CT Construction Digest Friday March 1, 2024
Major Connecticut River bridge to get $30 million work. Your commute may be affected
The state is preparing for a $30 million refurbishment of the Bissell Bridge, a key traffic link between I-84 and I-91 north of Hartford.
Work won’t start for two years, but engineers are cautioning that the bridge — heavily used at the morning and afternoon rush hours — will require lane closures and potentially some weekend shutdowns during construction.
Precise construction plans won’t be known until engineers do final designs in 2025, but the state department of transportation is letting the public know now that some potentially major weekend detours could be required in 2026 or 2027.
“As this is a river crossing, detour routes are pretty lengthy,” Jen Pixley, an engineer with CHA Consulting, acknowledged in a public presentation last week. “It’s not definite this will happen.”
The DOT is seeking to limit any complete shutdowns to weekends, when traffic is lighter. Even so, the bridge gets a significant amount of traffic on all days.
“The bridge is heavily traveled, with an average daily traffic of just over 62,000,” Pixley said.
The DOT and its consultants will do detailed traffic studies in 2025 to determine whether construction can be phased in a way that allows no more than one or two lanes to be closed at a time.
“As part of the final design phase, we will do some traffic counts to determine the volumes we’re dealing with. We’ll understand if one lane of traffic is sufficient or if we have to do a detour,” said Meziane Meziani, supervising engineer with the DOT.
If complete shutdowns are necessary, motorists would need to go miles out of their way, the DOT acknowledged.
Getting between the I-291 ramps at I-91 in Windsor at I-84 in South Windsor, for instance, would require one of two routes. For the first, drivers would head north to the Dexter Coffin Bridge between Windsor Locks and East Windsor, a roughly 16-mile detour. Alternately, they could go south to the Bulkeley Bridge in Hartford, which would add 8 to 9 miles to a trip, the DOT said.
The DOT hasn’t done estimates of the time that would add.
The DOT’s public presentation was done partly to let commuters, businesses and local officials know about what’s ahead.
“The Bissell Bridge is the town of South Windsor’s connection to Windsor. While we expect there may be minor delays on the bridge due to the DOT reconstruction, we are hopeful there is nothing too significant,” South Windsor Town Manager Michael Maniscalco said Wednesday. “That said, we will advise drivers to plan alternate route and to allot plenty of time if traveling in the area.”
Commercial shippers and the mega-warehouses around the Bradley International Airport region could be affected, since I-291 provides a rapid link to I-84 and northern New England.
Regardless of what’s done with car and truck traffic, the DOT anticipates temporarily closing the popular bike and pedestrian path along the north side of the Bissell Bridge during part of the construction. It’s a 1.4-mile like between Main Street in South Windsor and Windsor Meadows State Park in Windsor.
The 65-year-old bridge last underwent major work in 1993, when the superstructure was replaced and traffic lanes were expanded to two in each direction along with the 8-foot-wide multi-use path. It was once envisioned as part of a beltway loop around Hartford, linking Farmington on the western end and Rocky Hill on the east.
Contractors will repair structural steel, replace worn bridge deck joints and make other improvements. The project is funded through 90% federal grants and 10% state money, with no town dollars involved, Pixley noted.
Work on New Haven's State Street won't cause traffic nightmares, city engineer says
NEW HAVEN — If you're one of those people worried that the $6.7 million State Street redesign project that recently began will cause traffic nightmares, you can relax for now.
City Engineer Giovanni Zinn says the project to make a nine-block stretch of lower State Street more pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly won't involve street closures and will ultimately improve traffic and safety.
Any traffic disruption during the work will be minimal, Zinn said. The city will maintain "bidirectional traffic" throughout construction, although there may be short periods of road closures, he said.
"It’s more lane shifts than lane closures in Phase 1, as you see out there now," Zinn said, referring to work that recently began near the Encore by Goodfellas restaurant.
"On-street parking will be temporarily closed as we work on various areas," he said. "We are generally keeping legal parking where it exists, with some parking shifting around within a block."
"If anything, at the end of this, it's going to be a great improvement on State Street," Zinn said. The result will be a much more livable street, he said.
Among other things, he said, the traffic lights will be better synchronized, and dedicated turning lanes will be less disruptive when someone stops to make a turn.
