You save money on home energy costs and the Friends of the Pumpkinvine receive $25

The Friends of the Pumpkinvine Nature Trail, Inc. have joined with Energizing Indiana in a program to reduce your home energy costs and also generates funds for the trail and.

Energizing Indiana will donate $25 to Friends of the Pumpkinvine for each household that completes a free home-energy assessment and designates Friends as their beneficiary. The assessment can lower your home’s energy consumption, improve your home’s air quality and increase your home’s value.

The best way to schedule an energy assessment with Energize Indiana is through a link to the Energizing Indiana website on our website homepage: http://www.pumpkinvine.org/.   This link will take you to the Friends-of-the-Pumpkinvine scheduling page. It gives you the opportunity to schedule the assessment at your convenience and select the best appointment time. Here are the steps in the process.

1. Schedule your energy assessment through the link at www.pumpkinvine.org.
2. After you schedule the energy assessment, Energizing Indiana will contact you by phone to set up a time to make the assessment.
3. Then a representative of Energizing Indiana will come to your home and make the assessment. It takes about an hour. On that visit, they will inspect your home’s exterior, attic, furnace and water heater and appliances for ways to reduce your energy bills. They will also bring an energy savings kit that includes 20 compact florescent light bulbs, energy-efficient faucet and shower heads and insulation for water heater pipes – all installed for free. 
4. Finally, the Energizing Indiana representative will give you an energy-assessment report outlining weatherization steps that could improve your homes energy efficiency. You may or may not follow up on their suggestions at your own expense.

In short, the assessment and the energy saving kit are free, further weatherization is up to you, and for every assessment made through our website, Energizing Indiana will donate $25 to the Friends of the Pumpkinvine.

There are a few limitations to the program: your home must have been built before Jan. 1, 2010 and have had no utility sponsored energy assessment in the past three years.

I hope that you will take advantage of this opportunity to save on your energy bills and at the same time support the Friends of the Pumpkinvine Nature Trail, Inc.

Jigsaw puzzle of the Pumpkinvine in Middlebury

Area to be widened along Railroad Street in Middlebury

Table Talk

The latest Pumpkinvine newsletter is online: Pumpkinvine Trail Talk

Elkhart Truth article on Sept. 5 fatal accident

Another article about the accident on the Pumpkinvine in September:  Elkhart Truth

The November Pumpkinvine Newsletter is online:  Pumpkinvine Trail Talk

Remarks at the ribbon cutting ceremony for three new sections of the Pumpkinvine Nature Trail

A generous community built this trail

Middlebury, Ind.

Oct. 9, 2013

It’s an honor to represent the Friends of the Pumpkinvine at this ribbon cutting. Our volunteer organization has championed the rails-to-trails concept for this old corridor for over 20 years, and I’m thrilled today to see two more sections officially opened. It was 20 years ago, October 1993, that we signed a purchase agreement with Penn Central to buy the Pumpkinvine corridor, and the closing was in December of that year. When funding for the corridor was in place, we donated the land to the appropriate public agency.

Between the purchase and donation, we were busy. There were title searches of every corridor parcel, petitions and resolutions of support, letter-writing campaigns to public officials, creation of a website, fundraising letters and dinners, consultations with trail experts, visits to dozens of trails, travel to rails-to-trails conferences, walks with supporters to show off the corridor, news releases, 60 newsletters, a dozen brochures, eight lawsuits, three meditations, two additional purchases of land, and numerous negotiations for fencing.

Given all the hurdles in this 20-year marathon, what sustained the vision to recycle an old railroad corridor into a linear park? Many factors were involved, but the key was the generosity of people in Goshen, Middlebury and Shipshewana. We discovered huge numbers of people who believed that recycling an abandoned railroad into shared public space would improve the communities’ quality of life. Rails-to-trails isn’t just about creating a place for a few bicyclists, joggers, dog walkers or roller bladders to enjoy; it’s about creating shared public space where people can interact on a human scale, where it’s possible to talk to friends as you ride, walk as a family in nature and ride to work off road.

I can illustrate that community generosity with one story. South of Sunrise Lane is a section of the old corridor where the railroad received the land as an easement. That meant that the land reverted to the adjacent landowners when the railroad abandoned service.  Consequently, there was a gap in our ownership of the corridor, too, when we purchased it. But, fortunately for all of us, one family owned all the land on the west side of the Pumpkinvine in the easement area, and they had a vision for the possibilities of a linear park on the Pumpkinvine corridor. They were Ike and Mary Heign. Sometime after Ike’s untimely death, we approached Mary and her family about buying their half of the corridor, and they said yes. What a gift to the community! Without that section, the trail stops and Sunrise Lane; there is no link to U.S 20 on the old corridor.

Someday soon there will be recognition of their vision on the trail in a section named for Ike Heign. To me, they are true heroes of the day.

            I wish there were time to tell more stories about how generous this community has been with this project, but just let me say of our supporters, on behalf of the Friends’ board, thank you for the many ways you have enabled the creation of this trail. Thank you for your gifts of time, talent, money, and words of encouragement. You are the generous community that has created an awesome linear park. 

Photos of the ribbon cutting are at:  Ribbon cutting

Elkhart Truth article on accident of Sept. 5

This article spells out some of the circumstances of the accident:  Elkhart Truth article