ROTHA Begins $48M Putnam Memorial Bridge Rehabilitation Project in Conn.
Ken Liebeskind
ROTHA Contracting, Avon, Conn., is the lead contractor of
the rehabilitation of the Putnam Memorial bridge in Wethersfield and
Glastonbury, Conn., that started on March 16, 2026, and is slated to be
completed by Nov. 3, 2028, according to CTDOT.
"The purpose of the project is to increase the load
rating factor for all legal, permit and emergency vehicles through
strengthening and bracing of the existing structural steel," said CTDOT.
"The project will also include deck patching and new wearing surface
installation, drainage repairs, inspection catwalk removal, substructure
concrete repairs and full painting of the bridge."
The cost of the project is $48 million, which will be paid
by 80 percent federal funds and 20 percent state funds.
"We just started in the middle of March," said
Ryan Hawkins, ROTHA Contracting project manager. "We have constructed
access roads on the east and west approaches under the bridge. We have also
prepped some staging areas adjacent to the bridge. We installed E&S
control, construction signs. We also installed VMS signs to post the bridge for
a 20-ton weight limit during construction. Our painting subcontractor started
mobilizing this week and will start installing safe span platforms starting
next week."
Over the next couple of months ROTHA's painting
subcontractor will install safe span platforms under the entire bridge. This
allows ROTHA to access and perform the steel strengthening. The initial
temporary platforms will be smaller in size to reduce loading on the bridge
until the steel strengthening is completed. Once that is done, the painters
will install a full-width platform and containment to blast and paint the
entire steel superstructure.
"Generally, 2026 will be temporary platforms and steel
strengthening repairs, and 2027 and 2028 will be steel repairs,
blasting/painting, deck patching, scupper replacement, joint repairs and PPC
overlay," said Hawkins. "Basically, year one is mostly underside
steel repairs, then year two and three will be both underside repairs and deck
patching."
The construction equipment used for the project includes
a Volvo EW160
excavator and a Volvo L60H loader, a JCB articulated
truck, a Dynapac CA2500
roller, JLG 860SJ
and 660SJ manlifts, a Zim mixer for deck patching and the bridge deck will be
overlaid with a PPC (polyester polymer concrete) overload. CEG
Naugatuck revives plan to create new campus for grades 5-8: 'The time is right' for $200M project
NAUGATUCK — School officials are seeking to build a new
intermediate and middle school campus at the existing Cross Street Intermediate
School site, according to education
specifications for the project the Board of Education approved at a
recent meeting.
The proposal would relocate Hillside Intermediate and City
Hill Middle schools to the Cross Street site, creating a new consolidated
grades 5-8 campus, upgrading Naugatuck’s facilities for
those grades.
The proposal calls for the construction of two new
buildings, at an estimated cost of around $200 million.
The education specifications outlined a vision for two new
buildings, with one housing grades 5-6 and the other grades 7-8. The two
schools would share kitchen services, an auditorium and athletic space.
The grades 5-6 school would be designed to house at least
638 students, and the 708 school would be designed to house 613, for a total
of 1,251 students, according to the specifications that were approved
April 16.
The proposal revives a past plan to consolidate the campuses
that serve the borough’s middle school students. That consolidation was first
recommended in 2013 by a facilities planning committee in its overall blueprint
for using and upgrading Naugatuck’s aging school facilities.
Bob
Mezzo, chair of the Naugatuck
Board of Education, told CT Insider that he believes the intermediate and
middle school project as well as other school building upgrades are long
overdue.
“Unfortunately, many of our school buildings have outlived
their useful life years ago,” he said.
Naugatuck Mayor Pete Hess agreed.
“The buildings that we’re doing are in poor condition and in
need of a total remake,” he said. “The time is right now to do it. So we’re
moving forward with it.”
The proposed campus would not only allow Naugatuck to move
all of its grades 5-8 students onto one campus, it would also take some of the
district’s older school buildings offline, Hess said. Those buildings could
then be redone “and converted to other use,” including uses for the borough, he
said.
Meanwhile, Hess said, “it’s good to get better facilities
for the schools.”
A 2013 facilities planning committee recommended a
three-phase plan for updating the schools. The first phase called for
renovating Naugatuck High School, which was completed a decade ago.
Consolidating Naugatuck’s middle schools onto one site was
the second phase of the plan. While the plan had called for the project to
launch after the high school project was completed, it hasn’t yet begun.
Economic circumstances at the time prompted leaders to pause
their previous pursuit of the project, Mezzo said. Naugatuck had just
completed the $81 million renovation of its high school, and residents faced
increased tax bills after borough-wide property revaluations raised their
homes’ assessed values, Mezzo said.
Naugatuck’s taxpayers would have hesitated to approve
another school construction bond at the time, he said.
The new proposal for an intermediate and middle school
campus honors the 2013 facilities plan’s “original intent,” the education
specifications stated.
