Greyrock Place and Tresser Boulevard: As hardhats make quick work of putting up 11 new apartment buildings, part of the new Stamford “Urby” apartment complex, new details this week emerged on when the project will likely be completed. Certificates of occupancy for some of the buildings will be sought in July by developers F.D. Rich Co. and Ironstate Development Co., others in January 2020, attorney Lisa Feinberg told the Zoning Board. The project, started last fall, calls for nearly 650 residential units on the sprawling 4.3-acre site across from Stamford Town Center. The lot was long an undeveloped parcel leftover from Urban Renewal’s downtown razing. It sat vacant for decades earning the moniker “the hole in the ground.”
Civil engineers give state’s infrastructure a C-
Michael P. Mayko
Connecticut’s roads and wastewater treatment systems are in need of major repairs costing billions over the next two decades while issues facing the state’s bridges and drinking water are nearly as bad.
As a result state leaders and residents should consider spending more than $40 billion over the next two decades to make major repairs and upgrades
That’s what the Connecticut Society of Civil Engineers determined in their inaugural 2018 Report Card for Connecticut’s Infrastructure which was released Tuesday.
Combine the grades for their evaluation of bridges, drinking water, rails, roads and wastewater and the state gets an overall C- on its infrastructure. Those are the five areas the engineers focused on.
“There are bright spots in this report, but it is clear that we must prioritize our infrastructure systems to keep our state competitive and grow our economy,” said David Chapman, president of the Connecticut Society of Civil Engineers.However Jim Cameron, founder of the Commuter Action Group and a Hearst Connecticut Media transportation columnist, suggested “their grades should come with a dose of skepticism.”
"I'm always a bit suspicious of reports from a group with a strong self-interest in what they are grading. Like the construction trades, engineers are looking for work,” he said.
Still Cameron added, “who is better qualified to comment on something like this? So let's assume they're being objective and not just priming the pump for their own profits.”
Perhaps surprising to some the civil engineers graded the state’s railroad system the highest with a B rating.
They pointed out that the 41 million passengers who annually ride Metro-North have made it the busiest of its kind in the nation. They also commended the Department of Transportation for investing almost $780 million in the New Haven-Hartford-Springfield line.
In addition to passengers, more than 3.6 million tons of freight pass through Connecticut every year through the 10 freight train lines that service the state.
“I think the grade of B is fair, especially given the state and Amtrak's huge investments since the 2013 Fairfield derailment,” Cameron said. “There is still much more to be done and none of it will be cheap. Slower train schedules, daily delays for things like broken rails and broken down branch-line diesels will only worsen without the kinds of investments the report cites.”
Meanwhile Naugatuck Valley officials and legislators are calling for money devoted to increase train service on the Waterbury line as cities like Ansonia, Derby and Shelton increase the number of rental properties in their downtowns.
While rails ranked the best, the state’s roads and wastewater received the lowest grade of D+. The engineers maintain that at least $30 billion is needed to spent over the next 30 years to repair, refurbish and realign the 20,000 miles of road, most of which are over 55 years old. They claim the poor condition and congestion on state roads cost drivers $2.4 billion annually.
They grade the state’s bridges at a C- even after finding 7.8 percent are structurally deficient and 59 are over 50 years old. Everyday 79 vehicles cross state bridge, according to the engineers.
“ A D+ seems generous, as anyone who drives regularly can attest, Cameron said. “Like the C- for bridges, they’re in terrible shape. We're already paying a sort of "toll" in the form of bent rims, flat tires and front end re-alignments because our vehicles take a pounding.”
A similar issue faces the wastewater infrastructure where the engineers found 50 of the state’s sewage treatment plants were high risk for flooding during major storms. They believe $4.6 billion is needed to repair, renovate and upgrade plants throughout the state.
And on the flip side the engineers believe at least $4 billion must be spent through 2034 to keep the state’s drinking water dispensed at a high quality rating. They gave the aging systems a C-.
