Clare Dignan
NEW HAVEN — The Grand Avenue Bridge will be getting a makeover.
Beginning late this year, the city plans to begin rehabilitation of the bridge, expected to take up to two years. City engineers Tuesday sought input from residents on the future of the iconic neighborhood bridge.
“This is truly a special structure on the Quinnipiac river,” City Engineer Giovanni Zinn said. “It’s truly a treasure and with that comes the responsibility of preserving that historical character.”
In a community discussion involving dozens of area residents from both sides of the Quinnipiac River, Zinn covered the scope of work on the bridge, bridge closure and other traffic impacts, project finances and schedule, public amenities and business impacts, in addition to community concerns.
The design of the bridge project is 90 percent completed and expected to be finished and ready to be put out to bid by late winter. Construction is not anticipated to start until late fall . But once underway, construction could last up to 2 years.
The project cost is estimated to be $25.5 million, two-thirds of which will be underwritten through a combination of federal and state funds. The rehabilitation project will include new bridge abutments, approach spans, electrical and mechanical systems and rehabilitation of the swing span. “This is transformational,” state Rep. Al Paollilo, D-New Haven, said. “This will set the stage for the next 40 to 50 years. This is good planning and it has been a priority for the delegation.”The project limits extend from Front Street to Quinnipiac Avenue and will involved the replacement of both approach spans, rehabilitation of the center truss and full replacement of the mechanical and electrical equipment on the bridge.
The mechanical systems of the bridge currently working are the original systems built in 1898. The bridge closes for every few years for maintenance, which can take up to a couple of weeks to complete.
The city also plans to create new abutments where the bridge meets the land, allowing engineers to take weight off aging piers that aren’t structurally sound, because the approach spans will be built in one span, unlike the current two, Zinn said
One of the planned improvements is to provide a minimum sidewalk width of 10 feet on the south side of the bridge to accommodate a shared-use path.
Additionally, work will include rebuilding the bridge deck; rehabilitating the house; replacing any electrical; and blast cleaning and repainting the structural steel. The black paint on the bridge now causes it to overheat during the summer, so Zinn proposed changing the color to gray.Quinnipiac Avenue resident Chris Ozyck, who can see the bridge from his home, suggested painting the bridge green instead, so as not to make the neighborhood look drab. He cited other historical bridges in the Northeast that are green.
The other element Zinn sought input for was lighting on the bridge. It currently has no lights, but Zinn presented several options of how the bridge could be lighted.
“The lighting is a really subjective thing,” Ozyck said. “People don’t like change so getting consensus on lighting, if it’s not done in a traditional way, will be hard. It’s a great idea and I’ve been an advocate and I’m hoping we can work on it longer.”
The intersections on either side of the bridge will remain in service the entire time, Zinn said. Nevertheless, it will cause complications for a couple of days once it’s closed. Traffic was one of resident Lee Cruz’s concerns, along with the effect on local businesses.
“Whatever traffic (the businesses are) getting from the other side won’t be there, so how do we make that up?” he said. “But overall we need to do it and it’s going to be good for us. Just like telling kids to take their medicine and trust it will make you better.”
The importance of the bridge was evident in the number of people who showed up to the presentation, said Acting Economic Development Director Michael Piscitelli, a Fair Haven Heights resident .
“All of us on the city team are really proud we were able to organize design and construction funding so that it moves in sequence without having to shut the bridge without a plan to repair,” he said. “This is a New Haven treasure. It’s a historic resource for the state and the city. Here we have water dependent businesses, aquaculture, great coastal parks and the bridge is an anchor to all that. It’s an anchoring point to all residents.”
“This is the iconic symbol of Fair Haven,” Cruz said. “It is a physically and emotionally the bridge between Fair Haven and Fair Haven Heights. I don’t think there’s any person that’s grown up here in the last 100 years that doesn’t think of the Grand Avenue Bridge when they think of their neighborhood.”
The design firm Hardesty and Hanover has been hired for the project and the city will go out to bid later this year for the construction work.
The other element Zinn sought input for was lighting on the bridge. It currently has no lights, but Zinn presented several options of how the bridge could be lighted.
