History Revisited: Local area no stranger to transportation levies

Jim Streeter  For the past several years, a great deal of debate has taken place when the state legislature introduced bills proposing electronic tolls on various major highways in Connecticut.

Although many may believe that the highway tolls, used to offset the costs related to the labor, and materials to build and repair roads, are something new, transportation related fees and levies can be traced back to early history in New London and Groton.

In the mid-1650s, a few years after the British settled the Pequot Plantation in southeastern Connecticut, including what is now New London (then called “Nameeug”), many settlers established residences and farms on both the west and east sides of the Thames River (then referred to as the “Great River” or “Pequod”). Dependable transportation for people, materials and animals across the river became such an important matter that the leaders of the plantation granted a 50-year lease to Cary Latham to establish and provide a ferry boat service to cross the river. The lease authorized charging fees for providing the service.

Initially the ferry service, consisting of dugout canoes and flat bottom scows, operated between a wharf on the east side of the river, in the vicinity of where the Avery-Copp House Museum is presently located in Groton and a wharf at Winthrop’s Neck in New London, just south of the area where the Thames River railroad bridge is now located. The fees charged at the time were 3 pence per passenger, 6 pence for a single horse, and 3 pence for each calf or pig.

The ferry lease contained language authorizing Latham to “keep” (believed to mean sell) “some provisions and some strong liquors or wine for refreshments of passengers.” The lease also explicitly stated that no other Englishman or Indian could operate and charge for ferry service near Latham’s and if they did so, Latham could require that they pay him the fees that they had charged.

Ferry services between New London and Groton continued for another 270 years. Over those years, the cost of the purchasing, operating and maintaining newer and larger steam operated ferries, as well as providing larger wharf facilities, resulted in increasing, proportionately, the fees and levies charged for ferry services.

In 1919, the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad built a new railroad bridge across the Thames River to replace the one that had become inadequate to accommodate larger and heavier locomotives. Faced with the enormous cost of removing the old span, the railroad proposed gifting it to the State of Connecticut to convert into a vehicle (and trolley) highway bridge.

The total cost of converting the structure and purchasing land and constructing new approach highways to the bridge was placed at $450,000.

Several proposals were discussed to finance the conversion project including 1, the State bearing the entire cost; 2, the towns of New London and Groton and the railroad splitting the cost evenly; or 3, establishing a 20-year toll system on the bridge. The third option was adopted unanimously, and the state legislature authorized the projected expenditures for the vehicle bridge project.

The fees established for crossing the new highway bridge were 5 cents for pedestrians and vehicle passengers; 25 cents for one-seated autos, small trucks and two-horse vehicles; and 35 cents for large trucks and four-horse vehicles. Interestingly there was also a charge of 3 cents for individual sheep or swine (I gather some famers would herd their animals across the bridge).

From the time of its establishment, the charging of tolls on the Thames River bridge was resisted and objected to by a large portion of residents in the area. They considered the tolls to be an unfair method of taxation and a financial burden for those who needed to travel between New London and Groton for employment, shopping and recreation.

In March 1923, the state Legislature passed a bill abolishing the tolls on all state bridges, effective at midnight on Dec. 31, 1923. It was signed into law by Governor Templeton in April 1923.

The saga of bridge tolls in the area does not end here.

Beginning in the late 1930s, the number of vehicles crossing the old bridge on a yearly basis averaged over 5 million. The two-lane bridge could no longer effectively handle the large amount of traffic, and delays crossing the river became commonplace.

There had been a large increase in employment and activities at the Electric Boat Company and the U.S. Submarine Base, and traffic congestion on the bridge was raising major concerns by the state and federal governments.

In 1939, the state approved funding, through bonding, in the amount of $6 million to build a new four-lane replacement bridge across the river. Reimbursement for the bonds was to be paid from tolls to be collected from vehicles and pedestrians crossing the bridge.

The new highway bridge, ultimately named the Gold Star Memorial Bridge, opened to traffic in November 1943 and the established tolls for using this bridge included: 15 cents for two-axle automobiles, motorcycles, four-wheel trucks or horse-drawn vehicles; 80 cents for four-axle tractor-trailers and buses; and 2 cents for pedestrians and bicycles. Discount ticket books, containing 100 tickets at a cost of $6, were also available for automobiles with one passenger, bringing the single trip cost down to 6 cents. It should be noted that a few years after the bridge opened, the charge for automobiles and horse drawn vehicles was reduced to 10 cents.