“I'm so glad drinking water and waste water treatment systems also were included, as they are often forgotten in discussions of infrastructure,” Cameron said. “We take them for granted until we have a drought or our beaches are closed after a heavy rain. We might be able to live with late trains and bad roads, but we cannot live without water.”
With the grades came recommendation and those include prioritizing investment in infrastructure during difficult budget cycles and modernizing and building resilient infrastructure to prepare for increasingly severe storms”
They recommend a transportation lockbox to ensure “all transportation funds are used solely for transportation purposes.”
“All of these things are fixable... if we find the money,” Cameron said. “So until we get serious about tolls or taxes and put a lock on the state transportation funds’ box, these conditions will only get worse with time. Will it take another Mianus River bridge disaster to get Hartford's attention?”
Chapman said the report card was created “as a public service to citizens and policymakers to inform them of the infrastructure needs in their state”
It was modeled after the national Infrastructure Report Card, which gave America’s infrastructure a grade of “D+” in 2017.
A full copy of the 2018 Report Card for Connecticut’s Infrastructure is available at
InfrastructureReportCard.org/Connecticut.
Judge Denies Hartford's Motion For Control Of Downtown North Properties, Throwing Project Timeline Into Question
Jenna Carlesso
A Superior Court judge has denied Hartford’s motion for summary judgment in its case against the fired developers of Dunkin’ Donuts Park, a move that could throw off the city’s timetable for an expansive project in the Downtown North neighborhood.
As part of the lawsuit between the city and Centerplan Construction Co., the ousted developer, Hartford had asked the court to remove liens placed on the properties surrounding the ballpark and to allow the city to press ahead with new development there.
Centerplan won the original bid to build office space, housing and retail on the parcels, but was fired from the entire project after it missed two key deadlines to complete work on the baseball stadium. Another firm finished construction at Dunkin’ Donuts Park, and it opened a year late.
Centerplan sued the city for wrongful termination.
But as the case wound its way through the legal system, Hartford leaders put the remainder of the Downtown North project out to bid again, and last summer selected Stamford-based developer RMS Cos. The firm has proposed building 800 apartments and 60,000 square feet of retail at the site, along with parking garages. RMS owner Randy Salvatore said work could begin as early as May 2019.
The court’s decision Tuesday could complicate that schedule.
“The plain language of the contracts doesn’t allow the city to terminate the ground lease in the absence of a developer default,” Judge Thomas Moukawsher wrote in his decision. “This may be deeply inconvenient to the city. But it would be deeply inequitable to terminate a contract on equitable grounds without first weighing the equities for and against it.”The city had used Centerplan’s failure to finish the ballpark on time as justification for firing the company from the larger Downtown North project. Moukawsher said Tuesday, however, that Centerplan has not yet been found in default of its city contract.
“The developer hotly insists it isn’t in default, so the court can’t give the city what it wants — a summary judgment merely from the face of the contract,” he wrote.
Reached by phone, Raymond Garcia, an attorney for Centerplan, said only: “The decision speaks for itself.”
Howard Rifkin, Hartford’s corporation counsel, said the city is “disappointed” in the ruling and is “considering our options going forward.” He did not say whether it would affect Hartford’s latest effort to develop the area.
The city and Salvatore are in discussions. Officials had expected to send a tentative contract to the city council this fall.
Development of the parcels circling the ballpark is considered crucial in generating needed tax revenue for the city. Hartford, which last year nearly filed for bankruptcy, is on the hook for annual debt service payments on the $71 million baseball stadium. Tax revenue from the wider development would help to make those payments.
Last month, the State Bond Commission authorized borrowing $12 million to support the first phase of construction in Downtown North — 200 apartments behind the Red Lion Hotel on Trumbull Street.
The overall project, which is estimated to cost more than $200 million, would be financed primarily with private funds, but could need as much as $60 million in state taxpayer-backed financing, records show.
