At 10:30 a.m., Gov. Lamont will join Commission Giulietti, &
Connecticut Airport Authority Leadership for a groundbreaking ceremony for
Bradley International Airport’s Ground Transportation Center at Bradley
International Airport; Schoephoester, Windsor Locks.
Dan Haar: What bridge tolling in CT would look like
With no political consensus on tolls, we’re back to the starting gate, much to the chagrin of people who know full highway tolling makes the most sense. It’s too bad the Senate Democratic leadership won’t bring it to a vote, but that’s baseball for you.
Everything is back up for discussion. That, sources say, includes tolls for trucks only, and tolls for bridges only. Truck tolling doesn’t work legally and it doesn’t raise enough money, as I wrote a year ago when then-candidate Ned Lamont insisted on it.
So that leaves bridges. Rather than droning on pointlessly about the politics of it, let’s take a look at how bridge tolling in Connecticut would actually work.
Here’s the short answer: Tolling a dozen “deficient” bridges - the number that’s being bandied about at the Capitol -- at 50 cents a trip for all vehicles would raise $210 million a year, before expenses, by my calculations. We could charge trucks a bit more, maybe bring it up to $250 million, but that’s the reasonable limit.
And my list of 12 bridges are spread reasonably around the state. For example, there’s a needy bridge along I-95 in West Haven over the Metro North tracks, and another one nearby along I-95 in New Haven, over the Quinnipiac River. We’re not going to toll both, that would be unfair.
Call the list I’m proposing the Deficient Dozen - the highway bridges most likely to see gantries if that compromise plan actually happens.
It’s the wrong way to go because it unfairly singles out people who happen to use those exact locations, rather than the fairer way of tolling every mile by a smaller amount. But if we have no other option - and we may not - this is what it would look like.
That $210 million is a far shot short of the $900 million the state would raise under Lamont’s plan, tolling all four major highways from fencepost to fencepost. But jacking up the bridge tolls beyond 50 cents - say, $1 a trip - would be grossly unfair to people who happen to live near rundown highway bridges.
Let’s say one of the bridges was the Yankee Doodle Bridge, which carries Interstate 95 over the Norwalk River, and let’s say the charge was $1 each way. Plenty of people who live around there use that bridge more than once a day. They could end up paying $700 a year, maybe $900 a year or even more.
People who live and work near Bridgeport, where - strangely - there are no deficient bridges along I-95 - would get a free ride, literally, while the Norwalkers and Greenwichers and New Haveners might pay hundreds of dollars a year.
Here’s another big problem with bridge tolling. The targeted highway bridges tend to be in or immediately around the state’s biggest cities, again, with the exception of Bridgeport. If the purpose of tolls is to reduce traffic congestion in addition to raising money for needed repairs, bridge tolls could backfire in a very nasty way, clogging up local city streets at exactly the time when Connecticut’s economic development strategy calls for making cities more livable and enticing.
Lowering the fare to 25 cents each way would be a waste of time, not raising enough money to make a dent in the problem.
Then there’s a matter of how the money is used. Under federal rules, bridge tolls must be only at deficient bridges, and only to raise money to fix that very bridge. Here’s the catch: After the bridge is repaired, we can keep the toll in place forever.
I grew up four miles from the George Washington Bridge, which now costs, what, $175 to cross into Manhattan? Obviously that rule cuts both ways.
Let’s look at the list. The top deficient bridge, according to a report by the American Road and Transportation Builders Association, is the one in Norwalk along I-95, known poetically at the Yankee Doodle Bridge. It carries 145,000 vehicles a day, so a no-brainer there.
Then we come to the one I mentioned in West Haven - let’s give New Haven a breather - which carries 136,400 vehicles. New Haven has a bridge toll, don’t worry -- not far away on I-91, just a couple of miles north of downtown.
Other I-95 bridges are in Greenwich, over the Byram River; Branford at exit 55; and New London, northbound only, at the famous Gold Star Bridge, built in 1943 before I-95 even opened.
Heading north, wev’e got one in Shelton along Route 8, over the Housatonic River; and of course, the Waterbury mixmaster of I-84 and Route 8. That counts as a deficient bridge; two, actually. And we’d never raise enough money in tolls to pay for that one.
In Hartford, the notorious I-84 viaduct comprises seven separate, deficient bridges. We’d toll one of them, take our pick, they’re all lined up.
