Gov. Ned Lamont, Democrats unite around truck-only tolls, rule out passenger cars in compromise

Top legislative leaders said they have not held caucuses with rank-and-file House and Senate Democrats on the details of the plan, but they said there was more support among lawmakers for truck-only tolls than for tolling passenger vehicles. Lawmakers are targeting the large tractor-trailers they say cause far more damage to the roads than passenger […]

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NY developer proposes $40M mixed-use development along CT River in Hartford

The proposed development by Aqua Ark LLC, of Rye, N.Y., aims to include a variety of retail, restaurant and event spaces along city-owned land within Riverfront Park adjacent to the Mortensen Riverfront Plaza at 300 Columbus Blvd. Aqua Ark President George Bryant on Tuesday said the complex would be built on land-based floating technology that […]

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Hartford’s State House Square undergoing $12M facelift

More than $12 million is being spent to upgrade elevators, lobbies and a food court in the three-tower office and retail complex located across the street from Constitution Plaza. Half of the newly revamped Otis elevators at 90 State House Square will begin operating by Thanksgiving, with the other units coming online by February. The […]

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Lamont, legislators to reopen transportation talks today

Legislative leaders are going to the Executive Residence today to talk to Gov. Ned Lamont about the prospects of passing a transportation financing bill in special session, uncertain if the governor is ready to commit to one of the two competing ideas outlined by Senate Republicans and House Democrats. If Lamont passes a transportation financing […]

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Fixing Construction’s Fixed-Price Conundrum

Fixed-price contracts, also known as lump sum, have become essential to owners moving forward in the tumultuous energy megaproject market and for public-sector entities struggling to stretch funds and quickly execute transportation and other infrastructure jobs. Experienced contractors have historically been able to manage fixed-price projects to some level of profit or recover from a […]

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Study finds maternity benefits for construction tradeswomen financially feasible

A new study from the Chicago Women in Trades highlights the success that trade organizations like the Ironworkers have had offering pregnancy and maternity benefits to their workers. The lack of pregnancy and family medical leave policies can be a barrier to women’s entry and retention in the trades, according to the report, which also […]

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Transportation could make Lamont a one-term governor

I think Lamont should be commended for going all-in on an issue he and many others view as critical to Connecticut’s future. Good leaders often have to do and support unpopular things, and Lamont’s approval ratings — hovering around a paltry 24 percent — have already taken a beating because of tolls. The biggest problem […]

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$100M Pratt Street redevelopment project includes renovation of apartments at old Sage-Allen department store

A partnership planning a $100 million redevelopment of the Pratt Street corridor plans to acquire the Lofts at Main and Temple, currently mired in a foreclosure, to form the second of three parts of the larger redevelopment project. On Thursday, a major obstacle to purchasing the mortgage was removed when the Capital Region Development Authority […]

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Legal ruling moves Hartford one step closer to DoNo redevelopment

Bronin said Wednesday’s Appellate Court ruling “fully clears the way forward” for developing the parcels around the ballpark. He said the city is in the final stages of negotiating a development agreement with RMS Companies of Stamford, which is led by Randy Salvatore. Phase one of RMS’ plan includes a $46-million investment to build 200 […]

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Hartford Hospital to break ground on $70M expansion

Hartford Hospital will break ground Thursday on a $70-million expansion of its sprawling South Green neighborhood campus. The project centers around construction of a 49,550-square-foot addition to the north façade of its existing Bliss Building at 80 Seymour St., which will provide four floors of additional space to support clinical areas including MRI, interventional radiology, […]

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$20M mixed-use development eyed in Hartford’s North End

7 Summits Realty CEO Rohan Freeman on Tuesday said his firm is looking to secure public and private funding to build a four-story mixed-use development on vacant city-owned land at the corner of Albany Avenue and Woodland Street. The $20-million proposal includes 50 apartment units and retail/office space. According to plans, the top two floors […]

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Gov. Ned Lamont wants meeting soon on potential tolls compromise: ‘My job is to reach a solution’

With three proposals on the table, Gov. Ned Lamont said Wednesday he wants to host a meeting with legislative leaders soon to reach a compromise on financing for his $21 billion transportation plan to fix the state’s aging roads, bridges and railroads. House Democrats and Senate Republicans have released their own plans, with House Democrats […]

