Here's a look at state road construction projects in Connecticut this summer
The Connecticut Department of Transportation’s online map of
roadway projects shows a total of 604 active road improvement and maintenance
projects across the state.
Some of those are in the planning phase. Some are in the
design phase. A total of 179 active projects are in construction.
Despite the 90-degree heat, DOT spokesman Josh Morgan said,
“It’s a super busy time of year given we only are able to work April-October
(maybe a smidge later) because of weather.”
Though all work halted for the Independence Day holiday,
according to DOT, it restarted again on July 7.
Here is a list of upcoming DOT road projects:
Surface
treatment in Eastern Connecticut
A high-friction surface treatment project in Preston,
Hampton, Montville, Mansfield, Pomfret and Salem was scheduled to begin July 7.
The project was awarded to WJ Surface Treatments at a cost of $1.5 million.
The project involves Route 2A in Preston; Route 6 in
Hampton; Route 163 in Montville; Route 195 in Mansfield; Route 101 in Pomfret;
Route 164 in Preston; and Route 354 in Salem.
Route 8 bridges over Laurel Hill Road in Torrington will be
metalized between July 10 and Sept. 8. The project involves a total of 19
bridges along Route 8 between Torrington and Colebrook.
Allied Painting Inc. was awarded the project at a cost of
$15.7 million. Laurel Hill Road will be closed to traffic for the duration of
the project, eastbound traffic detoured onto Harwinton Avenue.
There will be cable maintenance conducted on the Merritt
Parkway between Exits 40, 44, 46 and 48 in Norwalk, Westport, Fairfield and
Trumbull beginning Wednesday July 9. The project is scheduled to be completed
by Friday, July 11, 2025.
Route
9 in Cromwell, Berlin and New Britain
A vegetation management operation on Route 9 between exits
29 and 37 in Cromwell, Berlin and New Britain is scheduled to begin Monday,
July 14 and is expected to last until Sept. 5, excluding scheduled
holidays.
The vegetation management project consists of the removal of
dead, diseased and decaying trees and other plants that have grown into the
safety space along the side of the roadway. DOT said the work is being
performed by J&J Brothers LLC.
Weather permitting, drivers will be detoured away from
Pinnacle Road in Ellington on July 14. According to DOT, “the project consists
of increasing the radii of the horizontal curve west of the Pinnacle Road
intersection and three horizontal curves east of Hopkins Road, as well as
realigning the intersections of Pinnacle Road and Hopkins Road.”
There will also be improvements made to drainage and
roadside safety systems. The $8.3 million project was awarded to Baltazar
Contractors Inc. It is scheduled to be completed by Nov. 30, 2027.
Joint
sealing on Hartford-area roads
Between Monday, July 14 and Nov. 7, a large number of routes
in the Hartford area will be subject to a joint and crack-sealing maintenance
project.
The following routes are included in the project and may
experience lane closures: State Route 533 (Grady Road to Route 30) in Vernon;
Route 69 (Route 72 to Route 6) in Bristol; Route 71 (Route 372 to OP
State Route571) in Berlin; Route 171 (Route 190 to Ringe Road) in Union; Route
31 (Route 44 to Tolland T/L) in Coventry; State Route 528 (Route 190 to Route
83) in Somers; State Route 536 (Route 372 to White Oak Ave.) in Plainville;
Route 70 (Cortland CR to Cheshire Road) in Meriden; Route 99 (Rocky Hill T/L to
Oxford ST) in Wethersfield; State Route 502 (East River DR to Route 44) in East
Hartford and Manchester; State Route 534 / Bolton (Hartford Road to Route 85)
in Manchester and Bolton; and Route 319 (Route 190 to Route 32) in Stafford.
There will be a traffic split to perform prefabricated joint
installation on southbound I-95 in Westport, July 14 through Aug. 17. The
project involves median replacement, resurfacing, drainage and safety
improvements, and was awarded to Yonkers Contracting Company at a cost of
$103.4 million. It is scheduled to be completed by Aug. 31
DOT said there will be a traffic split, though there will be
the same number of lanes on southbound I-95 between exits 17 and 18.