In all, the Deficient Dozen carry 420 million vehicles a year, yielding the $210 million at 50 cents a trip. That 420 makes for a solid symbol, as anyone who imagined the political gridlock we’re seeing in 2019 had to either be either brilliant or smoking pot.
You get the picture. The idea is to make bridge tolling as fair and efficient as possible. As the Deficient Dozen shows, it’s not fair and it’s not efficient. Still, this plan is what it would look like, more or less.
Maybe the best path is to increase the number of bridges to 24 or 30, but the returns start to diminish because traffic flows are smaller.
There is only one answer that works: Linear tolling along two or more highways, border to border. Anything short of that - including the dumbest idea, borrowing and paying Wall Street - is throwing away money at a time when we have roads, bridges and an economy to rebuild.
Hoping to cut down on traffic delays, DOT advises southbound commuters, especially those familiar with the area, to avoid the impacted portion of I-395 by taking Exit 5 for Route 32 toward Interstate 95 in New London. Throughout the 10-day lane closure, Waterford police and state police will help guide commuters through a temporary intersection at the I-395 south Exit 2 off- and on-ramps and Route 85.
The project replaces the bridge deck and parapet, and installs a precast concrete median barrier that will be safer than the current railing, project engineer Andrew Millovitsch said. The first half of the rehab saw an overhaul of the northbound section of the bridge; contractor Mohawk Northeast, which has performed repairs on the Gold Star Memorial Bridge, finished northbound improvements three days ahead of schedule last month.
Millovitsch said Wednesday that from a budget perspective, "we are right on target for original estimated amount."
I-395 and Route 85 combined handle more than 50,000 vehicles daily in the area, according to DOT, which spread word of the project to surrounding towns and states, public safety agencies, nearby businesses and regional trucking companies to suggest diversion routes.
State troopers on the highway will detour I-395 southbound drivers down the Exit 2 off-ramp toward a light, managed by Waterford police 24 hours a day, on Route 85. Highway drivers then will cross Route 85 and enter the southbound on-ramp to hop back on I-395. Northbound traffic will not be impacted, DOT and police said.
Millovitsch said the state and commuters were lucky to have a rare layout of both north- and southbound off- and on-ramps "directly across from each other," enabling the temporary intersection. Still, Waterford police, state and local officials urge drivers to expect delays and be careful.
Commuters getting off Exit 2 from I-395 south to Route 85 may not have two left turning lanes available, Millovitsch said, because DOT occasionally will close Route 85 lanes near the bridge when doing work overhead. Out of precaution, the contractor temporarily may halt traffic for up to 10 minutes on Route 85 while a crane hooks up to precast bridge deck panels, swings them out over the empty roadway and onto the bridge.
DOT has planned the project since 2017, when routine inspections of the 1957 bridge revealed the deck needed replacing. The substructure, girders and almost all the structural steel on the bridge are solid with only minimal repairs required, according to DOT. Mohawk Northeast will blast clean and paint the steel, protecting it from the elements and extending its longevity.
Millovitsch said the Accelerated Bridge Construction process approved by DOT might seem temporarily painful to commuters, but causes less frustration than the alternative: a costlier four- to six-stage construction including a year or 18 months of bridge lane shifts and closures.
The lane closure begins at 6 p.m. Friday.
Anyone with questions regarding the project should email dot.constrD2@ct.gov, and the email subject line must include project number 152-158 or 0152-0158.
Bradley to break ground on $210M ground transportation center
Sean Teehan
Bradley International Airport tomorrow will break ground on a $210 million ground transportation center.
The new facility will place all rental car companies at the airport, eliminating the need for shuttle service from the airport to the rental agencies off-site locations. It will include 830 parking spaces for rental cars.
“The Connecticut Airport Authority is embarking on a major transformation at Bradley International Airport with the groundbreaking for its new Ground Transportation Center,” a statement from the Connecticut Airport Authority (CAA), which oversees Bradley, said.
In addition to centralizing rental car facilities, the CAA said, the new transportation center will add public parking spaces and incorporate public transit options.
Chicago-based Green Courte Partners LLC said it bought Roncari Valet Parking and Galaxy Self Park, both of which are used by Bradley passengers. The two lots will be combined as a single entity.