It had originally been estimated that the costs to pay for the bridge, through the collection of tolls, would take until 1971; however, due to a larger than expected amount of traffic using the bridge, payment was expected to be completed by April 1963. Because of this, the tolls were removed from the bridge and tolls discontinued beginning April 1, 1963.

Highway tolls continued to be collected on the Connecticut Turnpike (I-95) and the Merritt and Wilbur Cross Parkways until December 1985. Revenues lost with the closure of the toll booths throughout Connecticut were partially replaced with new and additional taxes including those on the purchase of gasoline.

It can almost be guaranteed that the proposed establishment of electronic tolls on Connecticut highways will be hotly debated, just as the ferry, bridge and highway levies and tolls were contested in the past. New London and Groton are no stranger to this subject.

Jim Streeter is the historian for the town of Groton.

Ledyard orders DRVN Enterprises to remove salt from site within watershed

Kimberly Drelich  Ledyard — The town of Ledyard has ordered DRVN Enterprises to remove road salt that the company was storing in a building at 20 Lorenz Industrial Parkway, a site within 900 feet of the Ledyard Reservoir, Ledyard Mayor Fred Allyn III said.

After the town was made aware Monday of salt storage on the site within the watershed, town Planning Director Liz Burdick informed DRVN Enterprises, a tenant slated to be displaced from State Pier by the end of the month, that the use was not permitted on that site and the salt needed to be removed immediately, Allyn said.

Allyn said DRVN Enterprises President Steve Farrelly was very understanding and mobilized trucks to move the salt. As of Tuesday morning, most of it had been removed.

Burdick said Farrelly, who advised her he was unaware he could not operate his business on the property, also installed sediment and erosion controls and will remove any equipment on the site when the weather clears.

Allyn said a notice of violation will be sent to the property owner, Generation Four Realty LLC, a company that has an application pending before the Planning and Zoning Commission on Thursday. The site previously was owned by MJ Sauchuk.

Allyn said the public concern is two-fold: a nonpermitted use in a building without a certificate of occupancy and the storage of road salt within 900 linear feet of the water's edge of a public drinking water supply.

Watershed

The property, west of Route 117 and east of the Ledyard Reservoir, is within the watershed of one of the reservoirs that supplies water to Groton Utilities, according to the state Department of Public Health and Groton Utilities.

Groton City Mayor and Groton Utilities Commission Chairman Keith Hedrick said the utility has been investigating and engaged the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection and Department of Public Health for their help accessing the property, which the property owner so far had denied. He said Groton Utilities was working closely with Ledyard. He said the concern was that salt could leech from the site into the water supply and negatively impact the environment.

Rick Stevens, who manages the Groton Utilities water division, said the water in the reservoir, being released by the reservoir, flowing from there through brooks and streams to the terminal reservoir and going out to customers were all tested Friday and the mineral results were within normal, expected levels.

Hedrick said once all the salt is removed, Groton Utilities plans to inspect the property to make sure there are no hazards there.

Generation Four Realty LLC, which owns and operates CWPM, a waste removal and recycling company, has an application pending before the Ledyard Planning & Zoning Commission to modify a previously approved special permit for a recycling facility, according to the town’s website. CLA Engineers wrote in a November letter to the town on behalf of CWPM that the “present owner wants to modify the existing site plan to meet their needs, and to bring the property into compliance.”

Jason Manafort, the principal of Generation Four Realty, said he purchased the property in 2018 and he is working to finish the site plan approval process, which the previous owner did not complete, and bring the site into compliance.

In a Feb. 8 letter to Burdick regarding the pending application, the state Department of Public Health also noted it has “been alerted that in recent days large quantities of what appeared to be road salt have been trucked onto” the site. Eric McPhee, supervising environmental analyst for DPH’s drinking water section, said that raises “an additional concern about the risk this property poses to the water supply.”

“The application submitted does not appear to include provisions for salt use or storage, nor would the Department recommend locating/permitting this type of facility so close to a source of drinking water,” McPhee wrote, adding that DPH also was concerned that CWPM recently denied Groton Utilities staff access to the property to conduct an annual survey.

Manafort maintained that storage is allowed in the zone and he has not seen anything that says salt is not allowed there, but said the town had a problem with it so DRVN Enterprises is responding.