“The lighting is a really subjective thing,” Ozyck said. “People don’t like change so getting consensus on lighting, if it’s not done in a traditional way, will be hard. It’s a great idea and I’ve been an advocate and I’m hoping we can work on it longer.”
The intersections on either side of the bridge will remain in service the entire time, Zinn said. Nevertheless, it will cause complications for a couple of days once it’s closed. Traffic was one of resident Lee Cruz’s concerns, along with the effect on local businesses.
“Whatever traffic (the businesses are) getting from the other side won’t be there, so how do we make that up?” he said. “But overall we need to do it and it’s going to be good for us. Just like telling kids to take their medicine and trust it will make you better.”
The importance of the bridge was evident in the number of people who showed up to the presentation, said Acting Economic Development Director Michael Piscitelli, a Fair Haven Heights resident .
“All of us on the city team are really proud we were able to organize design and construction funding so that it moves in sequence without having to shut the bridge without a plan to repair,” he said. “This is a New Haven treasure. It’s a historic resource for the state and the city. Here we have water dependent businesses, aquaculture, great coastal parks and the bridge is an anchor to all that. It’s an anchoring point to all residents.”
“This is the iconic symbol of Fair Haven,” Cruz said. “It is a physically and emotionally the bridge between Fair Haven and Fair Haven Heights. I don’t think there’s any person that’s grown up here in the last 100 years that doesn’t think of the Grand Avenue Bridge when they think of their neighborhood.”
The design firm Hardesty and Hanover has been hired for the project and the city will go out to bid later this year for the construction work.
New Britain will discuss road work plans with residents
Skyler Frazer
NEW BRITAIN – The city’s Department of Public Works is hosting an informational session Thursday to discuss an upcoming project on Myrtle Street with residents.
Public Works officials will meet residents in Room 504 of City Hall at 6 p.m. on Thursday evening to discuss a Phase VI Streetscape project on Myrtle Street and East Main Street. According to design plans for the project, it will make improvements to Myrtle Street and East Main Street, between Washington Street and Martin Luther King Boulevard.
These improvements include the reconstruction of East Main Street between Martin Luther King Boulevard and Main Street and milling and paving Myrtle Street between Main Street and Washington Street. The work also includes the replacement of existing catch basin tops and installation of new catch basins, installation of new granite curbing, new concrete and brick paver sidewalks and pedestrian ramps to meet current Americans with Disabilities Act standards, installation of new signage and pavements markings, removal of impacted existing street trees and installation of new street trees, upgrades to existing traffic signals and new streetlights.
Based upon preliminary assessment of the project, construction will cost about $3.37 million. The State of Connecticut will provide about 100 percent of the construction costs through its Local Transportation Capital Improvement Program.
The city has completed the semi-final design of the project and now wants input from property owners in the area. City Engineer Rob Trottier sent out letters to property owners in the Myrtle Street and East Main Street area last week to inform them of Thursday’s meeting. Those interested in obtaining more information about the project can reach out to Trottier at 860-826-3355 or go to www.NewBritainCT.gov and look under the Public Works tab.
The informational session is scheduled for 6 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 31 in Room 501 of City Hall, 27 West Main St.
Third-casino bill eliminating need for federal approval could hinge on legal opinion
Brian Hallenbeck
Hartford — A legal opinion that former Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen slipped into the third-casino debate won’t go away.
It re-emerged Tuesday as a likely sticking point in a state legislative committee’s consideration of a bill that would enable the Mashantucket Pequot and Mohegan tribes to proceed with their East Windsor casino project without gaining federal approval of their amended gaming agreements with the state.
That approval, in the case of the Mashantuckets’ amendment, has not been forthcoming.
Following a meeting in which the tribes’ respective chairmen, Rodney Butler and Kevin Brown, addressed the Public Safety and Security Committee, Rep. Joe Verrengia, the West Hartford Democrat who co-chairs the panel, said he’s unwilling to risk the gaming revenue the tribes share with the state.
Jepsen repeatedly identified that risk, most recently during the last legislative session.
The tribes’ payments to the state — in exchange for the exclusive right to operate casino gaming — have exceeded $270 million in each of the last two fiscal years.
