WESTPORT — European expats Stefanie and Marc Lemcke moved with their two children to 66 North Ave. four years ago unaware their new home was across from a water tank.
“It was perfectly covered, nobody knew what was going on until two years ago when construction started on the site,” Stefanie Lemcke said of the North Avenue water tank. “When we walked over and asked what this was for they were like, oh, we are upgrading the water pump.”
Lemcke asked the Aquarion Water Company workers how long their work would take and she said they said six months.
But, “It wasn’t six months,” Lemcke said. “It almost took them 18 months to complete the upgrade of the water pump. There was a lot of noise and construction lights in our house. We were like, wow, it’s really weird no one has informed us.”
“Fast forward, they finally completed this and never planted anything,” Lemcke said. “Then we got a notice we are now invited to a neighborhood meeting with two days notice basically informing us they’re planning to build new water tanks. Not just the one tank that’s in the ground, but tanks.”
Lemcke was traveling for work and couldn’t attend. Her husband went instead and said only five neighbors attended.
Aquarion’s Director of Public Relations, Peter Fazekas confirmed Aquarion sent out a notice on June 26 for the meeting two days later on June 28.
“We heard about this gigantic project tripling the water storage, building two 40 foot towers where the one tower is. The current tower is only 12 feet above ground,” Lemcke said.
“There were a lot of questions coming up. Why this location? This is across from Staples and one of the busiest roads in the town,” Lemcke added.
At the July 20 Planning and Zoning Commission public meeting Planning and Zoning Director Mary Young attempted to assuage resident concerns.
“I guess I’m speaking from a defensive position because I was at that meeting, I spent a lot of time working with Aquarion along with some of my department heads to make this as modest a scope of work as possible to simultaneously meet the demands and the needs of Westport residents.,” said Young at the June 20 meeting.
Officials say water demands in town have increased dramatically since the North Avenue water tank was built in 1956. As Robert Yost, Chief of the Westport Fire Department said at the same meeting, “Homes in this town are getting larger and larger, as we all know, and made of synthetic building materials. All this requires more water to extinguish.”
“During peak summer usage sometimes that tank gets down to three feet,” Yost said. “I’m losing a lot of sleep. I think back to the Saugatuck Congregational Church Fire that happened in the winter. Had that happened in the summer, those hydrants would’ve went dry and we would have lost the church.” CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Mortgage holder on Norwich portion of former Norwich Hospital property files foreclosure
Norwich — The minority ownership members of Thames River Landing LLC, which owns the nearly 50-acre Norwich portion of the former Norwich Hospital property, have become frustrated at the lack of progress on development plans, and the member who financed the purchase of the land from the state has filed a foreclosure lawsuit against the LLC.
Thames River Landing LLC, headed by developer Mark Fields, purchased the three separate parcels on the Norwich side for a combined total of $300,000 from the state in October 2015, with Castanho Development LLC providing a $450,000 mortgage for the purchase at the time.
On Oct. 3, Castanho Development LLC, headed by Carl Castanho of East Hartford, filed foreclosure action in New London Superior Court, claiming that Thames River Landing has defaulted on the mortgage and a demand for full payment of the $584,898 in principal, interest and fees now owed.
Thames River Landing also owes $84,047 in back property taxes and interest through November bills to the city, which has top priority in any foreclosure action. If the taxes remain unpaid, city officials plan to schedule a tax sale auction for early 2018 on the three properties, listed as 705 Laurel Hill Road, 626 Laurel Hill Road and one listed as just Laurel Hill Road.
The property abuts the much larger 388-acre former Norwich Hospital property in Preston. Unlike Preston, Norwich declined an offer from the state to take over ownership and cleanup responsibility of the Norwich piece. The state sold the three parcels containing dozens of abandoned buildings and some contaminated land “as is” to Thames River Landing. Preston last year reached a development agreement with Mohegan Gaming and Entertainment for a major $400 million to $600 million development of the Preston portion, once final environmental cleanup is completed by the town.
Two minority partners of Thames River Landing LLC said this past week they welcomed the court foreclosure action and hope it will allow Castanho to become the lead owner of Thames River Landing to spur the cleanup and development of the property.
“It’s just a matter of trying to get it going,” minority partner Anna Valente of Glastonbury said. “We have no idea what he’s (Fields) doing. It’s been four years, and nothing has happened yet.”
Castanho declined to comment on the lawsuit.
Fields, listed as the managing member of the LLC, did not return phone calls seeking comment on the foreclosure action.
