Connecticut’s ‘most dangerous’ on-ramp to get $42.5M overhaul in Middletown

Adam Hushin

MIDDLETOWN — State and local officials gathered at Harbor Park Wednesday to announce a more than $40 million project to improve the city’s Route 17 on-ramp to Route 9 that will likely be federally funded through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., state Sen. Matt Lesser, Mayor Ben Florsheim and Department of Transportation Deputy Commissioner Mark Rolfe held a press conference to provide details on the project, beginning with why it’s necessary.

“Middletown is known for a lot of great things, but, for a long time, we have been known to some as having one of the most dangerous on-ramps in the state,” Florsheim said.

State Sen. Lesser said on Twitter that the city’s portion of the state highway averages an accident a day.

DOT officials confirmed that the Route 17 stop-controlled on-ramp to Route 9 is among the top 10 most dangerous interchanges in the state. From 2019-21 alone, there have been 319 crashes resulting in 27 injuries.

“As a Middletown resident, I know just how bad this intersection is,” Lesser said.

The Harbor Drive on-ramp to Route 9 is also dangerous, officials said. Florsheim said fixing that issue is especially important now that the city is moving forward with plans to invest in Harbor Park, including a new restaurant at the old canoe club, the riverfront area and recently completed boardwalk.

“We want this area to be friendly to pedestrians, too,” Florsheim said. “With this project, Harbor Park will be set up for success.”

Local officials said plans for a reconfiguration of the city’s on-ramps to Route 9 have been in place since 2016, but were delayed for various reasons, including lack of funding.

The project will cost an estimated $42.5 million to complete, and was recently confirmed to be fully state-funded, but is now more likely to be funded with federal dollars through the bipartisan infrastructure bill.

“Years ago, we identified this as a priority project, but then the state ran into fiscal difficulties, the cost got a little high, so we got put on the back burner,” Lesser said. “Thank goodness for this bipartisan infrastructure package putting it back on the front burner.”

The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law will provide more than double the state funding to improve the safety of the transportation system. This project in Middletown is just one of several in the state that DeLauro is working to allocate federal money.

“It is the most significant investment in our infrastructure that we have seen in decades, and it means that our communities are going to be able to really thrive,” DeLauro said.

Rolfe thanked DeLauro for her support of Connecticut commuters, and highlighted many of the changes this project will bring to Middletown. He added that the infrastructure program was accelerated by a year.

Changes include the addition of a full length, free-flow acceleration lane to merge from Route 17 to Route 9, eliminating the stop-controlled, short highway entry; improvements to the bridge that carries Route 17 over Route 9; an new pedestrian access point along Union Street; the conditions on Route 17 between the Main Street Extension and Route 9 will be improved; the removal of the Harbor Drive on-ramp to Route 9; and new street parking and sidewalks along tMain Street Extension.

“It will allow and insure that the 15,000 vehicles that come through that area each day will flow through freely and safely,” Rolfe said.

Construction is slotted to start in spring 2023, and could be completed as early as fall 2024.

43-unit apartment building approved for Castle Ave. in Fairfield

Josh LaBella

FAIRFIELD — A proposed 43-unit apartment development planned for Castle Avenue narrowly gained approval form the Town Plan and Zoning Commission on Tuesday. The commission voted 4-3 in favor of a zoning compliance sought by the developer, although there were some stipulations, after residents voiced their opposition with the plans in a meeting earlier this month.

“I understand the neighbors, I’ve heard them loud and clear. Your beef is with the Connecticut legislature,” Commissioner Daniel Ford said, going on to encourage those opposed to such developments to write their legislators.

The application was made under 8-30g, a state statute that allows developers to bypass municipal laws and regulations as long as a certain percentage of the project is affordable housing. Local boards must prove the project presents serious enough health or safety risks that outweigh the need for affordable housing there.

Berwick Associates LLC is looking to construct a four-story, 45-foot structure with 13 studios, 18 one-bedroom and 12 two-bedrooms units in the Kings Highway area.

The proposal also calls for 57 parking spaces, most of which would be under the building. The developer is planning to set 30 percent of the units aside as affordable.

“I appreciate and listened to the concerns of the neighbors regarding the parking situation, which is existing there,” Commissioner Steven Levy said. “But, based upon the record, I do not feel there is sufficient evidence as to any potential public harm which would outweigh the need for additional affordable housing.”