The issue was brought to light through a complaint by Kevin Blacker, who said it’s not good judgment to have road salt displaced from State Pier and then moved next to a public water supply. He said he would like the Connecticut Port Authority to temporarily allow DRVN Enterprises to use a building at State Pier to store the treated salt.

Salt storage

While DRVN Enterprises has a large pile of salt at State Pier, Farelly said DRVN Enterprises was using the Ledyard site to temporarily store a surplus of treated road salt — which cannot be stored outside for quality control — so DRVN could quickly distribute it to towns and companies, such as Electric Boat, for snowstorms. He said he was storing salt in a building, which although it did not have doors, had a concrete slab and 8-foot containment walls.

"Following DRVN's decision to store and treat some of their salt at an offsite location, DRVN made the Authority aware of their arrangements with a private landowner; the Authority was not involved in DRVN's process of selecting the site in Ledyard,” port authority Executive Director John Henshaw said. “DRVN's current extension expires on February 28th. We expect an update from them towards the middle of this month on their progress in selling and/or relocating any remaining product off the pier." 

Farrelly said he has been in need of a place to store treated salt since he lost use of a former salt storage building this summer. He requested to use another facility at State Pier for the treated salt but said the port authority said it was not safe to be used for salt storage.

Henshaw said DRVN had disassembled a salt structure, after being given the option to remove or forfeit the structure to the port authority. The structure and the salt pile were in a site of “ongoing geotechnical investigation, planned remediation and other predevelopment activities.” The port authority allowed the salt pile to be relocated to the Central Vermont Railroad Pier. The authority said that to alleviate relocation costs, it has not charged DRVN monthly rental fees.

“I’m in a bad spot, and I’m doing the best with what was dealt to me,” Farrelly said.

While it’s more difficult, he said, he can process the salt on demand this winter and distribute it from State Pier.

Meanwhile, a public hearing on the application for a limited recycling facility at the Ledyard site is scheduled on Thursday via Zoom, Burdick said. Since there are multiple outstanding issues, her staff recommendation will be to continue the hearing so those can be addressed.

Loureiro Engineering Associates buys Coventry contractor

Sean Teehan  Plainville engineering and construction company Loureiro Engineering Associates Inc. has bought Coventry-based contractor Pelletier Builders, Inc.

According to newly-installed Laureiro CEO Brian Cutler, the acquisition strengthens the company by expanding its construction capabilities. Pelletier will now operate as Pelletier Builders LLC, and will retain most of its employees.

“The Pelletier team brings decades of general contracting expertise on a range of facility types, which supplements our existing heavy/civil construction offerings," Cutler said. "This type of integration is rare in our industry."

Financial details of the purchase were not disclosed.

Cutler served as Laureiro's president before being appointed to the position of CEO in December. He succeeded Jeffrey Loureiro, who now serves as project coordinator.

“I am excited to pass the torch to Brian’s capable hands," Loureiro said. “He has played an instrumental role in the vision and core values that define us today."

Lamont uses federal dollars and reserves to boost local aid, avert tax hikes in his new budget

Keith M. Phaneuf  Gov. Ned Lamont will propose a lean, $46 billion, two-year budget Wednesday that relies heavily on federal aid and state reserves to close a major deficit without tax hikes and bolsters funds for cities and towns.

But while Lamont’s plan provides short-term stability, it also could leave Connecticut with several challenges to be resolved after the 2022 state elections.

The package would channel more than $400 million in emergency federal relief  to low-performing school districts, according to several sources that have reviewed the proposal. But it also would suspend plans to bolster regular state-funded aid for municipal schools by $90 million in the next two-year budget cycle.

Municipalities also would share receipts from a new tax on marijuana — at the same time that a more lucrative sales-tax revenue-sharing plan to assist towns remains in limbo.

The governor’s proposal does not expand Medicaid eligibility to cover more poor residents — something many of the governor’s fellow Democrats in the legislature’s majority called essential for Connecticut to emerge strong from the pandemic. And it also lacks a rate increase for the private, nonprofit agencies that deliver the bulk of social services.

Lamont did not propose tolls this year as he did in the last two, but he did call for a new mileage-based highway tax on large trucks and also would shift a a huge portion of sales tax receipts into Connecticut’s cash-starved transportation program.

And while the governor was able to steer clear of tax hikes, his plan would cancel previously approved tax relief for businesses and retired teachers.

