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A rally for a new Harding High School
BRIDGEPORT – With plans for a new Harding High School stuck in the school board’s facilities committee, some residents plan to hold a rally, hoping to shake the free.
A rally is set for 5 p.m. Monday, April 7, on the steps of city hall, 45 Lyons Terrace.
“The rally at city hall is being organized by concerned families and community members who believe that East End and East Side students deserve a new state-of-the-art high school,” said Brett Broesder, a spokesman for Mayor Bill Finch. Broesder said the mayor shares the sentiment and supports efforts to replace a dilapidated school that’s been in need of repair for more than two decades with a new one. That said, Finch does not plan on participating in the rally, but urges the school board to move forward with this project in a timely manner. The school board’s facilities committee, headed by John Bagley, won’t move forward until it receives a remediation plan that will convince it the school property, on the former GE factory site off Boston Avenue, can be made safe. The ground that sat underneath the factory is filled with toxins. Although the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection has told the committee the school will be brought up to residential standards before it will allow the school to be occupied, the committee apparently wants to see it in writing. Part of the remediation plan involves construction of the school which will encapsulate the toxins not removed from the site.
Bridgeport closer to driveway approval
More than a year after it OK'd construction of a controversial Sikorsky Airport driveway, Stratford zoning officials this week approved the project for a second time. The revised variance issued by Stratford's Zoning Board of Appeals will help Bridgeport, which owns the airport, end a legal dispute over the driveway and move ahead with a long-delayed runway safety project. "We appreciate the decision made by the Stratford ZBA this week," said Edmund Schmidt, an attorney for Bridgeport.
In 2012, contractor Manuel "Manny" Moutinho obtained a zoning variance to build a gravel driveway over Sikorsky to the gates of his mansion on Stratford's shoreline. The driveway is also used by a handful of neighbors. Moutinho, who had already received permission for the driveway from Bridgeport, argued that the original dirt driveway flooded and was unsafe for emergency vehicles.
However, the Breakwater Key condominium association filed a lawsuit because the driveway was planned through neighboring wetlands, and Moutinho never moved forward on the plan.
Meanwhile, Bridgeport determined that Moutinho's old driveway was in the way of the Sikorsky runway work. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
With outlet center, Chesire officials hope one thing leads to another
CHESHIRE — The Outlets at Cheshire — a co-venture of WS Development and Tanger Factory Outlet Centers — is expected to spawn additional economic development in the north end of town.
The sprawling 111-acre complex to be built off Interstate 691 and Route 10 will be anchored by a 510,000-square-foot retail village featuring 60 to 70 outlet stores. “We are not yet able to make any public announcements of tenant identities, but we can tell you that the tenant mix will be in line with the existing Tanger portfolio,” said Laurel Sibert, WS vice president of corporate marketing. Tanger owns or co-owns 44 factory outlet centers in the U.S. and Canada with more than 400 brand-name stores. Tanger Outlets Westbrook includes J. Crew, Timberland, Old Navy, Eddie Bauer, Hollister, Levi’s, Jockey, Nine West, and Bath & Body Works. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
"I would say, by September 30 we have to be out of the water, and for all intents and purposes, the job is substantially complete," he said. A DOT construction schedule shows that work began August 2012 and was originally slated for completion September 2013. Obey said that the start date of construction posed problems, because it came at the end of the four-month window within which the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection allows construction in the water.
The foundation is underwater, and so can only be worked on June through September.
Construction could have been completed more quickly were the town to close the bridge and set up a detour during construction, according to Obey. "Those things have to be factored into the schedule," he said. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Work planned on Norwich's Greeneville Dam
A nearly 200-year-old Norwich dam soon will undergo its annual checkup, and it likely will get a facelift, as well. Early next month, bids are due to City Hall for repairs to the Greeneville Dam, a 401-foot long structure built in the 1820s on the Shetucket River that is operated by Norwich Public Utilities. A pre-bid walkthrough is scheduled for 9 a.m. April 15, and all submissions are due May 8. The dam controls water flow into two of NPU’s hydroelectric plants at 10th and 2nd streets and is of a timber crib design. Logs are set up to create large box-like walls that are then filled in with earth or rubble. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Pressure to push more gas
SOUTHBURY — A massive project to push more natural gas through a pipeline in western Connecticut is being reviewed by federal regulators. Spectra Energy, a Houston-based company, has proposed to expand portions of its Algonquin Gas Transmission system to meet the rising demand for natural gas for heat and power. Algonquin, which spans 1,127 miles of pipeline, originates in New Jersey, crosses the Hudson River in New York, and enters Connecticut in Danbury.
It passes through Southbury, Oxford, Naugatuck, Waterbury and Cheshire northeast to Thompson, then through northwestern Rhode Island to Boston. It has spurs to New Haven and New London.
No pipeline work is planned in Greater Waterbury, although some improvements will be done to the gas compression station inside Oxford's industrial park off Prokop Road. Spectra opened the $25 million facility in Oxford — which includes a compression building, office, control center and garage and maintenance building — six years ago after the town sold it 70 acres in exchange for building Woodruff Hill Road in the industrial park.
Compression stations push gas through a pipeline. They are located every 40 to 50 miles along the Algonquin system. The closest station to the west of Oxford is in Southeast, N.Y., and the closest station to the east is in Cromwell. Marylee Hanley, director of stakeholder outreach for Spectra, said the pipeline improvements are necessary to meet increased demand for natural gas. "Demand for natural gas in the Northeast continues to grow at a really rapid pace. It is replacing other fuel sources," Hanley said. "We need to expand our infrastructure." The project, which has met opposition by some New York residents who say it is unnecessary, calls for replacing approximately 19.6 miles of existing 26-inch-diameter pipeline with 42-inch-diameter pipeline in Rockland, Westchester and Putnam counties in New York, and in Danbury. In those areas, the company will reopen the trench, lift out portions of the old pipeline, and replace it with the larger pipes in the same right of way, Hanley said. It also plans to lay more than 1 mile of new pipeline under the Hudson River using a drilling technique that will push the pipeline through bedrock beneath the river. Additional pipeline expansion will be done in Middlesex, Hartford and New London counties in Connecticut, and in Norfolk and Suffolk counties in Massachusetts. Five compression stations will be modified to boost horsepower to move the additional gas, according to the application. Twenty-five metering and regulating stations along the pipeline will be improved. They include stations in Southbury and Waterbury. The Algonquin pipeline has been in operation for more than 60 years, and is the largest source of natural gas in the Northeast. It transports natural gas to local distribution companies like Yankee Gas, Southern Connecticut Gas and Connecticut Natural Gas. It connects to the Texas Eastern line — which has 9,200 miles of pipeline that runs from the Gulf Coast to the Northeast — in New Jersey. Hanley said the Algonquin application is pending with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. She said Spectra hopes to get a certificate to begin construction in the first quarter of 2015. The work would be completed in November 2016 if it starts on time, she said.
Construction firm takes ownership on Conn. Studios project
SOUTH WINDSOR — A Delaware construction company has taken ownership of a proposed multimillion-dollar film studio complex through court proceedings.
The company, dck North America LLC of Delaware, sold and then repurchased Halden Acquisition Group’s 50 percent interest in Connecticut Studios on Monday in a public sale in Pittsburgh.The amount paid for Connecticut Studios is unknown, but Halden owed dck more than $2 million, according to documents filed in federal bankruptcy court in Rhode Island.
Also unknown is how much money changed hands when Halden’s former partner in Connecticut Studios, Pacifica Ventures of Santa Barbara, Calif., experienced the same fate last year, when, court records indicate, dck held a secured party sale against Pacifica Ventures’ membership interests.