The commission recommended stop signs be added to Castle Avenue near the site since traffic and parking were among residents’ chief concerns and developers said the project would generate 500 car trips a day. The commission also recommended parking be prohibited on Castle and Berwick avenues on the sides of the streets along the property.

The commission also required the developer to move a retaining wall five feet south.

Still, commissioners did not seem to want to approve the project, and voiced concern about how the state statute ties their hands.

“If this wasn’t an 8-30g, I would vote no. I would not approve this,” Ford said. “These applications are going to continue to come in and our hands are tied.”

Commissioner Alexis Harrison said she was concerned about the development’s potential impact on emergency vehicle access, school bus stops and pedestrian traffic. She also said there wasn’t a fire department safety report on the proposal.

“I understand that 8-30g is different, but I don’t think the General Assembly, when they passed this in 1990, envisioned that we would render decisions with not enough information,” she said. “I think there’s a lot more information that we need to render good decisions for the town.”

Commissioner Kathryn Braun also said she needed more information, adding the commission should not be satisfied with having its hands tied. She, Harrison and Commissioner Meg Francis voted against the application.

“It’s such a small plot of land,” Francis said. “It looks like your backyard for heaven’s sake.”

Vice Chair Lenny Braman said the commission has never hesitated to deny an 8-30g application when there is concern about potential health and safety impacts that rise to the threshold required by the statute.

“I take our responsibility very seriously, both in terms of the 8-30 standard and the law, but also our responsibility to protect public safety,” he said. “I’m persuaded that this application must, under the law, be approved with the conditions as stated.”

In dreaming of a new Union Station, other cities have ideas to offer

Ed Stannard

NEW HAVEN — If Union Station is to become a thriving transportation center, the willingness to create a vision that goes beyond traditional ideas will be critical.

That was the message of three rail leaders from White Plains, N.Y., to Los Angeles, who described their cities’ plans in an online webinar. The head of major stations planning and development for Amtrak spoke about plans afoot in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C.

Representing the city that is most like New Haven, Christopher Gomez, White Plains’ commissioner of planning, said it was up to the residents how much they were willing to dream.

“From my personal perspective, how far is the community willing to go to create and facilitate the vision of the community which does include uses beyond what is driving this transit station development currently,” he asked.

Multifamily housing and open space in the immediate area is highly important, he said. “How much do we want to work with our partners to create some level of retail and street presence?” he said. “How much do we want to reduce parking requirements and try to lead the region in a new sustainable way of developing? And then, is that something that politically there’s a will in your local communities to adopt?”

Gomez added that it’s also important to be realistic. “We started at the moon. … We had our druthers, we want this, and like any … good planning process, we had to sort of revert back to the reality.”

Technically, planning also demands making sure zoning codes fit the vision “and looking at ways to incentivize the type of development you want, and how far are you as a community and … municipality willing to go to make those pretty renderings a reality?”

Union Station, designed by Cass Gilbert and opened in 1920, along with State Street Station, are part of the Union Station Partnership between the city and the state Department of Transportation, which owns the station. The agreement includes an extendable 35-year lease.

Gomez described how much of the area around the White Plains Station “was pretty much blown out in the ’70s urban renewal,” much like the Hill neighborhood near Union Station. There, he said, the city received $800,000 in grants “to reknit and restore that urban fabric in downtown White Plains.”

But the vision is not just about the train station, which serves Metro-North. “It was really about the district, so we established approximately a quarter-mile to a third-of-a-mile radius around the station, which includes both the downtown … as well as our close-in neighborhoods,” Gomez said.

“So it’s all about connectivity, whether it be for commuters, access to the station from very far from downtown, or even for the residents from close-in neighborhoods to have greater access to the downtown itself,” he said.

Jeanet Owens, senior executive officer for project management and regional rail at the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, said the goal for Los Angeles Union Station was to make the 1939 terminal into a world-class transit station.

“I always ask, well, when you go in and you travel, I don’t want to just limit it to just what a rail station could look like,” she said. She compared the rail station to an airport, with “readily available passenger amenities, whether it’s something you can drink and eat, whether while you’re waiting for a train, you can work, so those are amenities that we’re looking at as we envision.”

