Recently there had been some concerns about which aspects of the project would be reimbursable by the $200,000 state grant or the $4.2 million federal appropriation. Those concerns had slowed the planning process a little while a dialogue was established with the Federal Transportation Agency and the New York Department of Transportation.

But as trolley committee chairman Giles Russell pointed out to representatives from CLA Site, the project consultants, ``We’re five months into the schedule and we’re three months behind.’’

The Linden Avenue project, or the Village Gateway Improvement Project as it is now being called, has been a slow process. It took a year from the time the federal appropriation was announced until there was talk of finding a firm to do the site analysis and design work.

In the meantime, Linden Avenue residents are growing impatient. The street is in bad shape and little has been done to improve the traffic and congestion since the village sought to close the Linden Avenue extension.

A group of them attended last Friday’s meeting to again plead with officials for some kind relief.

Officials could offer little to residents other than reassurances they would get the project moving and scheduled the first public presentation about the project. The consultant will have some concepts put together in an effort to gather public input.

While we are pleased the project is starting to pick up speed, our long standing concern about who will pay the operations and maintenance cost of the visitor center and parking lot once it is finished has not been addressed.

Not only has it not been addressed, it hasn’t received the slightest mention, except perhaps in passing, by the board of trustees or the officials involved in the project planning process.

If a new revenue stream is not found to extract money from the visitors who will be using the facility or a cooperative agreement is not reached with Bassett Hospital, whose employees will use the parking lot, the burden will be almost guaranteed to fall to village taxpayers. [an error occurred while processing this directive]