CT Construction Digest Tuesday January 23, 2024
The state Department of Transportation recently released a detailed study recommending transformative changes to Greater Hartford’s highway and other infrastructure that aim to ease roadway congestion and open more land in Hartford and East Hartford for possible development.
Many of the high-profile recommendations in the Greater Hartford Mobility Study have been discussed in the past, including the relocation of the I-84/I-91 interchange and lowering of the I-84 viaduct.
Those are potentially smart long-term investments that could benefit the region and enhance economic development within the city of Hartford and neighboring East Hartford, including reconnecting both municipalities to the Connecticut River.
Some of the recommendations mirror what was pitched a few years ago in the Hartford 400 plan, developed by prominent urban planner Doug Suisman and backed by the iQuilt Partnership in Hartford.
The Greater Hartford Mobility Study also recommends a network of new trails, bikeways and transit options.
While having a plan and vision are important to achieving any ambitious transportation infrastructure overhaul, the study doesn’t seem to bring any of these projects closer to reality.
That’s because it fails to address perhaps the most important aspect of any major infrastructure plan: how to pay for it.
In fact, the report mentions little about the cost of the dozens of recommended short-, medium- and long-term projects.
Without a clear funding plan, one could skeptically presume this will be another study that ends up on a shelf collecting dust.
In a follow-up email exchange with the DOT, an agency spokesman provided HBJ with cost estimates. Overall, the entire program will probably carry a $10 billion to $12 billion price tag, money the DOT and state obviously don’t have in their coffers.
The projects, DOT said, would need to be planned for and included in future capital programs, and require continued state funding to match future federal dollars over the next three decades.
Yikes. Sustained investment from the state and federal governments over three decades? That would require ongoing support from new administrations at the state and federal levels, each with their own priorities that might not include transportation infrastructure investment.
Connecticut already has a checkered history on funding transportation. A January 2020 CT Mirror article, aptly headlined “Broken promises to fund transportation defined last 15 years,” backs up that assertion.
The article, penned by well-known state budget reporter Keith Phaneuf, said: “Connecticut’s transportation program has been riddled, for more than a decade, by broken funding promises from both political parties. Between 2007 and 2019, officials pledged hundreds of millions of dollars for highways, bridges and rail lines, only to frequently snatch portions of it away at the last minute.”
To be fair, coming up with a funding plan to underwrite billions of dollars in new infrastructure investment isn’t the responsibility of those involved in putting together the Greater Hartford Mobility Study. It’s the job of state policymakers, and it may not be politically popular.
Gov. Ned Lamont’s first year in office provides a good case study. Lamont hit a roadblock in 2019 when he proposed adding electronic highway tolling on cars and trucks in order to generate much-needed revenue to maintain and upgrade the state’s aging transportation infrastructure.
Two separate tolling plans in 2019 and 2020 failed to garner support from the General Assembly, and helped sink the Democratic governor’s early approval ratings to below 30%, according to a Sacred Heart University poll.
Lamont argued, at the time, the state’s key revenue sources that fund transportation investment, including the gasoline and sales taxes, didn’t provide the reliable revenues the state needs. That still remains a longer-term issue, although Lamont in 2021 did persuade the legislature to approve a new highway mileage tax on most large commercial trucks.
This is not meant to dismiss the hard work that went into preparing the Greater Hartford Mobility Study, which incorporated input from many stakeholders and was thorough in its analysis and recommendations.
But until there is a realistic funding plan in place, it’s hard to envision grand plans to reshape Hartford’s inefficient highway system becoming reality.
I-95 project continues to transform East Lyme, two lanes at a time
Elizabeth Regan
East Lyme ― Route 161 in the area of Interstate 95 was a flurry of activity on a recent weekday morning as the four-and-a-half-year reconstruction project that began last March entered its second stage.
The latest phase of the project was made possible by the most visible hallmark of the project to date: the months-long effort by engineers from Maine Drilling and Blasting to dislodge an 800-foot expanse of ledge on the northbound span. The last blast went off earlier this month.
By the end of 2024, the project’s senior management team said drivers can expect to see extensive overpass work, the creation of a new Exit 74 northbound on-ramp and jarring elevation changes as the roadway is leveled out in phases.
Drivers who have become accustomed to the 50 mph construction zone with narrow, shifting lanes will see the situation intensify over the coming year. Because of contractual obligations to keep two lanes open at all times, there will be instances when southbound traffic will be shifted onto northbound lanes as the overpass work is completed in three stages.