“Roncari and Galaxy will be combined and rebranded as The Parking Spot, Green Courte's near-airport parking platform, by the end of 2019,” the statement said. “With this new location, The Parking Spot portfolio expands to 39 facilities nationally at 23 airports.”
Hartford trash plant suffers another equipment failure, forcing trash shipments to New York and Pennsylvania
Gregory B. Hladky
The aging regional trash-to-energy plant in Hartford has suffered another partial breakdown, a malfunction that comes less than eight months after catastrophic equipment failures forced a complete and costly closure of the facility.
One of the plants two giant turbines, both of which were repaired following the November 2018 shutdown, was taken off-line on June 21 and shipped to St. Louis for major repairs, according to the plant’s operators. The turbine is expected to be back in Hartford on or before Aug. 15.
The Hartford facility, which normally burns about 2,000 tons of garbage a day to power the turbines that produce electricity, is currently incinerating approximately 1,800 tons a day, according to Thomas Kirk, president of the Materials Innovation Recycling Authority, the quasi-state agency that runs the regional facility. About 200 tons of trash per day are being shipped for burial in Pennsylvania and New York landfills.
Kirk said the regional trash system’s 51 member cities and towns won’t be charged additional fees or have any of their garbage shipped out of state.But private garbage haulers are being charged an additional $15 a ton for the extra expense of having their refuse sent by MIRA to out-of-state landfills, Kirk said. The added charge means private haulers bringing trash to the Hartford plant are now paying $100 a ton.
Equipment failures have become almost routine at the Hartford plant, which was originally built in the 1940s and converted to burn trash in 1988. The facility’s two turbines were also built in the 1940s, but experts say those types of power-generating machines are often kept in service for many decades.
Equipment failures have become almost routine at the Hartford plant, which was originally built in the 1940s and converted to burn trash in 1988. The facility’s two turbines were also built in the 1940s, but experts say those types of power-generating machines are often kept in service for many decades.
MIRA is currently in lengthy negotiations with a developer partnership called Sacyr-Rooney to take over the Hartford plant, update its equipment and modernize its operations. But those talks only recently moved past a deadlock that lasted more than a year, and officials say many key financial issues still need to be negotiated.
The turbine now in St. Louis for repairs is expected to be back in Hartford “by Aug. 15 or sooner,” Kirk said. He said the cost of repairs would be “in the six figures” but the exact amount isn’t yet known.
Kirk said the problems with the turbine were causing vibrations that triggered an automatic safety shutdown. He said the exact cause of this new malfunction isn’t yet known but that it appears similar to the problem that resulted in the November failure.
“We expect this [repair] to fundamentally and finally fix the problem,” Kirk said. “This is not going to be a routine, twice-a-year issue.” He said any further breakdowns of this turbine would likely result in a decision to replace it.
“We expect this [repair] to fundamentally and finally fix the problem,” Kirk said. “This is not going to be a routine, twice-a-year issue.” He said any further breakdowns of this turbine would likely result in a decision to replace it.
MIRA paid about $6.1 million for shipping both of the plant’s huge turbines that broke down in November 2018 to St. Louis and to have them repaired.
Last year’s complete trash plant shutdown lasted nearly three months and cost MIRA nearly $15 million. The result was an increase in tipping fees of more than 15 percent for the regional system’s 51 member cities and towns. Those higher fees cost member communities hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Last year’s complete trash plant shutdown lasted nearly three months and cost MIRA nearly $15 million. The result was an increase in tipping fees of more than 15 percent for the regional system’s 51 member cities and towns. Those higher fees cost member communities hundreds of thousands of dollars.
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A Bloomfield official estimated that the higher tipping fees would cost his town more than $40,000 in added costs for refuse disposal in 2019-20. Officials in Hartford, which sends about 30,000 tons of garbage a year to the plant in the South Meadows section of the city, projected the increased fees could add $167,000 or more for the fiscal year that began July 1.
MIRA has already received about $7 million in insurance payments connected to the total plant breakdown that lasted until the end of January. Kirk said the quasi-public agency has filed additional insurance claims and those are now under negotiation.
But the operation’s coverage included a $250,000 deductible for each of the turbines that broke down last year. Insurance for millions of dollars in added costs to send thousands of tons of garbage for out-of-state disposal didn’t kick in until 45 days after the November 2018 shutdown.