Talking Transportation: Why Not a Cheaper, Simpler Replacement for the $1B Walk Bridge?
Jim Cameron
Imagine having to replace the George Washington Bridge,
in-place, while still handling thousands of cars and trucks each day. The
railroad equivalent of that is still underway in South Norwalk, replacing
what’s known as the Walk Bridge, a vital rail link in the Northeast Corridor
for Metro-North, Amtrak and the occasional freight train.
We all remember the woes of this 125-year-old swing bridge
that sometimes refuses to close, stranding thousands of riders. The 2017 plan to replace it includes
$161 million in Federal Sandy relief money. But the total cost has
ballooned from $600 million to over $1 billion (thanks to added rail yards and
such) and again seems to be climbing… and the old bridge is still there.
Some skeptics in Norwalk opposed the plan because of the
cost, others because they would lose their land by eminent domain. And
everyone’s concerned about the years of construction and mess… including
demolition of the Maritime Aquarium IMAX Theater.
The CDOT had considered all sorts of new bridge designs…
truss, lift, bascule, counter-weight and even an elevated fly-over. But
one design seemed conspicuously missing that might have be cheaper… a
non-movable, “fixed” bridge.
Why not just “close the river” and replace the old bridge
with a cheaper bridge that doesn’t have to swing or lift open because it’s
permanently closed? That option was not even discussed in the
voluminous Environmental
Assessment Report. Why?
Blame the US Coast Guard and Army Corps of Engineers.
They want to keep the mighty Norwalk River, all two miles of it, open and
navigable. But do they really have that much power? Isn’t it
possible to force those Federal agencies to, in effect, close the river to boat
and barge traffic by edict or a bill put through Congress?
Couldn’t the few companies still on the river… a concrete
company, an idle asphalt plant and a small marina… be bought-out with money
saved by building a cheaper fixed bridge that doesn’t raise or lower? The
answer is yes, but it wasn’t considered, and here’s why.
Six years ago I cornered then-CDOT Commissioner Jim Redeker
and asked him. (Spoiler alert: critics of the bridge plan won’t
like his answers.) The Commissioner said that CDOT did ask
the US Coast Guard and Army Corps of Engineers about a fixed bridge that would
close the river and were told “no way”… though critics say such concessions
have precedents elsewhere in the country.
I even asked a member of our Congressional delegation about
introducing a bill to “close” the river. He said he could do that, but
nobody official has requested that.
More important, then-Commissioner Redeker said whether fixed
bridge or movable, construction would still disrupt the neighbors just as much
and for just as long. And, said Redeker, the cost savings for going to a
smaller, simpler fixed bridge would only be 10 – 12%. Really? Hard
to believe.
The Walk Bridge project is worth watching because it may act
as a template for other “billion dollar bridge” replacements farther east in
the years to come. Everyone just wishes, five years after it started,
they’d get on with replacing that old bridge and keeping trains running.
STAMFORD — The Board of Finance is grappling with how the
city will fund its share of a $1.5 billion school facilities plan.
Earlier this year, the architectural firm SLAM gave a
presentation to city boards showing that if Stamford wanted to address 100 percent
of deferred maintenance in its schools as part of a master plan, the city’s
share of the cost would be about $541 million over 12 years.
SLAM has now updated the plan, stretching it out over 20
years and adding in factors such as inflation. Full implementation of the plan,
including addressing all the deferred maintenance, would cost the city about
$952 million over two decades.
Officials have zeroed in on a $756 million price tag, which
is expected to allow the city to address 60 percent of deferred maintenance.
A previous
estimate left out a project at Stamford High School.
The new plan projects that the state will contribute a total
of $766 million.
Sandy Dennies, the city’s director of administration, summed
up some of the key decisions the Board of Finance will need to make.
“I think you need to decide what you’re going to do by
selling bonds and what you're going to do by raising cash,” Dennies said during
a meeting last week. “And you’ve got to find the balance. How much do you raise
through tax increases and how much do you raise through bonding?”
Laura Berwick, who joined the Board of Finance in September
after Democrat David Mannis resigned, said the city has long “kicked the can
down the road” when it comes to its school buildings. She praised those who
worked on the master plan, saying that implementing it is feasible.
“But it is extraordinarily expensive, and I want to make
sure that we’re not putting an undue burden on the taxpayers of Stamford and
that we’re not over-bonding to a point where we put our (credit) rating at risk
or the debt service costs over the next 20 to 30 years (are) just a staggering
amount for the taxpayers to support,” Berwick said.