New light poles will be installed on I-95 North and
Southbound July 14 between exits 51 and 62 in East Haven, Branford, Guilford
and Madison.
The project is expected to be completed on Aug. 22 and will
involve lane
Route
41 in Sharon and Salisbury
Route 41, Stonehouse Road to Route 44 Main Street, in Sharon
and Salisbury will be milled and resurfaced starting July 15 through Aug.
19.
Drivers can expect delays 7 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday through
Friday.
A milling and resurfacing project on I-291 in Windsor and
South Windsor is scheduled to begin Sunday, July 20 and last until Sept. 18.
The project will resurface a 3.61-mile segment of I-291 in Windsor and South
Windsor from .16 miles east of the overpass for I-91 overpass as far as the
eastbound end overpass of Route 30.
A milling and resurfacing project on Route 218 in Windsor is
scheduled to begin July 20 and be completed by Sept. 18. The project involves
milling and resurfacing a 1.06-mile segment of Route 218 in Windsor from
Windsor Avenue to Deerfield Road.
Drivers can expect lane closures of Route 218 in Windsor
from Windsor Avenue to Deerfield Road.
The existing chain link fence Route 6 in Danbury from Saw
Mill Road to Milestone Road will be upgraded, starting Aug. 11. The project
should be completed by Sept. 15.
Drivers can expect lane closures between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m.
on Route 6 from Saw Mill Road to Milestone Road for the duration of the
project.
New Haven kicks off its 2025 paving work. Is your street one of 53 on the list?
NEW HAVEN — Heavy trucks and gigantic road-milling machinery
rumbled to life along Meadow View Road Wednesday morning, kicking off this
year's street
milling and paving work.
The city has hired a firm to do work along the 53
streets scheduled to be rebuilt this summer. The work is part of $2.8
million in infrastructure improvements and road repairs the city is doing this
year along the 237 miles of roads it maintains.
"It's our favorite time of year," Mayor
Justin Elicker said Wednesday at a press conference at Meadow View Road and
Meadow View Terrace in the Morris Cove section to announce the start of road
paving season in New Haven.
Residents and those visiting or working in New Haven just
need to be a little patient, because sometimes the milling, which strips the
old layers off your street and leaves it even bumpier than it was before, and
the paving don't happen all at once, Elicker said Wednesday.
That's especially true for those who live along one of the
bigger, busier streets also scheduled to be rebuilt in major ways under
separate projects, including Whitney
Avenue, State
Street, Quinnipiac
Avenue, Howard Avenue and Valley
Street.
Those projects, which depend on other sources of revenue,
might not get done until late summer or early fall, although work already has
begun along Quinnipiac Avenue, officials said.
"New Haveners deserve newly paved roads and we work
hard to make that happen," Elicker said.
Streets are chosen from street assessments done by outside
engineers, which are then reviewed by the city's Public Works Department, with
priority given to the lowest-graded and highest-traveled roads, Elicker
said.
The milling and paving work covers about 800 to 1,000 square
feet per day, he said.
Elicker and Public Works Director Michael Siciliano
asked residents to adhere to no-parking restrictions, including signs that will
be posted along streets being milled and paved before work begins. Those who
don't move their vehicles may be towed.
Asked specifically about some particularly rough patches of
Whitney, which have irked some residents who drive the road every day, Elicker
said the city will be putting the first half of that project out to bid in a
week or two.
The Whitney Avenue project includes new curbs and sidewalks,
said Elicker. He pointed out that at $2.8 million, the Whitney Avenue project
will cost as much as the entire seasonal milling and paving project.
The complete
list of streets scheduled for milling and paving can be found on the
city’s website under public works. This includes which sections of the streets
will be completed, as the entire road might not be part of this round of
paving.
Streets on the list include Meadow View Road, Meadow View
Terrace, Kneeland Road, Harrington Avenue, Fulton Street, East Ferry
Street, Lexington Avenue, Eastern Street, Marie Street, Flint Street,
Ellis Street, East Pearl Street, Chapel Street, Exchange Street, Shelter
Street, Clay Street, Fillmore Street, Market Street, Mill River Street, Eagle
Street, Foster Street, Lawrence Street, Everit Street, Mansfield Street,
Winchester Avenue and Elizabeth Street.