“At the end of the day, the governor will be focused on preparing Connecticut for recovery and growth,” Office of Policy and Management Secretary Melissa McCaw, Lamont’s budget director, told the CT Mirror last week. That means preserving services and protecting taxpayers, particularly in distressed municipalities that have been ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic.

The package, which Lamont is scheduled to present to the legislature at noon, would boost spending 2% in the fiscal year that begins July 1 and 3.5% in the year after that.

Lamont has warned for months that, despite the pandemic, Connecticut could not afford to be too aggressive with its spending.

Analysts warned in November that state finances, unless adjusted, would run $4.3 billion in the red over the next two fiscal years combined. A rosier revenue forecast in January whittled that shortfall down to about $2.6 billion, or roughly $1.3 billion per year. But that still represents more than 6% of the budget’s General Fund — an imposing gap.

Still, Congress authorized major new relief for education and housing in December that includes nearly $1 billion for Connecticut.

Connecticut has amassed just over $3 billion in its rainy day fund, and sources familiar with the package said Lamont relies on that and federal pandemic relief to fill at least two-thirds of the holes in the next budget.

Towns benefit from federal aid, marijuana revenues

The administration has been quiet about its plans for some of the federal aid Connecticut has received since the coronavirus struck last spring. And legislators lately have been pressing Lamont for details on his plans for the new education- and housing-related aid approved by Congress three months ago.

The governor finally tipped his hand with his new budget.

School districts would receive $220 million more in federal relief in each of the next two fiscal years, but Lamont makes sure the state’s finances also benefit from this arrangement.

To help balance Connecticut’s budget while districts receive dollars from Washington, Lamont would suspend two years of a 10-year initiative to increase the Education Cost Sharing program, the largest state-funded grant for districts.

Previously approved ECS increases of $30 million in 2021-22 and $60 million in 2022-23 would not be delivered. 

Grants would be scheduled to grow again, sources said, in the 2023-24 fiscal year. The federal relief would have expired by that point.

Lamont, who has pressed legislators to curb state borrowing, would use the credit card himself to cover half of a $100 million increase in non-education aid for municipalities next fiscal year. The other half would come from federal pandemic relief.

To keep that new source of local aid from expiring, Lamont would support taxation and regulation of marijuana sales for recreational use.

When the legislature’s nonpartisan Office of Fiscal Analysis last projected receipts from taxing marijuana, in 2017, its annual revenue estimate of $115 million was based on models from other states.

Pro-commercialization advocates have suggested Connecticut’s annual take could be $170 million or more.

No Medicaid expansion or boost for nonprofits

Health care programs, sources said, would not receive a funding boost similar to that proposed for cities and towns.

Lamont’s plan doesn’t include funding to expand HUSKY A, Connecticut’s Medicaid-funded health insurance program for poor households with children.

A coalition of 30 progressive Democratic lawmakers pressed for this and other health care and education investments last week, calling them essential to mitigate a racial divide in health care access only worsened by the coronavirus.

The budget also lacks a rate increase for the nonprofit social service agencies that have been pleading with Lamont since he took office two years ago for major relief for an industry whose funding has grown little over the past two decades.

According to the CT Community Nonprofit Alliance, the industry needs more than $460 million in additional funding annually simply to reverse this long-term fiscal damage.

Nonprofit leaders also say their businesses, collectively, have lost millions of dollars since the pandemic began. Safety, cleaning and hazardous-duty pay costs have increased, and revenues have been lost as certain programs are suspended or scaled-back to maintain social distancing.

Transportation program gets short-term boost

The governor would push more resources into a state transportation program headed for insolvency in 2024 or 2025, but these measures aren’t expected to solve that challenge over the long haul.

Legislators approved long-range plans in 2015 and 2017 to shift more sales tax receipts away from other programs and into the budget’s Special Transportation Fund. The STF not only funds Department of Transportation operations but also covers the debt payments on the hundreds of millions of dollars Connecticut borrows annually to upgrade highways, bridges and rail lines.

Lamont was chastised by transportation advocates two years ago when he and lawmakers scaled back that transfer. The governor’s latest plan restores that schedule, adding nearly $200 million in sales tax receipts to the STF in 2022.

To complement that, Lamont also is asking lawmakers to approve a new highway usage tax on heavy tractor-trailer trucks. Full details on the proposal weren’t available late Tuesday, but sources said the fees would be based on mileage and would be lower than those charged by neighboring New York.

Sources also said that while Lamont was able to avoid major tax hikes in his plan, he did generate more revenue by seeking to defer or cancel some previously approved tax relief.