On Route 161 Wednesday morning, Resident Engineer Robert Obey of the engineering firm GM2 was stuck at a light in his pickup truck with state Department of Transportation project engineer Andrew Millovitsch. A broken sensor on the month-old Exit 74 off-ramp traffic signal was creating congestion on Flanders Road heading north.
“Andrew, this is not good,” he said. He looked on as the highway dumped two lanes of traffic onto the road where drivers had to merge to avoid a cable truck and a police detail that had closed the right lane for utility work.
The sensor, damaged in heavy rain the previous Friday, was awaiting replacement parts expected that day.
“It’s a perfect storm,” he said.
Obey emphasized the interconnected nature of the $148 million project planned in multiple phases through 2027. Utility work must happen to allow for replacement of the overpass as well as the widening and leveling of the northbound side of the highway by the end of this year. That, in turn, must be finished before the southbound side and Route 161 underneath it can be addressed.
The new northbound off-ramp was unveiled as what Obey called an “early Christmas gift” in December. This year, work will continue to focus on the northbound side.
“We’re not touching southbound,” he said.
At the busy construction zone that now sits where the old ramp was, Obey said tall piles of dirt weren’t just “junk hills.” He pointed to a surveyor with a GPS receiver standing with a drainage subcontractor on one of the mountains of infill that will eventually become the foundation for new northbound lanes rising more than a dozen feet over the existing span.
To rid the dangerous thoroughfare of the hills and valleys that currently make it hard for drivers to see ahead, the side south of the bridge will be raised more than a dozen feet while the other side will be lowered about 9 feet.
Obey said a massive temporary retaining wall to be built this year between the new off- ramp and the bridge will be the earliest manifestations of the extent of the elevation changes ahead.
“People are going to drive by, they’re going to look over and they’re going to see a 14-foot earth retaining wall that’s going to temporarily support the highway,” Obey said.
Once the retaining wall goes up and the two new lanes are constructed, northbound traffic will be traveling that much higher and about 40 feet to the side of where it flows now. He said the gradual shift won’t be noticeable for those looking ahead, though a look down at the unchanged side of the highway will leave drivers feeling like they’re 14 feet in the air.
On the other side of the bridge, crews were deep in the crevasse next to the existing northbound highway where the new, wider span will be built. They were using a rig to pound 30-foot rods at 30-degree angles into the earth with grout reinforcements for another temporary retaining wall.
“When we put traffic down here, you’re going to see these huge walls and go, ‘Wow, I’m in a hole. I’m in a big hole,’” Obey said.
The chasm was created by the blasting work that closed the highway for short intervals most weekdays since Aug. 1. The goal was to keep the closures below 20 minutes, though that didn’t always happen in the densest areas of rock.
Millovitsch said a less intensive blasting project will occur on the southbound side sometime in 2025, with brief closures expected.
The bridge
At the main construction site on Route 161, the cranes that have started to show up on trailers for work on the south side of the bridge. The engineers said installing the south half of the bridge will be the most high-profile task through the winter.
“Once that crane boom goes up in the air, it’s going to draw people’s attention,” Millovitsch said.
The cranes’ main job will be to swing 180-foot steel girders into place sometime around April, according to Millovitsch. But they will be used before that on abutment work necessary to widen the bridge about 40 feet on either side.
Obey said the main traffic impacts will come from the installation of the steel beams over two weeks. The work will require overnight closures on Route 161.
When that happens depends largely on factors including how long it takes the steel to arrive in a business climate that hasn’t fully recovered from supply chain disruptions in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine.
While clauses in the agreement between the state and its contractors restrict major closures between Memorial Day and Labor Day, Obey said the project can’t afford any major delays.
“We have a contract, but they have the authority to change the contract at any time if it’s in the best interest of the project and the best interest of the taxpayers,” he said.
He reiterated that each major step of the project relies on completion of the one before it ― and on the vagaries of the weather. That’s why putting off the bridge work for several months could snowball into an extra year on a timeline already set to last more than four.
“Every business decision we make is one of balance,” he said. “Trying to strike a balance between being productive on the construction side and not turn the whole place into a parking lot with gridlock.”
Speed enforcement
The engineers credited the DOT’s work zone speed camera pilot program, which expired with the new year, for “changing the culture” of speeding on the interstate in East Lyme.
“Speeds are definitely down,” Obey said. “The vast majority of drivers are sensitive to the speeds through the work zone.”