For the current fiscal year, the Board of Finance set the
city’s so-called safe debt limit at $40 million. Wednesday evening, the board
explored the idea of the city bonding $70 million per year, with $30 million
dedicated to long-term school facilities projects and $40 million to city
capital projects, like road paving, as well as short-term school projects.
But $30 million won’t be enough to meet the goals set by the
schools master plan, Freedman said.
The plan calls for about $39 million in funding from the
city for the coming fiscal year. The number rises as high as $51 million in
future years. Freedman said the city will have to make up the difference
through taxes.
“If we bond $30 million, we’re still short,” Freedman said.
“Unless we’re going to bond even more than $30 million, we’re going to have to
have something in the mill rate. I don’t see how we get around that.”
This year, the Board of Finance and Board of Representatives
agreed to raise $20 million for school construction projects through
an increased tax rate. Freedman said he will recommend that Mayor Caroline
Simmons include another $20 million in her budget proposal for fiscal 2023-24.
Freedman also noted that there is a lag between when the
city pays for construction work and when it receives reimbursement from the
state. He said there were a couple ways the city could fill the gap, including
drawing against a line of credit or using tax money.
“It’s not enough to just fund the local share in a given
year,” Freedman said. “We do have to have the cash available to float the
state’s share.”
The meeting, which included school district officials, grew
tense when some finance board members suggested that the city and the Board of
Education will need to tighten up their budgets.
“Not only the administration, but the different departments,
the Board of Ed, they’re going to have to sharpen their pencil and make sure
that their budgets come in as low as possible so we can afford to fund the
capital side of the budget,” said Board of Finance Vice Chair Mary Lou Rinaldi,
a Democrat.
“I agree with Mary Lou,” Republican member Dennis Mahoney
said. “I think it’s incredibly important every day of the week and twice on
Sunday to focus in on where the city can become more efficient.”
Mahoney took issue with the fact that after the Board of
Finance and Board of Representatives cut the schools budget this year, district
officials decided to use federal COVID-19 relief dollars to temporarily
fund some positions, setting up what is known as a fiscal cliff.
In response, Superintendent Tamu Lucero pointed out that the
Board of Finance slashed the schools budget by $12.5 million during the 2020
pandemic-influenced budget season.
“At that time, we said to everyone that we were going to
have to put back some of these positions, and we laid out a plan for how we
were going to do it,” Lucero said. “But then the cuts kept coming to our
budget. At some point, I have to defend our children and the need for them to
be educated properly.”
Kemp Morhardt from the architectural firm SLAM told the Board
of Finance that the updated facilities plan factors in inflation, includes new
cost escalation numbers and reflects recent
changes to the state’s reimbursement rates for school construction projects in
Stamford.
A provision within a state budget bill granted an 80 percent
reimbursement rate for a new Westhill High School — a major jump from the 20
percent rate the state previously agreed to pay. Another provision increased
the state’s contribution for certain school projects from 20 percent to 60
percent for 25 years. Still, the overall price tag for Stamford has gone
up.
The old plan assumed a 95 percent reimbursement rate for
Westhill and an 80 percent rate for a new south Stamford school.
Cost estimates within the plan were based on 2021 dollars.
SLAM has increased those estimates 20 percent to reflect current dollars,
Morhardt said.
He said the plan’s timeline changed from 12 years to 20 in
an effort to keep Stamford’s share under $50 million per year. He noted that
federal COVID-19 funding will cover the cost of addressing some “immediate
needs” in the first phase of the plan, while other deferred maintenance work
will be pushed out to later years.
Morhardt also said that the new plan accounts for the
possibility that even if the state agrees to pay for a portion of the project,
some of the work may not be eligible for reimbursement.
“This is a bit of a conservative approach,” Morhardt said.
“As the projects get more defined and the projects unfold, of course we’re
going to maximize reimbursement as much as possible.”
Though the projected costs have changed, much of the plans
for closing, expanding and building new schools have remained the same. Dolan
Middle School, Cloonan Middle School, Toquam Magnet Elementary School and K.T.
Murphy Elementary School would close. Three K-5 schools — Hart Magnet
Elementary School, Roxbury Elementary School and Westover Magnet Elementary
School — would become K-8 schools.
K.T. Murphy would close in 2028 followed by Toquam in 2030,
Cloonan in 2033 and Dolan in 2035, according to the updated plan. The new Hart
school would still be built where Cloonan now stands as previously planned.
A new K-8 school would be established in south Stamford. The
school would have two sites under the new plan: one on Lockwood Avenue for
kindergarten through fourth grade, and another on the former K.T. Murphy campus
for grades five through eight.
Includes prior reporting by staff writer Ignacio Laguarda.