Sherman Avenue, West Ivy Street, Charles Street, Whalley
Avenue, Glen Road, Goffe Terrace, Jewell Street, Valley Place, Davis Street,
Laurel Road, Mumford Street, McKinley Avenue, Chapel Street, Scranton
Street, George Street, Congress Avenue, Carlisle Street, Kimberly Avenue and
Grant Street are also included.
The following sections will have work done at night: George
Street from Church Street to Temple Street, Park Street from Chapel Street to
Broadway and Tower Parkway from York Square Place to Dixwell Avenue.
New London Housing Authority continues effort to fund $30M Gordon Court replacement
John Penney
New London — In April, New London Housing Authority
Executive Director Norbert Deslauriers learned that his application for more
than $1 million in federal housing tax credits wasn’t approved.
Deslauriers had hoped to auction those credits, awarded
annually by Connecticut Housing Finance Authority (CHFA), to investors in
exchange for millions of more dollars in equity financing. That money would
have kick-started a massive $30
million demolition and rebuilding project at the Gordon Court elderly and
disabled housing neighborhood run by the housing authority.
“It’s not that we weren’t optimistic about our application,
but we were competing with a lot of other projects,” Deslauriers said
Wednesday.
Undeterred by the rejection,
Deslauriers within a week filed another application. The new submission, this
time for roughly $1.7 million in credits, was made through a less competitive
CHFA funding program — one that also offers fewer equity options — whose awards
are expected to be announced soon.
Selling credits to raise equity
The federal Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program
was created in 1986 to spur private investment in affordable housing. The
credits operate as a kind of coupon for companies seeking to build or redevelop
affordable housing projects by lowering the amount of taxes they’re required to
pay.
But the credits can also be sold to investors in exchange
for more equity than the credits are issued for, a process called
“syndication.” For investors, purchasing such credits offers a direct reduction
in federal tax liability and can be a stable, long-term investment. For
sellers, the equity earned reduces the financing they'd otherwise have to
secure for a project.
The credits come in 9% and 4% rates.
The 9% versions — the kind the housing authority initially
applied for — are allocated through a highly competitive application process
and provide a 9% tax credit each year for 10 years to the holder. That amounts
to $90,000 in tax credits per year, or $900,000 over the course of a 10-year
period.
Those credits can be sold to investors for about $.95 on the
dollar.
The CHFA Board of Directors in April approved a total of
$14.8 million in 9% tax credit awards for 10 projects, including $1.08 million
for Eastern Connecticut Housing Opportunities (ECHO). ECHO plans to sell the
credits to investors in exchange for up to $10 million in equity to help
finance the construction of a five-story, 46-unit apartment building on Union
and State streets.
But five other 9% tax credit applications, including the
$1.34 million request from the New London Housing Authority, weren’t approved.
That led to Deslauriers’ latest application for roughly $1.7 million in 4%
credits.
The 4% credit subsidizes 30% of eligible low-income unit
costs and is typically used to buy or rehabilitate existing properties. Unlike
the 9% credits, the 4% ones are backed by tax-exempt, private activity bonds
used to attract private investment for projects that have some public benefit.
Deslauriers said there are pros and cons to a 4% credit
subsidy.
“The advantage is, unlike the 9% ones, there’s no limit to
how many can be issued,” he said. “But you’re not going to get the kind of
investor equity you would with a 9%.”
In this application round, the housing authority partnered
with Boston-based Beacon Communities group, which Deslauriers said has
experience navigating the tax credit process.
“We were told we weren’t going to get an award without a
co-developer like Beacon,” he said.
Funding a new housing complex
The Gordon Court project, which had been expected to begin
this year, calls for demolishing the 38 existing units off Williams Street,
which were built in the 1960s, and constructing one building with 81
one-bedroom and five two-bedroom apartments.
But even if the latest CHFA award round favors the housing
authority, other revenue streams will have to be tapped to complete the work.