The local roll-out of the DOT’s Know The Zone pilot program on June 5 brought SUVs equipped with cameras to snap pictures of vehicles going more than 15 mph over the limit. The first violation came with a warning directed to the registered owner of the vehicle, while the second came with a $75 ticket. Subsequent violations cost $150 each.
DOT spokesman Josh Morgan said the agency is writing a report and drafting a bill proposal to continue the work zone speed camera program. It’s up to lawmakers to decide if the pilot program authorized to last through 2023 should become permanent. The upcoming session of the state General Assembly begins next month and adjourns May 8.
Millovitsch expressed surprise and disappointment the camera-equipped SUVs are no longer a fixture in East Lyme.
“We were lucky enough to be part of the pilot program, because it was obviously super beneficial for us,” he said. “So if they do implement a more permanent program, I’ll certainly see that we get on the list.”
Morgan said 24,875 warnings and 724 tickets were issued in the pilot program statewide. He could not provide the tally from East Lyme by press time.
He said the state spent $4 million on the pilot program.
Obey said state troopers will go back to doing speed enforcement the old-fashioned way.
“The backup plan has always been to have Connecticut State Police do active speed enforcement through the work zone,” he said. “So we would simply revert back to that.”
More information on the project, including interactive 3D models of the upcoming work, is available at www.i-95eastlyme.com.
New London State Pier could be threatened by new wind power projects in Providence and Salem, Mass.
Energy experts have differing opinions on whether efforts to establish a new off-shore wind farm staging areas in Rhode Island's port of Providence and in Salem, Mass. just north of Boston could impact the number of projects served by Connecticut's New London State Pier.
The two out-of state projects are potential threats to the amount of staging area activity at the State Pier in New London, according to Robert McCullough, managing partner of Oregon-based McCullough Research. The project in Salem, Mass. involves the impending acquisition of a 37-acre waterfront property in that city by a Massachusetts quasi-public agency, while the plans in Rhode Island are for a $70 million shipping and staging area for offshore wind turbines near the mouth of the Providence River in that city's port area.
"A lot of the attraction assumes that the wind projects will add employment locally," McCullough said. "As with all massive projects, this is a case of devil in the details. The effect is likely to be smaller than expected."
The primary economic benefit to the project will come from local laborers assembling the wind-turbine components in the port area, he said.
"The big dollar items are unlikely to benefit the local economy," McCullough said. "Offshore wind is tremendously challenging and the expertise and technology is primarily in Europe."
Eric Smith, the associate director of Tulane University's Energy Institute and a professor of energy issues, said not every port is capable of hosting wind power staging facilities.
"These facilities need acreage, an adequate workforce and deep water," Smith said. "And people always want the shortest distant between the shore base for the work and the ultimate destination of where these turbine are going to be erected."
But even with that specific set of requirements, he said wind power staging areas that are in relatively close proximity to each other run the risk of stealing work from each other.
"There is a finite amount of this work being done and it's a function of how many of these turbines will be assembled," Smith said.
McCullough said components for the turbines are shipped from Europe. And right now, the specialized ships used to install the wind farms come from overseas as well: The Charybdis, the first U.S.-made turbine-installation vessel, is currently under construction in Brownsville, Texas.
Growing pains in the United States' comparatively new off-shore wind industry have already claimed a project whose staging area was to have been in Bridgeport. Orange-based Avangrid pulled out of the Park City Wind project in October 2023.
Craig Gilvarg, an Avangrid spokesman, declined comment on whether competition from other wind power staging areas being in New England had any impact on the company's decision to pull out of the Park City Wind project. But Ken Kimmell, the company's vice resident of development for offshore wind, told the Boston Globe in late December that when Avangrid puts out new bids for wind power projects across the region, it intends to use the Salem staging area.
Avangrid is expected to be among the bidders submitting new wind power proposals to officials in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island, which are due to be submitted the end of January. Officials from the three states agreed in early October to launch a joint effort to procure new wind power contracts.
While Smith and McCullough contend that plans for wind power staging facilities in Salem, Mass. and Providence could pose a threat to New London's standing as a wind power staging area, it's not an opinion shared by New London Mayor Michael Passero.
"To achieve the scale of off-shore wind development planned for the next 10-to-20 years, use of all the ports capable of handling the assembly will be required," Passero said, "Port New London has great natural assets, including a strategic location that make it an especially attractive port for deploying wind turbine assemblies.