While the cost is expected to total around $200 million,
Hess said he hopes to maximize state school construction grant reimbursements
to ensure Naugatuck taxpayers are only responsible for a small portion: around
$30 million.
The borough’s state
school construction grant reimbursement rate is now 74.6% according to
the Connecticut Department of Administrative Services. But the mayor said he
would like to see that rate pushed up to 85%.
Hess said he also wants to structure bond payments for
the project so those payments wouldn’t be due until 2033. That year, Naugatuck
will see a $6 million injection in property taxes from a 3.2-million-square-foot
Amazon robotics fulfillment center that is currently under
construction.
“We’re trying to time the new school so it won’t have an
adverse impact on the mill rate,” Hess said. “That’s why I believe that
financially the time is right.”
The project would go to voters in a referendum in November
2027.
Mezzo said the board’s approval of education specifications
was the first step in what will be a multistep process, which will include the
voter referendum and applying for state school construction grant funds. A
projected timeline for the project wasn’t available.
If voters back the project and construction is completed,
officials said they hope to pursue another project: upgrading the City
Hill Middle School building and converting it for use as an elementary school.
It’s “in dire need of an upgrade,” Hess said.
For that project, Hess said he hopes the borough could
net a 95% reimbursement rate, by adding an early childhood education component
to it.
“Right now, that’s our plan, and we’re working with our
legislative delegation on it,” he said.
Manchester sells Broad Street Parkade site to developer of 232-unit mixed-use project
MANCHESTER — The town has sold the Broad Street Parkade site for $3.6 million to the prospective developer of an $80 million mixed-use housing and retail project with 232 apartments.
After a 2022 request for proposals, Manchester
selected Texas-based
Anthony Properties to develop five properties formerly
home to a blighted strip mall: 296, 324, 330, 334, and 340 Broad St. Under
the developer's site plan, approved in December 2025, the roughly 21.6-acre
site will have a residential component accessed from Green Manor Boulevard with
four 48-unit buildings and four 10-unit buildings, supported by a
clubhouse and other amenities, and 13,000 square-feet of commercial "pad
sites" with frontage on Broad Street.
The housing portion would feature 96 two-bedroom units, 88
one-bedroom units, and 48 studios, with 381 parking spaces on-site and along
Green Manor Boulevard.
Director of Planning & Economic Development Gary
Anderson issued a statement Thursday confirming that Manchester has closed on
its sale of the Parkade site to Anthony Properties for $3.6 million,
allowing the project to break ground "within the month."
"This marks a major milestone in the town’s ongoing
redevelopment efforts on Broad Street," Anderson said. "The agreement
signals the start of a transformational project, resulting from years of
dedicated planning and public investment, and establishes the groundwork for
the long-term transformation of the site."
As part of the agreement, Anderson said, Manchester will
contribute to public infrastructure projects that will support the
project and "ensure long-term functionality of the site." Planned
improvements to Green Manor Boulevard will better address the needs of the new
development and the wider public, and the extension of the Bigelow Brook
Greenway through the project site will connect Broad Street as a whole to
downtown Manchester, Center Springs Park, and the Cheney Brothers Historic
District.
"These investments build upon prior public improvements
in the corridor and reflect a continued strategy of leveraging private
development to improve public spaces," Anderson said.
Anderson in his statement that said town officials have
identified new construction at the Parkade site as a "major
piece" of broader plans to revitalize Broad Street, and the project by
Anthony Properties reflects the town's vision for a walkable, mixed-use
district in the area.
"With the signing of this agreement, Manchester takes a
significant step forward in realizing that vision and advancing a new chapter
of growth and investment in the community," Anderson said.
Redevelopment of the Parkade site would be the culmination
of nearly
two decades of efforts by town officials, starting in 2008 when the
Board of Directors charged the Redevelopment Agency with creating a plan to
revitalize Broad Street. The following year, the Board of Directors adopted the
RDA's plan and voters approved $8 million in bonds for Broad Street
redevelopment.
Manchester purchased a blighted shopping mall in 2011,
demolished the property in 2012, and chose Canadian developer Live Work Learn
Play to study potential development of the site in 2013, following a town bid
that only Live Work Learn Play responded to. The town signed a contract with
Live Work Learn Play to redevelop the property in 2016, but the contract lapsed
in 2018 before construction began in part due to legal
issues surrounding some of the land.
In 2019, the town began negotiations with Easton-based
developer Manchester Parkade I LLC, and the two signed a redevelopment
agreement for the Parkade site in 2021. Manchester declared the contract null
and void in 2022 and issued a new request for proposals, ultimately selecting
Anthony Properties to explore redevelopment of the site. Manchester
Parkade I LLC sued the town soon after, alleging a breach of contract.
The
town settled the case for $2 million in 2023, allowing negotiations
with Anthony Properties to resume and leading to a
new agreement that was signed in 2024.