Main Street Committee to to address sidewalk
CHESTER - The Main Street Project Committee will hold a public information session Tuesday, April 22 at 7 p.m. at the Town Hall. First Selectman Ed Meehan said the session has been called "to address the sidewalk-design issue." Over the past few months, neighbors along Main Street have been attending meetings of the Main Street Project Committee and have voiced concerns over proposals that would extend a sidewalk along the north side of Main Street, past the town-owned North Quarter Park, to the intersection of Route 154. The proposal requires a new, four-foot-wide sidewalk be constructed from School Lane to Route 154, the cutting down of some large trees near the North Quarter Park, and removal of a privacy hedge at 137 Main Street. In a petition signed by 35 residents and submitted last month to the Board of Selectmen, the neighbors say cutting the trees near North Quarter Park adversely affects "this gateway into Chester village." The petition continues, "The destruction of these trees and the proposed concrete sidewalk that stretches to Route 154 makes Chester urban and city-like...We, as residents of Chester, like rural and the charm in Chester. Is the additional north sidewalk worth destroying these trees, changing the rural nature of our town? Let's not drain the life from Main Street." CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Morgan Construction on hold pending permits
The good news is that no funding has been lost for the new Morgan School Project; the bad news is that timelines have been delayed due to permit acquisition both at the state and federal level.
According to State Representative Tom Vicino and Clinton Superintendent of Schools Dr. Jack Cross, at the present time no funding for the $64.7 million new Morgan School construction has been disturbed due to an extended timeline. The state is still committed to funding $19.1 million of the cost of the project, which includes the construction of the new high school on 35 acres on the Route 81 property. The holdup on the timeline, according to the Morgan School Building Committee Chairman Gerry Vece, is the Condition Letter of Map Revision (CLOMR) required from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, due to the fact that wetlands on the site will be affected by replacement of a culvert. The culvert replacement also required the completion of both the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Programmatic General Permit (PGP) and the Department of Energy & Environmental Protection (DEEP) 401 Water Quality Permit, which ensure that any discharge is consistent with the federal Clean Water Act and the Connecticut Water Quality Standards. Based upon the extent of the work, each of these applications required the completion of a flood study to analyze the impacts of the work within the floodplain and floodway. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
City on track with brownfield site
TORRINGTON — Mayor Elinor C. Carbone is determined to have the first phase of redevelopment of 100 Franklin St. finished by Aug. 1. She said the city is on track to meet that deadline set by the Environmental Protection Agency, which has provided the city with an $800,000 brownfield revolving loan fund for the cost of contamination cleanup. The work is expected to cost $670,000. The city will use the loan fund to pay for the work and then over time the city will repay the loan and remaining funding will be earmarked for future brownfield projects. Carbone said a 26,000-square-foot parking lot with 45 spaces will be installed parallel to Franklin Street. The area of the city is growing as new restaurants have opened recently on Franklin and East Main streets, prompting the need for additional parking. The city purchased the 2-acre, dogleg-shaped property that hugs the Naugatuck River for $1 in January and since has been lining up approvals to begin construction. If work isn't finished by Aug. 1, the city could lose the federal funding. The property formerly was home to the Torrington Manufacturing building, which was on the market for years and which the previous administration tried to market to investors as a mixed-use space for housing and retail. Cleanup concerns sent potential redevelopers packing, even after the building was demolished and reduced to a pile of bricks in 2010 in an effort to sell the space while eliminating some work for a new owner. Nobody bought, until it was offered to the city for a buck. Carbone said seeing the project through has been a priority for her since she took office in December. As a part of the EPA approval process environmental consultants held a hearing at City Hall Tuesday. Only two people attended: resident Jacque Williams and Gerald Carbone, the mayor's husband. The consultants, who began studying the property in 2007, said 16 areas of contamination concern have been found, but the extent of what needs to be cleaned up will be determined by final tests. The solutions range from digging out the top four feet of soil and taking it away to paving the entire lot with three inches of asphalt to seal in dirty soil. Michael M. Gaughan, senior project geologist for HRP Associates, said the property was developed for industrial use in 1885 and the last buildings were torn down in 2010. In between, various industrial processes, including metal plating and metal work using oil laden machines, were done on the property leading to the possibility of contamination. He said contaminants in the soil came from spills or illegal dumping and also from scraping smoke stacks and using coal dust as fill. Arthur Bogen, of Down to Earth Consulting Solutions, said the work on phase one will help the city determine how much it will cost to complete phase two. He said the city will be able to study the cost of phase one, once that is complete and extrapolate the cost to the remainder of the property. "We can have great confidence that the solution is protective of human health and it stops environmental degradation that was a byproduct of the former use," Bogen said. "We are headed in the right direction."