Great Barrington — Hikers who make a daily trek up Monument Mountain were greeted with a surprise last week. It wasn’t a bear, or a moose, or the apparitions of Melville, Hawthorne, or the heartbroken Mohican maiden who, legend has it, hurled herself off a quartzite ledge.
It was a pay-and-display parking kiosk.
The Trustees of Reservations, the conservation entity that manages 113 properties across the state, recently installed kiosks at five of them. Monument’s has not yet gone live, and in fact, it is still wrapped in its cardboard box. But when it does, parking will cost $5 per car, unless one has a membership, which ranges from $37 to $67 per year, depending.
Susan Lacombe, one of a number of local die-hards who hike Monument every morning as an antidote — both physical and economic — to the gym, wondered how she would manage a $5 per day parking habit, before she realized she could get a membership. “I’m all for supporting it,” she said. “As long as it stays accessible for locals.”
“Revenue is only part of the story,” said David Beardsley, the Trustees’ Director of Enterprise. While The Trustees does not sneeze at any source of funds, given the expanse of land and historic sites under its stewardship, Beardsley said that the organization is “trying to understand more about visitors and visiting patterns. We think we have 20,000 visiting Monument, but don’t have a way of calculating that.”
Beardsley said the kiosk would give a “breakdown of members versus non-members,” and because the kiosk asks visitors to enter their zip code, The Trustees will get a sense of a property’s “geographic reach.”
“We want to learn more about who is using the properties so we can serve them better.”
Money from the parking kiosks will go into the general operating budget, Beardsley added, to fund programming and stewardship. “It will benefit Monument Mountain without a doubt.”
Members of The Trustees will receive a postcard with a parking code on it. Beardsley said it should go out in the mail this week, and that the machines will go live soon after.
The parking kiosks are a new idea, he added, and The Trustees plan to evaluate the system and decide whether to install machines at its other properties. “The hope is that this will also add incentive to join The Trustees, because membership is critical to the work we’re doing around the state. We hope that this becomes another way for people to support the organization.”
Enforcement of the new system will be gentle. “We’re not going to be enforcing in a rigorous or in your face way at all. There will be signs to say that the fees support property care.” Staff who are at the site on any given day, will place reminders to use the system on windshields of cars that are without tickets.
The Trustees are “focused on expanding programming and stewardship in the Berkshires,” Beardsley added, given the popularity of Monument, Naumkeag and The Mission House in Stockbridge. The Trustees, who had already owned and managed 503-acres of the mountain, partnered with Fish & Game last June to purchase 45-acres of private land that provides access to, and includes, the Flag Rock overlook on the southwest slope of the mountain, and 280-acres that includes Monument’s highest elevation. Private parcels on Monument have been donated or sold to The Trustees over the years; the original gift was 260-acres from Helen C. Butler in 1899.
The plan is to eventually connect the Monument Trails with the Flag Rock trails that begin in Housatonic Village; the town earlier this month voted to allocate $20,000 in Community Preservation Act (CPA) funds to repair existing trails on Monument and to begin the planning of trails and a trailhead for the Flag Rock overlook. The Trustees plan to eventually site an official trailhead with parking and kiosk in Housatonic, but will first take the community’s pulse to find the best location for it. Once a decision is made, The Trustees may in future request more CPA money to build the new trail.
The Mountain’s history includes the legend of that fallen Mohican maiden, as told by poet William Cullen Bryant, and the crystallization of a friendship between Herman Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne. That and its beauty and diverse wildlife habitat have made it a popular summer playground since the mid-19th century.
Beardsley said that The Trustees is not “in any financial distress,” and that the organization has a “strong membership base and balanced budgets.” The organization, he added, wants to grow its resources to make sure its “ambitious goals” can be accomplished.
“We want the properties to stay beautiful, safe and open.”