Castanho filed a motion for default on Oct. 30 after Fields failed to respond to the suit by the Oct. 24 court deadline, but Montville attorney William McCoy filed an appearance on behalf of Thames River Landing on Thursday. McCoy declined to comment on the foreclosure action Thursday. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Road Construction outside sub base will impact access; main gate will be closed
Groton — Those with access to the Naval Submarine Base may experience delays and a change in traffic patterns near the base's main gate as the intersection of Crystal Lake Road and Military Highway will be under construction through Nov. 18.
In addition to possible delays and changed traffic patterns, the main gate will be closed to all inbound and outbound vehicle traffic from 10 p.m. through 5:45 a.m. from Nov. 12 through Nov. 15. Pedestrian access at the main gate will be unaffected.
During the closure, Gate 5 along Route 12, commonly referred to as the "hospital gate," will be open for inbound and outbound vehicle traffic.
NY realty developer Avner Krohn helps lead New Britain’s comeback
Visit downtown New Britain and you'll see a change. The city of 73,000, consigned to the New England rust belt after most of its factories closed and two highways split the city, is making a comeback.
Business leaders cite the CTfastrak rapid bus system, transit-oriented developments and pedestrian-friendly streets as signs of a nascent, but visible rebirth. They also credit Avner Krohn, a 35-year-old developer from Long Island.
New Britain's Economic Development Director Bill Carroll wonders, "If Avner were not part of downtown, where would we be?"
Krohn stumbled on New Britain in 2006 when he took a wrong turn while passing through Connecticut. Though the story may sound apocryphal, Krohn acknowledges that when he discovered New Britain he found the city charming; he was impressed with its potential, historic architecture and the desire of residents he met to turn things around.
He has chaired the New Britain Downtown District where he participated in urban planning, streetscape design and promoted a "gentrification" of the city. To Krohn, this means buying decaying properties to revitalize neighborhoods and, wherever possible, do historic rehabilitations.
Though Krohn's company, Jasko Development, owns multiple properties in Connecticut and New Jersey, his five buildings in New Britain cover over 100,000 square feet worth more than $10 million.
Working with three city mayors, Krohn's efforts have resulted in a more active downtown and a pro-development attitude among city leaders, officials said.
"Avner saw a community he could invigorate," said New Britain Mayor Erin Stewart. "Together with three different administrations he worked to preserve the city's historic past while focusing on its future."
His most recent project, the Raphael Building on 99 West Main St., is a mixed-use retail and residential building, a project he calls the culmination of his work in the city. Sixteen above-market luxury apartments are available. They include one- and two-bedroom units with rents ranging from $1,075 to $1,500 a month.
"To me, it's my most gratifying, most beautiful project, something that should have a positive effect for future projects downtown," Krohn said.
Working with Central Connecticut State University Professor Leah Glaser and her historical preservation class, the Jasko team used more than $400,000 in historic tax credits to complete the project. The city received a grant in 2015 from the Connecticut Main Street Center program to determine the project's feasibility in turning the decayed 1925 building into residential housing above commercial space. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Final Piece Of Hartford's Front Street Now Under Construction
Downtown’s Front Street, where construction first began in 2008, is now seeing its final piece — apartments and retail space along Arch Street — starting to fall into place.
Construction on the fourth and final phase of Front Street got underway Thursday, a day after the closing on nearly $23 million in financing for the project that will add 53 apartments and nearly 11,000 square feet of shop and restaurant space. The project — three stories of rental units over street-level retail — is expected to be ready for occupancy in early 2019. The construction follows closely on the August opening of the University of Connecticut’s new downtown campus across Arch Street.
Peter J. Christian, director of development at HB Nitkin Group, Front Street’s developer, said downtown Hartford apartment leasing remains strong, making the developer optimistic about future demand for more rentals. “We are eager to get going,” Christian said.
Christian said Front Street Lofts, an earlier phase of 121 apartments, is nearly fully leased.
Front Street is part of the larger Adriaen’s Landing project that dates to the late 1990s to provide entertainment options for those attending events at the Connecticut Convention Center and create a neighborhood that would link the riverfront to the rest of downtown.
“This piece will make it go a long way to doing that,” said Michael W. Freimuth, executive director of the Capital Region Development Authority. “This brings Arch Street into the fold. It’s been more of a service street than a neighborhood street. It will help connect to the Main Street corridor.”