The state’s 10% surcharge on its corporation tax was scheduled to sunset in 2020 — meaning firms filing returns this spring would get a break. But Lamont’s plan would keep it in place, costing corporations an estimated $15 million.

The budget also would suspend a tax break for retired teachers. Connecticut currently exempts 25% of their pensions from the state income tax, and that was slated to grow to 50% for returns filed in 2022. But it would remain at 25% under the governor’s plan.

This would cost retired teachers about $8 million per year.

Multimodal Planning in the I-84 Danbury Corridor

Written by Ct. DOT I-84 Danbury Project Project   The Ct. DOT I-84 Danbury Project Team is crafting a Purpose Statement for the I-84 Danbury Project. This Purpose Statement is important because it defines what problems the Project seeks to address, and what the Project wants to achieve. The Purpose Statement also provides the framework to develop and evaluate a wide range of concepts. At the third Project Advisory Committee (PAC) meeting in September, committee members were asked a series of questions about needs for the I-84 corridor in greater Danbury. The exercise provided the Project team with local insights and input towards the Project’s Purpose.

---The purpose of the I-84 Danbury Project is to reduce congestion and improve the mobility of people and goods in

the I-84 corridor in greater Danbury---

Questions for the team included whether PAC members change their travel patterns or behavior to avoid congestion on I-84, with most answering that they did. PAC members were also asked if they felt that congestion has gotten worse over the last five years, and whether congestion on I-84 was hurting the local economy. The consensus for both questions was yes! PAC members also agreed that improved access to commuter rail, bus transit, and Park & Ride areas would be beneficial. Reducing congestion and crashes, and improving safety overall, were identified as important to the Project’s purpose. PAC members also chimed in on bike and pedestrian amenities, connectivity within the city, and rest areas and pull-offs for trucks on I-84. I-84 through Danbury is important because it is a major commuter and freight route near large employers in one of the fastest growing regions of the state, so addressing issues of congestion and mobility are crucial. 

Based on the PAC’s input, an in-depth review of the Project’s Needs and Deficiencies Study, and review of comments provided by the public and stakeholders on-line and at numerous outreach events, the project team prepared and discussed the following draft purpose statement with the PAC: The purpose of the I-84 Danbury Project is to reduce congestion and improve the mobility of people and goods in the I-84 corridor in greater Danbury. In the coming months, the Poject team will begin developing concepts that could meet the purpose of the Project. They will bring their first concept to the PAC in the Spring 2020 for review and discussion. This meeting will be a workshop where the PAC can provide feedback to the Project team. A variety of additional ideas and concepts, on the highway and local road connections, are likely to be developed as a result of feedback from this PAC workshop. These ideas and concepts will be made available to the public on the Project website at http://www.i84danbury.com/. Help shape the future of Danbury by checking these out and providing your thoughts too!

Multimodal Planning - A Primer Multimodal planning considers many types of transportation including cars, buses, trains, bicycles, and pedestrians, as well as the connections between those various travel modes. People have different needs and preferences when it comes to how they move about and travel. A transportation system is more successful when travelers and commuters can use different modes to reach their destinations. There are many ways to implement multimodal planning. Multimodal planning can include creating bike lanes on a road so that cyclists can travel next to automobiles. It can include building accessible sidewalk ramps and crossing signals so that users with disabilities can travel more easily in an area. It can improve access to and frequency of transit service. Simply put, multimodal planning considers much more than just Multimodal Planning in the I-84 Danbury Corridor 2 Winter 2020 Newsletter Multimodal planning near a highway ramp can involve creating continuous sidewalks, safer crossings, and better lighting to improve travel for all users in the corridor.

The benefits of multimodal planning are substantial. Improving these more sustainable forms of travel can encourage their use, ease congestion on the highway itself, reduce environmental impacts, and improve overall quality of life. Incorporating Multimodal Planning into the I-84 Danbury Project While the focus of the I-84 Danbury Project is largely on the highway itself, the Project will also consider other elements such as potential impacts to transit stops /service and ramp connections to local streets. Several stakeholders have already asked the Project team to consider pedestrian safety improvements at the highway’s many underpasses.

To address these concerns, the Project team will consider lighting, ADA-compliant ramps, and improved crosswalks and signals where appropriate. To share your thoughts on the planning process, please visit the Project website at www.i84danbury.com and leave a comment for the project team.