Ulysses Hammond, interim executive director for the Connecticut Port Authority, said the staging area at the State Pier can coexist without having its work poached by other ports.
"If we are to even come close to achieving any of our climate change goals within the next 10 to 20 years, it will require a robust set of wind marshalling terminals," Hammond said. "We are about collaboration, not competition. This is about brining a new industry to America."
The port of New London is in a unique position, he said, in that it is the first operational U.S.-based heavy-lift marine terminal that will accommodate offshore wind towers, nacelles and blades. The pier can support cargo of up to 5,000 pounds per square foot on its two separate heavy lift platforms.
Justin May, an external spokesman for Eversource Energy's wind power business, said the State Pier is currently being used for staging and turbine assembly for the South Fork Wind project, now underway.
"Once South Fork Wind is completed, turbine staging and assembly activity for Revolution Wind — Connecticut’s first offshore wind farm — will commence at the site," May said. "As we’ve stated publicly, New London State Pier is a tremendous resource for offshore wind developers due to its unobstructed access to the sea, proximity to offshore wind lease areas, and heavy-lift capabilities."
Hartford's Bushnell Park South plan advances with $3M loan to buy parking lot for redevelopment
HARTFORD — The Capital Region Development Authority will loan money to Norwalk-based Spinnaker Real Estate to purchase a parking lot in the future Bushnell South neighborhood, according to the authority's executive director.
The parking lot, known as "Parcel A," is a 90,000-foot swath of pavement bordered by Hudson Street, Capitol Avenue, West Street, and Buckingham Street. CRDA is spearheading the development of this lot, as well as several other properties south of Bushnell Park, in hopes of building housing and other development, eventually creating a new neighborhood.
The CRDA board met Jan. 18 to approve a $3 million loan to Spinnaker, which did not respond to requests for comment.
"What we just approved yesterday is a loan instrument that would help Spinnaker purchase the property, but also would require the property to be developed consistent with the overall plan of development for Bushnell South that's probably not likely to happen for three to five years," said Michael Freimuth, executive director of CRDA, in an interview with CT Insider on Friday.
The Bushnell South project combines the work of several different developers, under the guidance of CRDA's specific vision for the 12-acres of "under-utilized" real estate.
The new neighborhood, when completed, will include "commercial, apartment rental, and new homeownership" according to the CRDA wesbite, but Freimuth said that vision will not come to fruition until the mid-2030s, after Freimuth says he will have departed his role. When all is said and done, CRDA hopes for over 1,000 units of housing in the neighborhood.
The housing will vary in density. Freimuth said the plan is to "drop the scale of the development down as you go from the park into the neighborhood to be more of a neighborhood scale, and pick up that row house brownstone effect that goes toward Main Street."
The property slated for redevelopment by Spinnaker is home to 250 parking spots, several billboards, and Y2KG Auto Detail, a garage in the corner of the property on Capitol Avenue. The loan agreement approved Thursday allows CRDA to put covenants on the property to guide what can be developed there.
The need for surface parking in the Capitol Avenue corridor has declined recently after the construction of two new parking garages, including one for state employees, Freimuth said. As a result, the paved lots are often vacant. Figuring out how to provide parking for new developments without repeating the overly paved patterns of the past is top of mind in the Bushnell South planning.
Freimuth said CRDA anticipates at least two new garages, including one on Parcel A, now owned by Spinnaker, and one on another lot, Parcel Four, run by New Jersey-based Michael's Organization.
"We'll have to incorporate into both of those sites a different parking dynamic that will service not just the buildings that are built, but the area, generally whether it's the Bushnell (Theater) or state employees or other residential development," Freimuth said. "It's really the biggest challenge of the site."
Leadership at the Bushnell, which has 300,000 patrons across the region and is a main Hartford attraction, has been enthusiastic about the project despite concerns about parking and traffic, Freimuth said.
"We will have a voice as an active and engaged participant in shaping the development of Bushnell South as we march toward the 100th anniversary of the opening of the Bushnell in 2023," said David Fay, president and CEO of the Bushnell in a statement. "We look forward to sharing the news of each phase of development as it emerges in the months ahead."
The biggest project at the moment is the redevelopment of 55 Elm St., a former state office building set to become 264 apartments. Freimuth said it will likely open up in June or July.
CRDA, which operates the XL Center and the Connecticut Convention Center, is responsible for several other Hartford-area developments including the Front Street Lofts, Spectra on Pearl, and the Swift Factory. The authority gets its funding both from the state and revenues from existing properties and projects.