Millions in federal aid to boost offshore wind in Bridgeport
BRIDGEPORT — With an infusion of $10.5 million in federal
dollars, the city and a private company on the harbor are aiming to make Bridgeport
a hub for future offshore wind energy projects.
But the direct beneficiary of that federal aid is not
Avangrid's previously ballyhooed Park City Wind project, but instead
local shipyard
operator Bridgeport Boatworks.
This week members of Connecticut's congressional delegation
announced $17 million for improvements to Bridgeport's and New London's ports.
According to the notice of grant award from the U.S. Department of
Transportation, $10.5 million is headed to the Bridgeport Port Authority to
design and build an "operations maintenance and wind port" that involves
harbor dredging, the installation of bulkheads, a floating service dock and
pads for cranes.
The grant award document made no mention of a specific site,
but the congressional delegation's press release named Bridgeport Boatworks
along Seaview Avenue.
"This announcement will ensure that Bridgeport plays a
pivotal role in the emerging wind industry in our region," Boatworks'
owner Harry Boardsen said in the release.
"This investment in Bridgeport's port infrastructure
will help create hundreds of jobs in our region and generate millions in direct
economic benefits," said Robert Christoph Jr., the developer who owns the
acreage where Boatworks is located. "This transformative grant award will
help continue to unlock Bridgeport Harbor's enormous untapped potential to
serve as an economic hub for the region and the State of Connecticut."
Park City Wind received similar accolades for its plans to
locate a temporary construction staging area and, later, a permanent
maintenance and operations facility, elsewhere on Seaview Avenue on a parcel
owned by the Bridgeport-Port Jefferson ferry.
But as reported in July, a lease
announcement between Park City Wind and the ferry was premature, and,
because of re-zoning
under Mayor Joe Ganim's administration, the proposed staging area cannot
proceed, though the operations/maintenance building could.
Then last week it was announced during Avangrid's third
quarter earnings call with Wall Street analysts that
Park City Wind's completion date had been pushed back from 2026 to 2027.
The company has continually, including this week, insisted
that Bridgeport will continue to play "a central role" in its plans.
But asked about the $10.5 million federal grant, an Avagrid spokesman replied,
"Park City Wind was not involved."
Boardsen, meanwhile, in an email did not name down a user
for its future offshore wind facilities.
"We have been a part of many conversations over the
years with many offshore wind developers," he said. "We hope any of
the projects coming online could utilize our facility."
"Bridgeport Boatworks has been part of the offshore
wind power conversation from the start," Boardsen said. "We actively
encouraged the state to write legislation to procure offshore wind power as a
... renewable energy source and also knowing one day it could be an integral
economic driver in Bridgeport Harbor."
As for additional financing and a timeline, Boardsen said
the entire project budget is around $30 million and will include "a
private contribution."
"We are not pursuing additional state or federal money
at this time," he said, and also confirmed no municipal dollars are
involved.
"We will begin the permitting conversation soon,"
Boardsen said. "The grant application has been in the works for over a
year. Depending on how quickly we navigate the various permitting requirements
we will get to work. Would love to get going sometime next year."
Norwich residents get chance to comment on proposed second business park
Claire Bessette
Norwich ― As permitting gets underway for a proposed $24
million, 384-acre second business park in Occum, neighbors are rallying
opposition to the plan many say would ruin Norwich’s quiet corner.
The first chance for public comment will be at a
neighborhood meeting at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Norwich Worship Center, 165
Lawler Lane. Norwich Community Development Corp. officials will explain the
Business Park North plan and answer questions.
Wednesday’s meeting will be less formal, with more audience
interaction with project officials than the City Council-zoning board public
hearing at 7:30 p.m. Monday Dec. 5 at Kelly Middle School, 25 Mahan Drive.
In Norwich, the City Council serves as the zoning board,
which handcuffs aldermen and Mayor Peter Nystrom from discussing the project
outside the public hearing and zoning board review.
Nystrom, Alderwoman Stacy Gould and Alderman Swaranjit Singh
Khalsa are voting members of the NCDC Board of Directors and have had to recuse
themselves and skip executive session discussions at recent meetings, as the
project neared permit stage.
The Commission on the City Plan must give a recommendation
on the proposed business park master plan to the zoning board. The commission
will discuss the plan at its 7 p.m. meeting Nov. 15 at City Hall, but there
will be no public hearing at that time.
NCDC has an option to purchase the 17 properties for $3.55
million from M&A Holdings LLC and Byron Brook Country Club LLC. The owners
had purchased the properties, including the former Tarryk and Doolittle farms,
in the early 2000s for a golf course resort and residential project that fell
through. The parcels now are zoned for a planned development district or
general commercial development.