The connection to Main Street and the core of downtown is evolving, but “it’s not quite there yet.” CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center expects to break ground in the spring on a $26 million outpatient orthopedic surgery center on its Hartford campus, the latest expansion in the Hartford area targeting bone and joint replacement patients.“Like a lot of things in health care, innovation is a big part of this,” Michael E. Joyce, an orthopedic surgeon at St. Francis, said. “When I started, a hip or knee replacement patient would stay in the hospital a week or two. When we started the Connecticut Joint Replacement Institute 10 years ago, they were staying three, four, five days. Now, most of our hip replacement patients go home in less than 24 hours.”
Joyce, who leads a group of 24 physicians who are partnering with St. Francis on the new ambulatory surgery center, said the trend now points to more orthopedic patients going home the same day.
“Through advances in anesthesia and certain kinds of nerve blocks that we’re doing, our hip and knee replacement patients are now up and walking a couple hours after surgery,” Joyce said. “And now they have the potential to go home the same day.”
St. Francis plans for the 33,000-square-foot surgery center call for six operating rooms, a recovery area, a physical therapy space and room for procedures to relieve pain that may or may not require sedation.
If the hospital secures approval from the state Office of Health Care Access, the center could open for its first surgeries in July 2019.
The move comes a little over a year after crosstown competitor, Hartford Hospital, made a splash with the opening of a $150 million Bone and Joint Institute, which also includes services for outpatients.
When asked, St. Francis said its plans are not a response to Hartford Hospital. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Pratt & Whitney Opens New Engineering Headquarters In East Hartford
Dozens of employees and their families formed a chain outside Pratt & Whitney’s new engineering headquarters in East Hartford on Saturday, their gloved hands holding one long ribbon against the morning’s icy breeze.
When they tore through the ribbon, they each were left holding a piece of Pratt history — the unveiling of the 92-year-old company’s $180 million engineering and technology building and the completion of a financial deal with the state worth twice that much.
A 2014 law allows United Technologies Corp. to use up to $400 million in accumulated state tax credits in exchange for a commitment by the aerospace and building systems conglomerate to spent as much as $500 million on its various businesses by 2020.
In June, UTC opened a refurbished, $60 million research center. The Pratt & Whitney engineering facility, which will be home to 1,750 employees, is among the final projects. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Route 8 bridge repairs almost done
HARWINTON- The two-year project to repair the twin bridges that carry Route 8 over the Naugatuck River between Litchfield and Harwinton is almost finished.
“Any day now,” state Department of Transportation spokesman Kevin Nursick said last week.
The bridges have been under repair since September 2015. The work was scheduled to be completed last month.
Traffic has been down to two lanes, one in each direction, for more than two years.
“You’ve had a variety of traffic patterns here so we could do the work,” Nursick said.
Northbound traffic at one point had been funneled onto the southbound side while the bridge was under repair, and vice versa. Now there is one lane of traffic on each bridge.
DOT inspects bridges at least once every two years. This bridge has been on a list of bridges the state has been planning to rehabilitate since 2011. Nursick said the most recent inspection did not identify any specific problems with the bridge, but its age meant the deck and the steel support beams would be getting worn out.
Nursick compared the repairs to regular maintenance on a car.
“You have to replace the tires, you have to replace the brakes, on top of changing the oil,” he said. “At some point, those maintenance activities don’t keep up with the deterioration.”
The concrete foundations at the bottom of the bridge were in pretty good shape, Nursick said. But the steel beams that lift the road up above the valley needed substantial structural repairs. The deck – the part of the bridge on top of those beams and on which the pavement sits – was replaced completely. So was the pavement.
Rotha Contracting Co. of Avon won the state contract to perform those repairs. In August 2015, the company estimated the project would cost just under $10.6 million. Nursick said the actual cost is roughly $12.1 million.
Even with the state’s tight budget, that $2 million overrun is not a big concern, according to state Rep. John Piscopo, R-Harwinton.
“The Department of Transportation has a contingency,” he said, referring to a fund that absorbs the impact when projects go over budget. “So hopefully it’s in the contingency.”
Some $300,000 of the overrun was spent on a crossover from the northbound to the southbound lane of the bridge, which was requested by the town of Harwinton.
Part of the bridge is in Harwinton and the other half is in Litchfield. Depending on which side of that line an emergency happens on, different emergency responders come to the scene.
But it can mean a longer wait if something happens on the northbound side, and first responders have to travel south to get to the scene.
“We have to go down to (Exit) 41, get off the highway and get back on,” said William Buys, chief of the Harwinton Volunteer Fire Department.
With the crossover, a paved path that will connect the two sides, Buys estimated responders can save one to two miles. That will allow them to get to people faster.
The current crossover, on the north side of the bridge, cannot support a fire truck.