BLT Loses Effort to Narrow Claims for Collapse of The Lofts in Stamford
Angela Carella
STAMFORD – Embroiled in a complex lawsuit over its collapsing Harbor Point building, The Lofts, developer Building & Land Technology looked to lighten the number of claims it faces.
So BLT filed a motion requesting that a judge strike several of the claims brought by the New York City real estate investment firm that bought The Lofts from BLT in 2016.
But a judge has rejected BLT’s request.
So the claims by the real estate firm, Gaia, against Stamford’s biggest developer, landowner and taxpayer will stand. So does the massive lawsuit, which names BLT, 18 of its affiliates, a number of its contractors, and the city.
Gaia sued BLT last year, after it had to vacate all 225 Lofts apartments in 2022. It was discovered that the century-old wooden supports are rotting and shifting, causing the converted lock factory – six stories high and nearly three football fields long – to tilt and sink.
Walls, ceilings and beams at The Lofts are cracking; floors are buckling; and window and door frames are bending. Gaia representatives have said in court filings that they began seeing those problems in 2017, a year after buying the building from BLT.
In August BLT attorneys presented their arguments for striking a number of Gaia’s claims to Judge Sheila Ozalis in state Superior Court in Stamford:
The Lofts purchase agreement prohibits Gaia from suing BLT.
Gaia cannot seek money from BLT because when Gaia signed the agreement, it waived its ability to collect damages.
Gaia cannot pursue certain claims because they are subject to a three-year statute of limitations that has run out.
Gaia did not provide sufficient evidence to show that BLT sold The Lofts knowing the foundation is failing.
Gaia cannot sue BLT because BLT didn’t sign the purchase agreement; its affiliates did.
But this month Ozalis denied BLT’s motion on all counts. Among the judge’s conclusions:
The statute of limitations must be taken up during trial, not in pre-trial motions.
Though BLT affiliates, not BLT, signed The Lofts purchase agreement, affiliates are subject to obligations in the agreement.
Gaia presented sufficient evidence to allege that BLT breached its contractual obligation “to act in good faith,” and to allege that BLT failed to share information about problems with the building.
Because there is evidence that BLT may have misrepresented the condition of the building, the purchase agreement may not be valid. That could, in turn, invalidate Gaia’s promises not to sue, and to waive any claims for damages.
BLT’s motion to strike the claims and the judge’s denial were a swing and a miss for the developer, caught in a lawsuit that began in November 2022 and will continue for about two more years. According to Connecticut’s Judicial Branch website, jury selection isn’t scheduled to begin until September 2025.
The Lofts was BLT’s first, and signature, Harbor Point building when it opened in 2010. It was reconstructed from the Yale & Towne lock factory, which put Stamford on the map as a manufacturing center more than 100 years ago.
After The Lofts, BLT erected multiple new luxury apartment high-rises in Harbor Point, the developer’s project to remake the old industrial South End.
But the historic factory building was reconstructed on its original wooden pilings, which now are damaged by dewatering, Gaia alleges. Dewatering happens when the water table beneath a building drops, exposing the pilings to air, which rots them. The pilings also are settling at a fast rate as the drier soil compacts, Gaia claims.
The water table beneath The Lofts dropped because BLT installed an impermeable liner to contain contaminated soil at the site, Gaia charges. The effect was that rain could not soak in.
The city had a role, too, Gaia alleges. City crews failed to maintain underground drainage pipes, further diminishing groundwater at the site, and failed to inspect the foundation when Gaia sought a permit to repair it in 2020, Gaia alleges.
The company further alleges that BLT took soil tests in 2010, when it was building The Lofts, but withheld the results. Gaia alleges that it discovered the foundation problems in 2022 after doing its own groundwater tests.
BLT’s attorney, Wendy Venoit of Cozen O’Connor in Boston, did not return a request for comment.
A spokesman for the New York City law firm Anderson Kill, which represents Gaia, said attorneys will not comment.
The Lofts building at 200 Henry St. now is empty and dark, surrounded by a chain-link fence and a proliferation of weeds. Gaia states in court filings that the building faces “inevitable demolition or destruction” and settlement is progressing “at a dangerous rate.”
Gaia executives have said the company’s insurance carrier will not cover any damage caused by dewatering. The company is seeking compensation from BLT “in an amount to be proven at trial,” the lawsuit states.