The plan also includes making travel easier and less stressful for passengers, including ADA-compliant elevators and escalators and helping people get around. “In addition to that, wayfinding signage and … as any traveler, when you’re trying to run to catch a plane or run to catch a train or a bus connection, you want to know, how much time do I have, right? How much time do I have to chitchat? How much time do I have to grab a coffee or grab a pretzel?”

The station is also being redesigned so trains don’t enter and exit from one end but travel on run-through tracks, “so that our Amtrak services can now operate in and idle in Union Station for less than a minute or two,” Owens said. “Same with our commuter rail system and our high-speed rail system. This is a game changer for Southern California.”

Gretchen Kostura of Amtrak described Philadelphia’s William H. Gray III 30th Street Station as “the hole in the doughnut.” The 2016 30th Street District Plan, “really set forth the guiding vision to create a significant amount of new private development in and around the station, as well as the ability to expand our operations and meet the growing need of this community,” she said.

“You’ve got the strong business district just across the river, from our station, and you’ve got Penn and Drexel and a lot of the universities just to the opposite side of us. So we’re sort of this doughnut, the hole in the doughnut, and really the goal of the development plan ... was to infill that doughnut and make it to be more of a cohesive and seamless connection between all the neighborhoods.”

Kostura said Washington Union Station “was almost chartered by Congress to be multimodal facility.” The challenge, she said, is looking at the evolving transportation needs.

“What does bus look like in the future? What does parking look like in the future? What is rideshare? I mean, when we started this process planning, Uber wasn’t a thing, and now it’s a question of what does Uber look like in the future versus a taxi?” she said. Other issues include balancing how much parking is needed with people being dropped off and picked up, buses, bikes and even electric scooters.

“We are now at a place that I hope all of the different agencies and entities are sort of satisfied that we’re meeting the future demand,” Kostura said. “I joke that I work for a train company, and I spend a lot of time talking about buses. It has been a challenge to plan for all of those, especially as the needs have changed continuously over the last five to six years.”

West Hartford Town Council Gives Unanimous Approval to Farmington Avenue Mixed Use Project

Ronni Newton

The West Hartford Town Council gave a unanimous vote of approval to a project that will transform a key corner at the gateway to West Hartford Center, replacing two outdated and functionally obsolete office buildings with a mixed-use residential and commercial building that will will include 48 apartments and support the concept of “new urbanism.”

Brian Zelman and Avner Krohn, two of the principals of Farmington Avenue Acquisitions, said Wednesday morning that the existing buildings on the site are already vacant and they are excited for the construction to commence.

“We will start with asbestos removal in a few weeks,” Krohn said. “We have already filed with the state.” While the remediation is underway, they plan to file for demolition permits with the goal of beginning full-out construction by June or July. The goal is to have the building ready for occupancy by 2023.

Zelman said the branding for the project, including the name of the building, is being finalized and will be announced in the next few weeks.

The project will add to West Hartford’s grand list. When complete, the development is estimated to generate $300,000 of annual tax revenue to the town, as compared to the roughly $60,000 the existing property has been generating.

“This is a very, very exciting application,” Mayor Shari Cantor said prior to the vote on the proposal. “I am really happy to be at this point. This has been a long time in progress,” she said, thanking all who have been involved in the process.

“This is truly a new urbanism development,” she said, making use of existing amenities in the neighborhood, with accessibility to Trout Brook Trail, and will be a gateway to the Center.

“We really want people to populate and walk, and be a part of the community,” she said, and the project is a big step in that direction and will provide West Hartford with additional housing options.

While this project will be primarily market-rate, two units that will have a 20-year deed-restricted commitment to workforce housing, reserved for those earning no more than 80% of the Area Mean Income (ARI).

“We tried very hard to do as much as possible … which ended up being the 2 units,” Zelman said, noting the economic challenge and feasibility when dealing with a property that is less than an acre.

“One way for more affordability is to add inventory,” Cantor said.

Other Council members also voiced their strong support for the project before voting.

“This is really encouraging to see,” said Deputy Mayor Liam Sweeney, noting there is about to be a “spurt in development in that area.” Earlier Tuesday, Kingswood Oxford announced their plans to sell the property currently occupied by the Children’s Museum to Continental Properties, which plans to construct a luxury rental development on the site.