NCDC’s option expires Dec. 31. The agency had hoped to
secure federal funding as part of a larger, unsuccessful regional federal grant application this
summer. NCDC President Kevin Brown said the agency continues to work on
alternative purchase avenues.
Meanwhile, NCDC and real estate consultant Henry Resnikoff
have pushed forward with design and permitting. The City Council-zoning
board approved zoning regulations for a Business Master Plan
District in April 2021. The Dec. 5 meeting will review the specific plan for
the property.
The conceptual master plan map submitted in September shows the property divided into
potential development parcels with a dozen buildings ranging from 9,000 square
feet to 500,000 square feet.
The plan calls for reconstructing Exit 18 ramp off
Interstate 395 at Route 97 to create a designated main entrance into the
business park. A roundabout is proposed where the new road intersects with
Canterbury Turnpike to keep business park traffic off the rural road.
There are 148 abutting property owners to the 17 business
park parcels on Canterbury Turnpike, Scotland Road, Lawler Lane and Route 97 in
Occum.
Dozens of residents have taken to Facebook forums to voice
opposition to the project and rally residents to attend public meetings.
Opponents pledge to circulate petitions to present to the City Council-zoning
board to a project some say would ruin the rural character of the city’s “quiet
corner” and disrupt wildlife habitat.
Opponents questioned the need for a second business park,
citing vacant commercial and industrial buildings in the current Stanley
Israelite Norwich Business Park and elsewhere in the city. Others questioned
promises of a property tax windfall if the city grants generous tax breaks
“only to have the business pack up and leave” once the tax breaks end, one
commenter posted.
Samuel Browning, a local attorney and former alderman, is an
abutter on Scotland Road. “I’m probably in the minority in that I don’t oppose
this,” Browning said. But he has questions and concerns, especially about the
access road and traffic.
“I hope they get the highway ramp done,” Browning said. “If
they don’t get the access right from day one, it will be screwed up. it will
increase the opposition.”
Browning also said the first city business park is nearly
full, because the city allowed condominiums and apartment complexes. “They
turned great swaths of it into condos.”
Pastor Jeff Sharp at the Norwich Worship Center said he was
approached by a neighbor who asked the church to host the neighborhood meeting.
The church seats about 200 people, and if necessary could set up an overflow
video viewing room downstairs.
Sharp said the congregation, which has about 120 to 130
active members, has not discussed the business park much. The church itself
sold rear land to the former golf course project in 2007. Sharp said the church
uses its large lawn that would overlook the development for barbecues and youth
activities.
“We’ve known for a number of years that something would be
built around us,” Sharp said.
NCDC President Brown said project officials will give a
presentation and answer questions in an informal setting Wednesday. They will discuss
impacts on residents, buffer zones and a proposed public bikeway and walking
path.
Brown said officials will assure residents that no
construction is imminent. The project needs local, state and federal
permitting, including approval from the Office of State Traffic Administration
for the access road. NCDC will apply for federal funding again in spring.
Brown said he understands concerns about traffic on
residential roads and said the proposed access roads would come first.
“We would not put the cart before the horse,” Brown said.
“Yes, we understand the concern about the traffic pattern.”
Windsor logistics center built on spec signs major national tenant
Alarge Windsor logistics center that was being constructed
on spec has signed a national tenant to occupy the entire property.
Columbus, Ohio-based Safelite Group, parent company of the
well-known Safelite AutoGlass brand, has signed a long-term lease to occupy
165,625 square feet in the Baker Hollow Logistics Center, at 105 Baker Hollow
Road.
Safelite will be the property’s sole occupant. It will use
it for its windshield replacement operations and support office, according to
Condyne Capital Partners, the logistics center’s Massachusetts-based developer.
Condyne paid $1.65 million for the 15.8-acre Baker Hollow
Road site last December. The seller was Windsor-based O.J. Thrall Inc., which
previously used the land as a tobacco farm.
The logistics center is still under construction but should
be completed by the end of the year. After that, Safelite will make some
improvements to the property. The lease starts in April, according to Shawn
McMahon, a broker with Jones Lang LaSalle’s Hartford office. He and Daniel
McGillicuddy brokered the lease deal.
When complete, the property will feature a 5,000-square-foot office, warehouse
space, 32-inch ceiling heights, 38 dock doors, four electric vehicle charging
stations, a 100,000-gallon fire storage tank and 25% of the roof will be
reserved for solar, Condyne said.
Condyne and its partner, Polar Design Build, contracted
Flood Consulting, Maugel DeStefano Architects and Quieto Consulting
Engineers for the overall design of the building and its grounds, the company
said.