The $6.7 million project, partially funded through a $5.35 million state Department of Economic and Community Development grant, will redesign the streetscape along a stretch of State Street between Trumbull and Water streets.
City officials have said the project will "knit back together" areas of the city that were chopped up by urban renewal. Several officials have said the project will reconnect neighborhoods such as Wooster Square, the Hill and Downtown.
Zinn said it will also make State Street safer for the many people who aren't in motor vehicles.
"Thirty percent of the households in New Haven don't have cars," Zinn said. "A lot of people walk in that area ... a lot of them ride bicycles."
"I think the goal here is to create a street that's much safer for our vulnerable users," Zinn said. The city also aims to create a much smoother street for commuters, with more potential for development as parking lots along State Street's east side are opened up, he said.
Work on Phase 1 of the project began about two weeks ago and will create a dedicated corridor for walkers and bikers, officials said at a news conference Wednesday. The project's first phase will also include "bump-outs" to protect pedestrians along State Street, from Trumbull Street to Grove Street, with the second phase running from Grove Street to Water Street, Mayor Justin Elicker said. Phase 1 is expected to last through the end of the summer.
Elicker said Phase 2 will include "activating" several underused parking lots for future development.
The project aims to unlock the redevelopment potential of seven parking lots, with 650,000 square feet of transit-oriented, mixed-use development, including 450 new housing units, plus retail space, officials said.
State Street, one of New Haven’s major corridors, connects the Downtown, East Rock, Hill and Wooster Square neighborhoods. The area includes the State Street train station.
Hartford’s Bushnell South project takes big step forward with purchase of large parking lot
HARTFORD — The closing of a key real estate deal this week has brought Hartford’s ambitious Bushnell South development closer to a groundbreaking.
Norwalk-based Spinnaker Real Estate Partners exercised its option on Tuesday to buy a 90,000-square-foot parking lot at Capitol Avenue and Hudson Street for $3.25 million, according to the Capital Region Development Authority.
The authority voted in January to loan Spinnaker $3 million toward the purchase, which forms a crucial piece of the Bushnell South development and speeds development of the project.
About 250 parking spots, billboards, and an auto shop currently occupy the newly purchased parking lot. The property will likely be developed as a parking garage for the larger Bushnell South project, which involves several developers and multiple phases.
Envisioned as an entirely new neighborhood with housing, retail, and amenities, the Bushnell South project is not expected to be completed until the 2030s but construction of initial phases could begin in as soon as three years, CRDA Executive Director Mike Freimuth said.
Cutting-edge “mass timber” technology was pitched for the $130 million first phase of the project, two mid-rise apartment buildings housing 233 apartments that are set to be built by The Michaels Organization.
The Bushnell theater has expressed concern about the closing of surface lots in the Capitol area as construction nears on the Bushnell South project and more drivers return to downtown Hartford.
But Freimuth has said the lot Spinnaker purchased this week is often vacant due to the opening of two new parking garages in the area.
Local officials have also expressed concern about the current number of surface parking lots in Hartford, which occupy 22 percent of the land in downtown.
170 units proposed for Shelton’s Fountain Square development
ANew Jersey-based developer has submitted revised plans for the residential component of the Fountain Square mixed-use project in Shelton.
The Shelton Planning and Zoning Commission at a hearing Wednesday heard plans from applicant F.S. Shelton LLC and principal John Abene for a five-story, multi-unit apartment complex at 745-801 Bridgeport Ave.
The $25 million project, by developer Highview Commercial, would feature 170 apartments, a portion of which would be affordable. The development would feature nine studio apartments and 81 one-bedroom, eight one-bedroom with office, and 72 two-bedroom apartments, along with a pool, club house and other amenities.
The plans call for 52 affordable units, half at 80% of the area median income (AMI), and half at 60%, the development team said. The remaining apartments would be market rate.
The board last year denied a plan that called for 152 units, 18% of which would be affordable at 80% AMI.
Plans previously approved for a 123-room hotel and office space were scrapped for the residential building.
If approved, the apartment building would sit among several new commercial buildings, including restaurants, medical and retail sites that are a part of the multimillion-dollar Fountain Square development area that has been in the works since 2019.