Deslauriers said the new building would carry a permanent mortgage and the
state Department of Housing will be asked to fill any gap in funding in the
form of loans or grants.
The Gordon Court work is the first of a larger phased
project that also calls for redeveloping the two other state-overseen
facilities managed by the housing authority, the George Washington Carver
Apartments on Colman Street and Riozzi Court. All the complexes are open to
tenants ages 62 or older or who are 100% disabled.
All three of the facilities planned for replacement have
been plagued
with the types of plumbing, ventilation and other infrastructure issues
expected in 60-year-old structures.
Deslauriers said there have been fewer building issues since
the weather turned warmer.
“But health and safety of tenants is the priority,” he said.
“So, we’re not going to put off a major heating repair just because we might be
getting a new building a year later.”
Tariff fallout leads to layoffs at Massachusetts concrete firm
Pittsfield, Massachusetts-based Unistress Corp. and its
subsidiary, Berkshire Concrete Corp., are laying
off 233 workers, according to a Massachusetts Worker Adjustment Retraining
Notification notice filed for the week ending June 27.
CEO Perri Petricca said the layoffs stem from the delay
of two
major contracts following volatility in steel prices tied to the
latest round of President Donald Trump’s tariffs, according to The Berkshire
Eagle.
Trump doubled tariffs
on imported steel and aluminum from 25% to 50% on June 3, fueling
further cost spikes for construction materials.
Tariff-driven volatility is sidelining
projects and shrinking overall backlog across the industry.
Unistress, a precast manufacturer whose portfolio includes
Boston’s Big Dig megaproject and Yankee Stadium in New York City, is cutting
nearly half its workforce as it adjusts operations in response to material
costs and uncertain project timelines. Petricca told The Berkshire Eagle the
move is temporary, but with the firm usually netting about a dozen contracts a
year, the two delays caused significant financial pressure.
The layoffs land as input
costs continue to swell.
Construction material prices inched up 0.2% in May, with
aluminum and steel among the top gainers, and are up 6% on an annualized basis,
according to Associated Builders and Contractors. Those figures also don’t yet
reflect the June tariff hike, which economists say will push prices even
higher.
Contractors are already feeling the pinch. Nearly a quarter
of builders reported tariff-related project cancellations in May, according to
ABC. Backlog
slipped to 8.4 months, down from a two-year high, with sales and staffing
confidence also falling.
Unistress filed a WARN notice as required under federal law,
which mandates advance notice of mass layoffs. The layoffs will take effect
between July 7 and Aug. 25, according to the filing. Construction Dive reached
out to Unistress, which declined to comment on the layoffs.
Restaurant owner proposes horse-racing track on Enfield farm
A restaurant owner is proposing to construct a horse-racing
track and training facility on a 59.3-acre farm in Enfield.
Nicholas Vamvilis, owner of Maine Fish Market Restaurant in
East Windsor, has applied for a special permit to develop a commercial horse
training facility.
A public hearing on the application is set for the Planning
and Zoning Commission’s meeting, which starts at 7 p.m. Thursday.
The property at 20 Oliver Road, which contains mostly vacant
farmland, is owned by Seafood Delight Farm LLC in Somers. Nicholas Vamvilis and
Peter Vamvilis are listed as principals of the company, which is based in
Somers.
The trapezoid-shaped property, which is zoned for industrial
use, hugs Interstate 91 to the west and is adjacent to Enfield Animal Hospital.
According to the project plans, a half-mile oval
horse-racing track will be constructed on an existing hay field, along with
three barns, each with two stories, ranging from 7,200 to 8,550 square feet,
and a gravel parking lot.
The inside of the track will contain a series of paddocks
for training or holding horses, with grass and hay landscaping.
Bathrooms are proposed in the barns, along with minor
exterior lighting by the doorways.
No outdoor seating is planned.
The current driveway used to access the property will be
replaced with an 18-foot wide gravel driveway with a new three-sided box
culvert carrying it over an intermittent stream.
The application states the proposed facility is a “general
continuation” of the current agricultural use of the property and is not
expected to be detrimental to any adjacent properties.
A similar commercial horse training facility with a
racetrack, Lindy Farms, is located in Somers.