Sen. Tony Hwang, a Fairfield Republican, asked the tribal chairmen if they’d seek a new opinion from Jepsen’s successor, Attorney General William Tong.
Rodney Butler, the Mashantucket chairman, said the legislature should seek such an opinion if it thinks it is necessary.
“I have requested that very opinion,” Verrengia said. “It’s already in motion.”
He said he had asked the speaker of the House, Joe Aresimowicz, a Berlin Democrat, to seek an opinion from the office of Tong, who took office this month.
Sen. Cathy Osten, the Sprague Democrat who introduced the bill eliminating the need for federal approval, pushed for prompt approval of the measure, which she said would enable the tribes to start construction in East Windsor “within a month.” She said the bill “negates” the political “interference” the tribes believe has tainted the U.S. Department of the Interior’s action — or inaction — on the gaming amendments.
Amid the delay, MGM Resorts International, the Las Vegas-based casino operator, has opened a nearly $1 billion resort casino in Springfield, Mass., where it has had an impact on business at the tribes’ existing casinos, Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun. The proposed East Windsor facility, to be called Tribal Winds, is meant to limit that impact.
The tribal chairmen said Tribal Winds could be open in 18 to 24 months after construction begins and would provide the state with an additional $75 million annually in gaming revenue payments.
Kevin Brown, the Mohegan chairman, said the tribes already have sunk $15 million into the East Windsor project, much of it in acquiring the casino site off Exit 45 of Interstate 91 and demolishing the abandoned Showcase Cinemas building that stood there. The tribes expect to spend between $250 million and $300 million on the project.
“We’re ready to go when you are,” Brown told the committee.
The tribes have long maintained that federal approval of their gaming amendments is unnecessary, a view Interior officials shared, the tribal chairmen said, up until “heavy lobbying” by MGM Resorts changed things.
While the tribes have secured all local approvals for the East Windsor project, it was revealed that owners of property near the casino site have filed a lawsuit against the town and the tribes over the issuance of zoning approvals. The tribal chairmen said the suit is not expected to hamper the project.
Verrengia limited Tuesday’s discussion to the status of the East Windsor project, though the public safety committee will be taking up a number of other gaming-related matters during the current legislative session, including the legalization of sports betting.
A bill referred to the committee this week calls for the creation of the Connecticut Gaming Commission and establishment of a competitive bidding process for a resort casino license.
Windsor's Great Pond has apartments underway
Gregory Seay
Nearly a decade since plans for Windsor's Great Pond mixed-use development first aired, construction is underway on a 230-unit apartment community in the master-planned community.
Fairfield residential developer Eastpointe LLC since last Nov. 1 has been constructing on 12 acres acquired from Great Pond's owner the first of eight buildings that will comprise Eastpointe's The Preserve at Great Pond, Eastpointe co-managing partner William R. Finger said Tuesday.
That first building will house 50 apartments on four floors and is slated to be ready for occupancy by late August, Finger said. The other buildings, all completed in stages one year later, will have three floors and will house 12, 24 or 36 units, ranging from studios and one-bedroom apartments to two- and three-bedroom units. Rents will run from $1,400 to $2,400 monthly, he said.
The Preserve is the first development on Great Pond since owner Winstanley Enterprises LLC, of Concord, Mass., one of Connecticut's biggest commercial landlords, in 2010 bared its ambitious vision for a mixed-use development on 633 acres fronting Windsor's active Day Hill Road corridor.
Winstanley is a partner in redeveloping Great Pond with ABB Group, owner of the former Combustion Engineering nuclear-boiler production/testing facilities that once occupied the site.
Winstanley officials referred inquiries about The Preserve to Eastpointe, which is no stranger to the Hartford region. In 2014, it began development of Simsbury's 168-unit Eastpointe at Dorset Crossing apartments off Hopmeadow Street.
In July 2017, Eastpointe sold Dorset Crossing for $36.5 million, or $217,000 per unit.
The Preserve, occupying a site fronting Day Hill Road and in the shadow of Hartford Financial Services Group Inc.'s Windsor office building, will offer many of the amenities increasingly popular with the Hartford region's urban and suburban apartment dwellers, Finger said.
