(vec-new $t) in a generic body was refused as if it had said nothing about
its element type. The feature was not missing: env.tyvars and env.subst are
keyed on the bare name, and type_named and the cast arm asked them of the
name as written, so the spelling with the sigil fell past the guard into the
no-element-type message. (vec-new t) had always worked.
One helper the three of them share, beside resolve_name, which already
stripped for itself. A sigil on a name nothing binds reaches resolve_name
now too, so it is answered as the unbound variable it is.