Fate of Barn Tied to Water Bottling Plan

By Dan Gearino on Wednesday, July 16, 2003.

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For more than a year Barrington residents have opposed a water bottling plant in their town. In other parts of the state, towns have been struggling with how best to preserve barns. In Peterborough, the two issues, water and barns have merged.

The Keene Sentinel's Dan Gearino reports.

The situation in Peterborough
has elements of so many New Hampshire stories: A BUSINESS WANTS TO EXPAND…IN THIS CASE A WATER BOTTLING PLANT. There’s AN historic barn. And TOWN residents FEAR CHANGE.

But the combination of these elements makes for a confusing picture.

First, the pumping station. Monadnock View Holdings wants TO EXPAND its small spring-water business.

Two times, the town zoning board has said no.

And residents have opposed the plan every step of the way.

They DON’T WANT THE increased truck traffic.

AND THEY FEAR the affect the pumping MIGHT have on their wells.

All of this is puzzling to the company’s managing partner, John Blanchette:

QUOTE (12): We’re asking to just remove about 14 truckloads per day.
Probably more like seven truckloads per day as we begin. It’s like putting a
straw in a swimming pool.

REPORTER: But resident Greg Scerbinski (ZERBINSKI) says BLANCHETTE’S PROMISES don’t trump common sense.

QUOTE (15): It’s a rural zone. They’re proposing a commercial operation. And they were denied properly so the first time. And they came back and tried to say it was different. And it’s either you’re pregnant or you’re not
pregnant. Either you’re commercial or you’re not commercial.

REPORTER: But this WATER BOTTLING PLANT ISN’T PLANNED FOR just anywhere.

It WOULD BE located on land that also includes a grand stone barn built nearly a century ago.

Blanchette’s company owns the barn and the land.

And he says that without approval for more pumping, he can’t afford to maintain the barn.

He says he might have to sell the barn to a ski lodge and have it trucked away.

Historian Elizabeth Durfee Hengen of Concord says that stone barns are rare
in New Hampshire.

QUOTE (25): I know of fewer than six stone barns in the state. I actually
only know of two others, but there are probably one or two others out
lurking out there that we know about. But, of the ones we know, this is not
only the most distinctive in terms of its appearance, but it also the very
largest.

REPORTER: Walking the grounds near the barn, Blanchette describes it.

QUOTE (20) (BIRD SOUNDS AVAILABLE FOR MULTI TRACK): It was designed like a church, it has an east west facing to catch the rising run in the morning sun and the setting sun at night. As you’ll notice, the sun is now setting over Monadnock as we speak. There’s 200 yard open field leading up to the mountain. It’s a spectacular site, a magnificent building.

REPORTER: The neighbors love the barn.

But they say that Blanchette is blackmailing them by tying the barn TO THE BOTTLING PLANT.

And they cheered when the town zoning board rejected the pumping plan for the second time last week.

That is, even though Blanchette says this means the barn may go.

So there you have it: A water story and a barn story rolled up in one
package.

The moral, according to Blanchette?

QUOTE (3): Stay away from Peterborough. Peterborough is anti business.

REPORTER: He said that fresh from the sting of last week’s rejection.

But this isn’t over. The company plans to go to court. And one resident,
Cindy Lynch, isn’t resting easy.

QUOTE (14): I wish I could say that I felt great relief, but I don’t think
we’re anywhere near there yet. These folks have had a hard time
understanding that they purchased residential property.

For NHPR news, I’m Dan Gearino.