Sweeney also commending the developer for taking what’s not a huge step in adding affordable housing, but is still a step with the including of the workforce units.

Democratic Council member Carol Anderson Blanks said she’s excited that there is development all over town, that several of the development partners in this project are residents with “some real skin in the game,” and that there is some element of affordable housing included.

She also commended the project’s accessibility to the Trout Brook Trail and bus routes, and providing outdoor space on the patio and balconies. “I just think this is a home run, and quite a benchmark for all the developments that come after this … this is a true collaborative effort,” Blanks said.

“This is what we need, we need to see more projects like this,” said Republican Al Cortes. “This is the perfect corner for this project.” Cortes said the only negatives he sees are that “workforce is not quite affordable,” and also that some of the parking is offsite.

“I hope that this is the first of many housing projects to come into our central business district,” said Democrat Leon Davidoff. “This is probably going to be a catalyst,” he said, noting the Kingswood project announced earlier in the day.

“As fully developed community, the only option we have is redevelopment,” said Davidoff. The existing buildings are “tired and obsolete,” he said, and this project is designed for the 21st century, not the past.

“I think this will be a landmark property,” Davidoff said, one that will be used as waypoint for directions. He noted that there was no request for tax abatement either.

The development, Democrat Ben Wenograd said, is “going to give us a great landmark.” He said he is excited that the developers are working to create the types of projects the town has envisioned.

The rental rates for this property have not been set, but regarding comments on social media regarding rental costs of other properties, Wenograd said “supply and demand actually works,” and adding to the inventory will control costs.

“This is not gentrification, it is adding to our housing stock,” he said, and will help our town grow and maintain affordability.

Project description

Farmington Avenue Acquisitions LLC purchased the two parcels, which total 0.98 acres, in the fall of 2020, and have been consulting with West Hartford’s Design Review and Advisory Commission for nearly two years as the project design has been underway.

Farmington Avenue Acquisitions is a partnership between Krohn and Zelman as well as Richard Korris, who is a West Hartford resident, and Zach Korris.

The team provided a detailed overview of the plans during a public hearing held prior to the Town Council meeting and vote.

“Adding more residential units to this area will promote an urban walkable environment,” said Zelman, who is a West Hartford resident and has an office in the Center. The location adjacent to the Trout Brook Trail, he said, is key, and the project is “the epitome of new urbanism” and supports the town’s 2020-2030 Plan of Conservation and Development goals of encouraging “infill development on vacant or underutilized lots,” mixed-use development, and projects that enhance walkability.

“My partners and I are committed to building something that will stand the test of time,” Zelman said during Tuesday night’s Town Council public hearing. The project has been designed based on the “anticipated needs of 2030,” and while they said there is not sufficient available space on the roof for installation of solar panels, there is a commitment to energy efficiency and state-of-the-art security. Eight charging stations for electric vehicles will be installed, and there will also be bike racks.

The building, which was designed by by Phase Zero Design, will include five stories, plus an underground level where there will be 21 covered parking spaces. The entrance and exit to and from all onsite parking will be accessible from a driveway on the east side (closest to Trout Brook Drive). In addition to the underground spaces, the remainder of the 57 onsite parking spaces will be in a surface lot, and the developer has also contracted with the town for reserved parking spaces in the nearby Isham Garage in Blue Back Square. Specific spaces will be assigned through the leasing process with a likely cost saving for residents who park offsite.

The goal, said architect Chris Milliard of Phase Zero Design, was to “design a building that reflects the excitement of West Hartford.”

The ground floor will include roughly 10,000 square feet of commercial space – and while the occupancy has not been secured the developers said it will not be a restaurant, and the four residential floors will have identical layouts with a total of 48 apartments. Thirty-six of the units will be one-bedroom, and 12 will be two-bedrooms. There are balconies for all but the eight units that face Farmington Avenue, and a 2,000 square foot patio for use by the residential and commercial tenants along the west side of the building.

Avner, who has a number of projects under development throughout the Greater Hartford area, noted that this is a “high-end boutique building.” There is an extensive amount of steel being used, with expensive finishes on both the exterior and interior.

“Hearing the comments really reaffirms why we developed the project to be what was proposed and approved,” Zelman said Wednesday morning. “It’s the best project for the center of town,” what’s best for the location and the community and not just to satisfy a developer’s goal.