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Cyclists ride along the Colchester Causeway on Aug. 11. The causeway will close for repairs in September. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDigger

The Colchester causeway is set to close at the end of the month to begin major infrastructure work as part of a $1.8 million series of repairs.

The popular Island Line recreation trail spans three miles across Lake Champlain connecting Colchester to the town of South Hero. The path runs on the former route of the Rutland Railroad and draws thousands of cyclists, runners and walkers each year.

The causeway will be closed on Sept. 3 and is expected to reopen for Memorial Day weekend next year.

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Glen Cuttitta, Colchester’s director of Parks and Recreation, said the path was heavily damaged during a storm on May 4 last year where winds exceeding 70 miles per hour sent 7-foot waves crashing over the trail. It closed for two months before reopening in July after assistance from the state.

“It kind of just eroded significant portions of the causeway and rendered some areas impassable,” he said.

Signs and orange cones presently mark the spots where cyclists have to watch out for patches where the path has been partially washed out. Additional erosion of the path occurred during high-water levels on the lake this spring.

Crews will be placing heavy armor stones to make the causeway more durable, along with medium sized stones to build it up, and a new layer of crushed stone will be added onto the path’s surface.

That work follows immediate repairs after the 2018 storm to make the path usable. The majority of the costs are covered through a $1.15 million Federal Emergency Management Agency disaster recovery grant. The state is also contributing funding, leaving the town of Colchester covering about $100,000 of the project.

Vermont’s congressional delegation helped secure the FEMA funding through a federal disaster declaration for five counties.

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The total price tag on the causeway work – including the temporary repairs last year – is $1.8 million, according to Cuttitta.

He said the narrow path only allows for one to two trucks at a time to transport stones and equipment, making the work difficult, time consuming and expensive.

This is not the first time the trail has faced erosion challenges. The causeway was previously closed for nearly 18 months after storm damages in 2012, before Colchester received FEMA funds to reopen the path.

Cyclists and pedestrians gather at the end of Colchester Causeway on Aug. 11. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDigger

“The challenge is it’s in the middle of a lake,” Cuttitta said. “And so it’s really at the mercy of Mother Nature, so to speak.”

He said new regional bike network connections have made the causeway an increasingly important recreation site beyond the town of Colchester.

“We see comments online with people who visited as a national kind of destination for biking because of its uniqueness being in the middle of a lake and the spectacular views and experience that it gives people,” Cuttitta said. “So I think it’s a vital resource to the state.”

Local Motion, a Burlington-based bike and walk advocacy organization, operates a ferry to transport cyclists across “The Cut,” a 200-foot gap in the causeway between Colchester and South Hero. The ferry normally runs into October, but will close for the season on Sept. 2 this year because of the work.

Karen Yacos, the organization’s executive director, said the bike ferry draws about 15,000 passengers each year. She said the closure is unfortunate but well worth the wait for an improved path.

“I think most people that love the causeway and the ferry are happy to see that it’s going to be taken care of in the way that Colchester is going to take care of it,” she said.