Now that the rehabilitation is almost finished, it should be decades before the bridge will be closed for major repairs again. “You’ll have a bridge in solid shape for a cool 40 to 50 years,” Nursick said.
Joyce, who leads a group of 24 physicians who are partnering with St. Francis on the new ambulatory surgery center, said the trend now points to more orthopedic patients going home the same day.
“Through advances in anesthesia and certain kinds of nerve blocks that we’re doing, our hip and knee replacement patients are now up and walking a couple hours after surgery,” Joyce said. “And now they have the potential to go home the same day.”
St. Francis plans for the 33,000-square-foot surgery center call for six operating rooms, a recovery area, a physical therapy space and room for procedures to relieve pain that may or may not require sedation.
If the hospital secures approval from the state Office of Health Care Access, the center could open for its first surgeries in July 2019.
The move comes a little over a year after crosstown competitor, Hartford Hospital, made a splash with the opening of a $150 million Bone and Joint Institute, which also includes services for outpatients.
When asked, St. Francis said its plans are not a response to Hartford Hospital. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Pratt & Whitney Opens New Engineering Headquarters In East Hartford
Dozens of employees and their families formed a chain outside Pratt & Whitney’s new engineering headquarters in East Hartford on Saturday, their gloved hands holding one long ribbon against the morning’s icy breeze.
When they tore through the ribbon, they each were left holding a piece of Pratt history — the unveiling of the 92-year-old company’s $180 million engineering and technology building and the completion of a financial deal with the state worth twice that much.
A 2014 law allows United Technologies Corp. to use up to $400 million in accumulated state tax credits in exchange for a commitment by the aerospace and building systems conglomerate to spent as much as $500 million on its various businesses by 2020.
In June, UTC opened a refurbished, $60 million research center. The Pratt & Whitney engineering facility, which will be home to 1,750 employees, is among the final projects. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Route 8 bridge repairs almost done
HARWINTON- The two-year project to repair the twin bridges that carry Route 8 over the Naugatuck River between Litchfield and Harwinton is almost finished.
“Any day now,” state Department of Transportation spokesman Kevin Nursick said last week.
The bridges have been under repair since September 2015. The work was scheduled to be completed last month.
Traffic has been down to two lanes, one in each direction, for more than two years.
“You’ve had a variety of traffic patterns here so we could do the work,” Nursick said.
Northbound traffic at one point had been funneled onto the southbound side while the bridge was under repair, and vice versa. Now there is one lane of traffic on each bridge.
DOT inspects bridges at least once every two years. This bridge has been on a list of bridges the state has been planning to rehabilitate since 2011. Nursick said the most recent inspection did not identify any specific problems with the bridge, but its age meant the deck and the steel support beams would be getting worn out.
Nursick compared the repairs to regular maintenance on a car.
“You have to replace the tires, you have to replace the brakes, on top of changing the oil,” he said. “At some point, those maintenance activities don’t keep up with the deterioration.”
The concrete foundations at the bottom of the bridge were in pretty good shape, Nursick said. But the steel beams that lift the road up above the valley needed substantial structural repairs. The deck – the part of the bridge on top of those beams and on which the pavement sits – was replaced completely. So was the pavement.
Rotha Contracting Co. of Avon won the state contract to perform those repairs. In August 2015, the company estimated the project would cost just under $10.6 million. Nursick said the actual cost is roughly $12.1 million.
Even with the state’s tight budget, that $2 million overrun is not a big concern, according to state Rep. John Piscopo, R-Harwinton.
“The Department of Transportation has a contingency,” he said, referring to a fund that absorbs the impact when projects go over budget. “So hopefully it’s in the contingency.”
Some $300,000 of the overrun was spent on a crossover from the northbound to the southbound lane of the bridge, which was requested by the town of Harwinton.
Part of the bridge is in Harwinton and the other half is in Litchfield. Depending on which side of that line an emergency happens on, different emergency responders come to the scene.
But it can mean a longer wait if something happens on the northbound side, and first responders have to travel south to get to the scene.
“We have to go down to (Exit) 41, get off the highway and get back on,” said William Buys, chief of the Harwinton Volunteer Fire Department.
With the crossover, a paved path that will connect the two sides, Buys estimated responders can save one to two miles. That will allow them to get to people faster.
The current crossover, on the north side of the bridge, cannot support a fire truck.
Now that the rehabilitation is almost finished, it should be decades before the bridge will be closed for major repairs again. “You’ll have a bridge in solid shape for a cool 40 to 50 years,” Nursick said.