A 6,000-square-foot clubhouse also under construction, Finger said, will feature a fitness center; golf simulator; cafe; a resorts-style swimming pool; outdoor bocce court; and a firepit.
For more active residents, The Preserve will offer free loaner bicycles; and a ¾-mile walking/jogging trail ringing Great Pond's 16-acre pond.
Originally bared in Dec. 2010, family-run Winstanley Enterprises touted Great Pond as a $750 million project that was to be a mix of single-family and multifamily housing aimed at a wide demographic. Fully developed, it also would include hundreds of thousands of square feet for neighborhood retail, office and research and development space.
But last August, Winstanley's patriarch, David Winstanley, indicated in papers filed with Windsor a shift in his development vision for Great Pond.
According to area commercial brokers, Winstanley Enterprises lately has pitched a portion of Great Pond's acreage available for development into a pair of mammoth industrial distribution facilities -- each around 500,000 square feet -- like the kind that have sprouted or under construction in Windsor.
Online retail giant Amazon occupies a sprawling, 1.4 million-square-foot fulfillment center adjacent to Great Pond.
These improvements include the reconstruction of East Main Street between Martin Luther King Boulevard and Main Street and milling and paving Myrtle Street between Main Street and Washington Street. The work also includes the replacement of existing catch basin tops and installation of new catch basins, installation of new granite curbing, new concrete and brick paver sidewalks and pedestrian ramps to meet current Americans with Disabilities Act standards, installation of new signage and pavements markings, removal of impacted existing street trees and installation of new street trees, upgrades to existing traffic signals and new streetlights.
Based upon preliminary assessment of the project, construction will cost about $3.37 million. The State of Connecticut will provide about 100 percent of the construction costs through its Local Transportation Capital Improvement Program.
The city has completed the semi-final design of the project and now wants input from property owners in the area. City Engineer Rob Trottier sent out letters to property owners in the Myrtle Street and East Main Street area last week to inform them of Thursday’s meeting. Those interested in obtaining more information about the project can reach out to Trottier at 860-826-3355 or go to www.NewBritainCT.gov and look under the Public Works tab.
The informational session is scheduled for 6 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 31 in Room 501 of City Hall, 27 West Main St.
Third-casino bill eliminating need for federal approval could hinge on legal opinion
Brian Hallenbeck
Hartford — A legal opinion that former Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen slipped into the third-casino debate won’t go away.
It re-emerged Tuesday as a likely sticking point in a state legislative committee’s consideration of a bill that would enable the Mashantucket Pequot and Mohegan tribes to proceed with their East Windsor casino project without gaining federal approval of their amended gaming agreements with the state.
That approval, in the case of the Mashantuckets’ amendment, has not been forthcoming.
Following a meeting in which the tribes’ respective chairmen, Rodney Butler and Kevin Brown, addressed the Public Safety and Security Committee, Rep. Joe Verrengia, the West Hartford Democrat who co-chairs the panel, said he’s unwilling to risk the gaming revenue the tribes share with the state.
Jepsen repeatedly identified that risk, most recently during the last legislative session.
The tribes’ payments to the state — in exchange for the exclusive right to operate casino gaming — have exceeded $270 million in each of the last two fiscal years.
Sen. Tony Hwang, a Fairfield Republican, asked the tribal chairmen if they’d seek a new opinion from Jepsen’s successor, Attorney General William Tong.
Rodney Butler, the Mashantucket chairman, said the legislature should seek such an opinion if it thinks it is necessary.
“I have requested that very opinion,” Verrengia said. “It’s already in motion.”
Sen. Cathy Osten, the Sprague Democrat who introduced the bill eliminating the need for federal approval, pushed for prompt approval of the measure, which she said would enable the tribes to start construction in East Windsor “within a month.” She said the bill “negates” the political “interference” the tribes believe has tainted the U.S. Department of the Interior’s action — or inaction — on the gaming amendments.
Amid the delay, MGM Resorts International, the Las Vegas-based casino operator, has opened a nearly $1 billion resort casino in Springfield, Mass., where it has had an impact on business at the tribes’ existing casinos, Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun. The proposed East Windsor facility, to be called Tribal Winds, is meant to limit that impact.
