The Martha’s Vineyard Land Bank commission announced this week that it had purchased 19.8 acres on Tea Lane in Chilmark abutting its Middle Ridge Preserve. The sellers were Fielding and Elizabeth Lewis, and the price was $1,200,000.
The preserve was originally created in 1994 when Mr. Lewis and his brothers sold the Land Bank a notable hilltop lot comprising some seven acres, according to a press release: “Remarkable are the long-distance view from the summit: the Tisbury Great Pond, the plains of Edgartown and, on clear days, the standpipe on Nantucket Island.”
The purpose of the new purchase, which brings the total size of the preserve to 26.8 acres, is to conserve the slopes on the hilltop’s southerly flanks. One of the preliminary management goals calls for examination of whether the land is suited to agricultural uses such as grazing.