New London, labor and environmental leaders tout offshore wind’s potential
Benjamin Kail
New London — More than 100 people packed a meeting room at St. James Episcopal Church on Tuesday night for a forum on offshore wind, an industry whose leaders are targeting New London as a potential hub.
City, labor and environmental leaders who led the forum were enthusiastic about the possibilities. Spurred by the federal government's leasing of waters along the East Coast, seven states have committed to build more than 10 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity in federal waters by 2030. Officials argue New London is a prime location for some manufacturing and shipping — a deepwater port, with no overhead obstructions, between Boston and New York City.
Deepwater Wind — the Block Island Wind Farm developer tapped to deliver electricity to Connecticut from a wind farm in federal waters south of Martha's Vineyard by 2030 — pledged to invest $15 million to help revamp New London State Pier to facilitate offshore wind development. Denmark-based Orsted, which recently purchased Deepwater Wind, and New Bedford, Mass.-based Vineyard Wind also pitched projects to the state with promises of a regional economic boom through clean energy.
But how, when, and for how long offshore wind projects create local jobs and economic development remains to be seen. Questions also remain on pricing — with competitive cost and price data redacted in proposals to regulators — and overall impacts on the environment and electricity grid.
Felix Reyes, the city's director of development and planning, assured guests that officials were asking developers tough questions about what's best for the city and how to take advantage of a burgeoning industry.
"We've got a lot of housing opportunities, industry opportunities, and then there's the manufacturing aspect," said Reyes, arguing that the area around the Crystal Avenue properties and State Pier could "transform dramatically to be our manufacturing and industrial area of the city. I get excited when I hear manufacturing and things being built by hand."
Orsted, Reyes noted, placed a bid with the Connecticut Port Authority to manage State Pier. Reyes and Orsted officials say a successful bid could lead to local supply chains and manufacturing jobs.
Christopher Bachant, business agent and organizer for Carpenters Local 326, said New London could "be used for potentially all the offshore wind projects from Massachusetts to New Jersey. It doesn't mean everything is going to be built here. It could be for support."
Bachant said he couldn't make a hard estimate on local job potential, but he said development in the region would lead to local vendors supplying "tie wire, plywood, staging planks, hammers, nails, screws."
Bachant said wind developers have agreed to project labor agreements allowing for apprenticeship programs and job creation "for your grandkids and your kids. People who live here, they don't have to watch people who aren't from here come into the work."
Jamie Vaudrey, a University of Connecticut marine sciences professor, said for hundreds of years humans have been accessing carbon stored in the earth hundreds of millions of year ago as oil, gas and coal.
"We're creating a shortcut for the carbon cycle," she said. "We're not giving it a chance to leave the land through its normal pathway, which is volcanoes. Instead, we're digging down, bringing up those fossil fuels and we're burning them."
Emitting so much carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, she argued, creates "climate weirding," with more intense storms, record temperatures and increased rainfall.
"We need to make a change now, and offshore wind energy is a good option for building that renewable energy sector," said Vaudrey, who noted that offshore wind companies must conduct rigorous studies and site surveys to avoid impacting wildlife such as birds, marine mammals and benthic life on the ocean floor.
For Rev. Ranjit K. Mathews, the forum represented an opportunity for civil discourse.
Mathews pushed visitors to avoid thinking of humans as having dominion over the planet, "when in actuality it should be about relationality" and a deep respect for nature.
Matthew Morrissey, Deepwater Wind vice president, said in an interview the company was "extremely excited the community is getting together to discuss the impacts of offshore wind."
Morrissey said the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority will soon begin its evaluation of and, "we hope, approval, of the contract we successfully negotiated with Eversource and United Illuminating."
Regulators say PURA should complete its process in the next few months.
Morrissey added that Deepwater Wind has "vessels out at sea that will be active through the turn of the year. The information that comes back will inform many aspects of the design of our project."