Put Your Community First
Kristina Cannon, Main Street Skowhegan
Credit: MXH Marketing; Home Page Photo Credit: OSI
Hey, I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but there are SO MANY awesome outdoor resources available to us here in New England. Have you ever stopped to wonder how those amazingly mapped and maintained trail networks or hut systems or water access points come to be?
Probably no surprise, there are a LOT of people and organizations hustling in the background, because big projects like those usually require a LOT of cooperation and alignment on a lot of fronts. For every great trail system you enjoy, there are probably 100 that never left the drafting table.
We’ve touched on this a little bit in the past, recently when I talked to Abby Bennett about the Mahoosuc Land Trust here in Maine, and before that when Jen Klein joined me from the Trustees of the Reservations in Massachusetts - both of those organizations are doing great work of preserving and promoting outdoor spaces for the public to enjoy.
It’s not too difficult to recognize the beauty and potential when you’re looking out from a mountain top or over a pristine lake or dramatic oceanfront cliff. But what about the turn of the century mill towns scattered across the state that used to harness Maine’s countless rivers for manufacturing power? When buildings and dams and ugly fences and parking lots are crowding your urban center’s waterfront, do you have any options?
Today’s guest says Heck YES! I’m stoked to welcome Kristina Cannon, Executive Director of Main Street Skowhegan to the pod.
I found Main Street Skowhegan after I saw some kind of social media post about a whitewater park that was going to be built on the Kennebec River in Maine and went down a Google rabbit hole (as one does). I had a mental picture of kayak racks and PFDs piled up in a dirt parking lot in some rural location along the river, but heck no - it’s going to be right smack dab in the middle of downtown Skowhegan!
The Skowhegan Riverpark Project is just one of about a zillion cool things that Main Street Skowhegan is working on, with Kristina at the helm, so I’m going to let her tell you all about it and get you stoked for your own Skowhegan Staycation.
We just missed the craft brew fest, but there are plenty more reasons to visit Skowhegan coming up, head over to VisitSkowhegan.com or check out @visitskowhegan on Instagram and Facebook for all the details on upcoming festivals and events.
Better yet, when you decide that Skowhegan sounds like a pretty cool place to take your remote work - where you can run some rapids in the morning, run your financials an hour later and be running out for locally sourced wood-fired pizza at lunch - go to Main Street Skowhegan or Skowhegan Entrepreneurship to find out how easy it will be to make those dreams your reality!
Main Street America program - and the 10 accredited communities in Maine:
Skowhegan (Main Street Skowhegan)
Belfast (Our Town Belfast)
Rockland (Rockland Main Street)
Augusta (Augusta Downtown Alliance)
Gardiner (Gardiner Main Street)
Bath (Main Street Bath)
Brunswick (Brunswick Downtown Association)
Westbrook (Discover Downtown Westbrook)
Saco (Saco Main Street)
Biddeford (Heart of Biddeford)
And more links from our conversation:
What is a 'design charette'? (this link will tell you AND give you all the info you need to host your own!)
Mill City Park (Franklin, NH)Maine Community Foundation
Big Pock (Class IV rapid on West Branch of Penobscot)
Kingdom Trails (VT)