePage said on his WGDR show this morning that they considered it a great success, topping $100,000 in sales for the season. The summer farmer's market opens in its usual place, the parking lot next to Julio’s Restaurant and Christ’s Church Parish House, off State Street.

I biked on to Hunger Mountain Co-op. which was celebrating its grand opening after the renovation, with a truckload sale, member discount, horse-drawn wagon rides, and other activities.

Tom Whipple writes a weekly column related to peak oil at the Falls Church (Virginia) News-Press, which I often read on EnergyBulletin.net. This week, he takes on the folly of continuing to build low-mileage cars when there are more cars registered in the US than drivers and we have every reason to believe that gas prices will skyrocket again in a few years.

If we are going to replace enough of those gas-guzzling internal combustion vehicles before they have to be scrapped for lack of affordable fuel, then the sooner we stop the better... Since Washington seems to be telling Detroit what to do these days, let's get them going in the right direction. The first step would be to rapidly phase out the production of large, heavy, internal combustion power vehicles. Halting the manufacture and sale of 2-axle vehicles that do not get over 30 miles per gallon is a good start. If somebody really needs something bigger and less efficient, then there are and will be millions for sale on the used market.

Current fuel standards are a political compromise and absurdly too low for the era. We should be building vehicles that get not less than 100 mpg as soon as possible. Absurd no - such cars have already been built and with crash programs and licensing of existing technologies could be in large scale production in a few years.

The whole thing is worth reading.

The plans for a modest food garden on the State House grounds are proceeding, with energy focussed both on gaining approval from the Capitol Complex Commission and the details of what to plant and how to maintain it.

Sarah Hinckley captured most of the details in an article in today's Times Argus.

As I said in my previous post, interest in homegrown food is taking off. One barrier to getting started in gardening is access to tools. If you've never gardened before, it can be a significant investment to get the set of tools to turn over some sod and get started. Especially if you invest in good tools. If you're turning to gardening to save food dollars in the short run, it's little consolation that good tools are the least expensive ones in the long run.

Some of Vermont's libraries have stepped in to help out. Ruth Hare has an article in today's Times Argus and Rutland Herald, describing the wealth of non-book items that libraries in Vermont lend out, including gardening tools.

Baldwin Memorial Library in Wells River loans out a four-person tent, five pairs of snowshoes, a couple of fishing poles (it's BYOL — bring your own lures), a posthole digger, garden rake, seeder for planting, gardening fork and more...

In Vermont's largest city, Fletcher Free Library serves the community's many storage-challenged apartment dwellers by lending an assortment of yard and garden tools. Safety counts here, too.

"We try not to have any tools that are hazardous," says Lorrie Colburn of the circulation department. That means no chainsaw, no matter how often people may ask for one.

Instead, the library maintains a collection of rakes, push brooms, cultivators, posthole diggers, trowels and other items — "anything that helps beautify and clean up the city," says Colburn. They're attractively arranged behind a picket fence tool stand with artificial flowers.

The collection also includes snow shovels, and people have been known to borrow them in the winter to make a little money clearing driveways and steps, she reports.

Kill-a-Watt digital electrical meters, useful for tracking down where your household or business has the biggest opportunities to save electricity, are also stocked at many libraries.

How about calling up your local library and seeing whether their collection includes gardening tools? And, if not, why not suggest they buy the basics?

I spoke with David Fried of Elmore Roots nursery today, and he's excited about the huge interest in local food in the Montpelier area. He gave a talk at the Montpelier library last night on growing small fruits, and he was told to expect 8-10 people. Sixty five showed up, with people coming 20 minutes early to be sure to get a seat!

It's not just here, of course. Yesterday's Times Argus had an AP article about how seed companies are selling out of seeds for basic vegetable like onion, tomatoes, and peppers.

It seems slow when we're living through it, but by historical standards, the food production system may be going through a rapid transformation toward being more local.

People have been eyeing the State House lawn in Montpelier for a long time, envisioning food production there. Joseph Kiefer of Food Works has given me a Montpelier Food Policy from 1988, prepared by Roger Crowley's 6th grade class at Main Street Middle School, that envisions growing food on the State House lawn.

Now the White House is preparing to break sod for a food garden on the South grounds. They've been getting pressure by many food-related groups to grow food there.

A group formed as part of Transition Town Montpelier is now in advanced discussions with state officials about planting a food garden on the State House lawn this year. The climate is milder in DC, and the White House will probably plant before the State House, but there's a chance we'll be the first State House in the nation with a food garden growing on its lawn.

Watch this space for details.