What about from a permitting/code perspective? If the barn is already part of the footprint then it might be easier to fix it up then go through whatever environmental permit process related to impermeable surfaces etc. etc.

Vermont Energy Contracting & Supply. I'm in Chittenden County. Love the ducted system, they just tore out the furnace and replaced it with an air handler with a heat pump coil and one outdoor unit. We repurposed existing ductwork so no noticeable difference outside the basement.

1200sf 2 story house, 18k centrally ducted Mistubishi. Most would consider this quite undersized! But we got our home sealed and insulated beforehand. We do well, but start to droop when it gets below -5 (currently mid sixties in the house and -13 outside). Last winter we had a -15 to 0 stretch for 48 hrs and the house stayed in the 60s.

Huge caveat here. We have an internal electric resistance duct heater that is NOT working and has never worked due to a broken relay we discovered today. It's 5 kW on a dedicated 30 Amp breaker. If this was working I'm sure we'd be up to 70F indoors no problem. Get your installer to test the backup electric heat!

Not necessarily. For most recreational mountain bike trails I'm familiar with, access is at the landowner's discretion. Famously, a few years ago, landowners in East Burke revoked access on what had been some of the most popular trails in the state.

On the other hand, I know of some properties that the state sold to timber companies where public hiking access was a condition of the sale. Not sure what sort of legal process would need to happen to get that changed.

And then there are town highways and legal trails. These are public rights of way found on the town highway map that pass through private parcels. If a new landowner wanted to prevent access, they'd need to go through the town selectboard who would bring it to a vote. This seems to happen regularly.

These are interesting stats, thanks for sharing. Just note that you'll need to add state lands to that. The statistics seem only to refer to federally owned land.

Compared to western states, Vermont has a large percentage of private land.

However, what makes VT unique is the amount of public access to private lands. Forests in the north are comminly owned by large timber or maple companies but maintain public access easements for hiking, winter access, and permitted hunting. You'll have WMAs or state parks or town forests here and there, but only sporadically.

Similarly, most mountain biking networks traverse private lands with permission. VT has robust legislation to limit landowner liability, and we're lucky enough to have landowners excited to be a part of mountain bike networks.

The south has bug chunks of National Forest where there's tons of access. But that's a small minority of the state's area.