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Village of Steep Falls Gets Its Groove Back

August 04, 2009 - STEEP FALLS -- Ellen Walker can remember band concerts on the Steep Falls village green when she was kid. She can even remember how the neighbor's dog howled when the trumpets started in.

But that was more than 60 years ago. Since then, what was one of the busiest villages in Standish has become quieter and less like a village.

Now times are changing, again, in Steep Falls.

"We've got a lot of things going on," said Walker, who lives across from the Post Office in the same house where she was born 77 years ago.

As president of the Steep Falls Improvement Society, Walker is helping drive a series of projects that are bringing back the village's old charm and vitality.

Earlier this month, the town received a $60,000 federal grant to create a new playground and skateboard park in Steep Falls, and villagers hope to begin work this fall. The playground effort follows library improvements two years ago and the construction last summer of a new gazebo on the village green, where children are once again gathering for live entertainment.

"It's new and it's old," said David Robinson, a village resident and local historian.

Steep Falls lies at the northwestern tip of Standish, next to the Saco River. The center of the village, at the intersection of routes 11 and 113, used to have a busy train station. Youths from Portland and points south would arrive to meet buses on their way to camps in western Maine.

The village is quieter now, but still has a library, post office, store and small businesses, including a furniture maker and soap maker.

It also has new families who brought new energy to the community, Robinson said. "I think a lot of people moved here and realized it's a nice village, like the old days," he said.

The revitalization efforts have been building for the past two years, since the designation of Route 113 as a scenic byway attracted the attention of town officials, such as former Town Councilor Carolyn Biegel, Walker said. Their support has helped bring grant money for the projects.

Villagers also have donated a lot of time to the effort, Walker said. Volunteers built the gazebo, for example, and local gardeners and an arborist helped improve the landscaping, she said.

Volunteers are now preparing to build the new playground, too. The site for that project – town-owned land on Mill Street – used to be home to the village's schoolhouse and is now a rustic ice skating rink and vacant lot.

The land offers a perfect opportunity to give kids a place to play, said Biegel, the former councilor.

"The residents said these kids need a place. You can't tell them you can't (skateboard) down the road or the post office steps, but not give them a place to do those things," she said.

The grant will pay for a landscape architect to design a playground and skateboard area and buy equipment. The ice rink will remain there for winter recreation.

"The reason that it's doable is because the community members are willing to do all the in-kind work," Biegel said. "We'd like to actually install the playground equipment this fall and then in the spring finish landscaping."

The new energy in the village, and the return of the gazebo and red-white-and-blue bunting, is exciting to longtime residents as well as newcomers, Walker said.

"With all the nostalgia, they're having a great time," she said. "Some of them have been here longer than I have."

The Steep Falls Improvement Society, which had been virtually inactive, has been meeting monthly once again. And at the February meeting, the members decided to put the new gazebo back to work.

"Someone said, 'What do you say we have a band concert?'" Walker said.

This month, about 200 people – mostly kids – gathered on the green for a magic show. And Walker is now arranging a band concert for August.

By JOHN RICHARDSON, Staff Writer, Portland Press Herald, July 30, 2009


Lakes:
Regions: Sebago, Sanford


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