The tribal chairmen said Tribal Winds could be open in 18 to 24 months after construction begins and would provide the state with an additional $75 million annually in gaming revenue payments.
Kevin Brown, the Mohegan chairman, said the tribes already have sunk $15 million into the East Windsor project, much of it in acquiring the casino site off Exit 45 of Interstate 91 and demolishing the abandoned Showcase Cinemas building that stood there. The tribes expect to spend between $250 million and $300 million on the project.
“We’re ready to go when you are,” Brown told the committee.
The tribes have long maintained that federal approval of their gaming amendments is unnecessary, a view Interior officials shared, the tribal chairmen said, up until “heavy lobbying” by MGM Resorts changed things.
While the tribes have secured all local approvals for the East Windsor project, it was revealed that owners of property near the casino site have filed a lawsuit against the town and the tribes over the issuance of zoning approvals. The tribal chairmen said the suit is not expected to hamper the project.
Verrengia limited Tuesday’s discussion to the status of the East Windsor project, though the public safety committee will be taking up a number of other gaming-related matters during the current legislative session, including the legalization of sports betting.
A bill referred to the committee this week calls for the creation of the Connecticut Gaming Commission and establishment of a competitive bidding process for a resort casino license.
Windsor's Great Pond has apartments underway
Gregory Seay
Nearly a decade since plans for Windsor's Great Pond mixed-use development first aired, construction is underway on a 230-unit apartment community in the master-planned community.
Fairfield residential developer Eastpointe LLC since last Nov. 1 has been constructing on 12 acres acquired from Great Pond's owner the first of eight buildings that will comprise Eastpointe's The Preserve at Great Pond, Eastpointe co-managing partner William R. Finger said Tuesday.
That first building will house 50 apartments on four floors and is slated to be ready for occupancy by late August, Finger said. The other buildings, all completed in stages one year later, will have three floors and will house 12, 24 or 36 units, ranging from studios and one-bedroom apartments to two- and three-bedroom units. Rents will run from $1,400 to $2,400 monthly, he said.
The Preserve is the first development on Great Pond since owner Winstanley Enterprises LLC, of Concord, Mass., one of Connecticut's biggest commercial landlords, in 2010 bared its ambitious vision for a mixed-use development on 633 acres fronting Windsor's active Day Hill Road corridor.
Winstanley is a partner in redeveloping Great Pond with ABB Group, owner of the former Combustion Engineering nuclear-boiler production/testing facilities that once occupied the site.
Winstanley officials referred inquiries about The Preserve to Eastpointe, which is no stranger to the Hartford region. In 2014, it began development of Simsbury's 168-unit Eastpointe at Dorset Crossing apartments off Hopmeadow Street.
In July 2017, Eastpointe sold Dorset Crossing for $36.5 million, or $217,000 per unit.
The Preserve, occupying a site fronting Day Hill Road and in the shadow of Hartford Financial Services Group Inc.'s Windsor office building, will offer many of the amenities increasingly popular with the Hartford region's urban and suburban apartment dwellers, Finger said.
A 6,000-square-foot clubhouse also under construction, Finger said, will feature a fitness center; golf simulator; cafe; a resorts-style swimming pool; outdoor bocce court; and a firepit.
For more active residents, The Preserve will offer free loaner bicycles; and a ¾-mile walking/jogging trail ringing Great Pond's 16-acre pond.
Originally bared in Dec. 2010, family-run Winstanley Enterprises touted Great Pond as a $750 million project that was to be a mix of single-family and multifamily housing aimed at a wide demographic. Fully developed, it also would include hundreds of thousands of square feet for neighborhood retail, office and research and development space.
But last August, Winstanley's patriarch, David Winstanley, indicated in papers filed with Windsor a shift in his development vision for Great Pond.
According to area commercial brokers, Winstanley Enterprises lately has pitched a portion of Great Pond's acreage available for development into a pair of mammoth industrial distribution facilities -- each around 500,000 square feet -- like the kind that have sprouted or under construction in Windsor.
Online retail giant Amazon occupies a sprawling, 1.4 million-square-foot fulfillment center adjacent to Great Pond.