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$20M mixed-use development eyed in Hartford’s North End

7 Summits Realty CEO Rohan Freeman on Tuesday said his firm is looking to secure public and private funding to build a four-story mixed-use development on vacant city-owned land at the corner of Albany Avenue and Woodland Street. The $20-million proposal includes 50 apartment units and retail/office space. Freeman’s firm has committed $1.5 million to […]

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Hartford Hospital to break ground on $70M expansion

Hartford Hospital will break ground Thursday on a $70-million expansion of its sprawling South Green neighborhood campus. The building is scheduled to be open by Aug. 2021. Hartford Hospital has gradually expanded its campus over the years, including the late 2016 opening of its $150 million Bone & Joint Institute. Hartford HealthCare CEO Jeff Flaks […]

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House Democrats propose truck-only tolls at 12 sites across Connecticut; say tolling cars is off the table

House Democratic leaders proposed a new compromise Tuesday that calls for installing electronic highway tolls for trucks only on a dozen bridges across the state in the latest chapter in the long-running debate at the state Capitol. In return, Gov. Ned Lamont is expected to support using a portion of the state’s rainy day fund […]

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On tolls plan, local officials torn between tax burden and infrastructure needs

While some support tolls to fund improvements to the state’s highways and bridges, others want more details on the plan and some are worried about the potential clogging of local roads and financial impact to residents. The proposal calls for funding 14 infrastructure projects — including the rehabilitation of the northbound span of the Gold […]

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Vineyard Wind CEO sees both New London and Bridgeport as viable wind hubs

Vineyard Wind, which has two leases in waters south of Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket, wants to transform Barnum Landing, an underused part of Bridgeport Harbor, into a manufacturing and staging facility for the offshore wind industry, and later into a long-term hub for workers servicing the turbines, which have a life cycle of 25 to […]

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Senate GOP’s no-tolls alternative relies on rainy day fund

The GOP would use nearly two-thirds of the state’s budget reserves to pay down pension liabilities, producing an annual savings of $130 million that could be spent on transportation. Another $100 million would come from cutting annual borrowing for things such as capital spending on local schools and public universities. The GOP’s alternative echoes several […]

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Lamont rebuffed on tolls by Senate Democrats

The Senate Democratic majority effectively took highway tolls off the table Wednesday as a means to leverage low-cost federal financing of Gov. Ned Lamont’s sweeping $21 billion plan to maintain and modernize Connecticut’s aging transportation infrastructure over the next decade.  Senate Democrats met for two hours with Lamont in their third-floor caucus room at the […]

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Nonunion building contractors criticize organized labor’s hold on public works construction tied to potential toll revenue in Connecticut

Lamont has assured organized labor in Connecticut that his administration will honor so-called project labor agreements, which are bargaining pacts that apply to construction projects. Lamont sees labor on board his recently revised $21 billion transportation plan as a key component of his sales pitch to the legislature. On Tuesday, he showed the other side […]

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Crane falls on New London construction site

A crane working on the construction of an apartment complex on Howard Street Monday morning fell into the road. The crane, which was being used for the apartment complex under construction at the corner of Bank and Howard streets, fell partially into the roadway. No one was injured. Pennsylvania-based A. R. Building Company is working […]

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East Hartford’s Founders Plaza eyed for major mixed-use redevelopment

The town’s economic-development arm is searching for a developer for an ambitious plan to convert the area surrounding the half-century-old Founders Plaza office tower on Pitkin Street into a mixed-use residential-retail center with up to 2,000 new apartment units. East Hartford’s development-services department this year collaborated with the building’s landlord, Merchants 99-111 Founders LLC, the […]

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Bloomfield sees steady development boom

One town that’s seen its fair share of development in recent years is Bloomfield. In fact, the town of nearly 21,000 saw $189.2 million worth of construction projects between 2015 and 2017, ranking it 14th among the state’s 169 cities and towns in overall investment, “There is a lot of construction going on. The list […]

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Lamont Pitches Revised Transportation Plan With No Legislative Leaders In Sight

The 10-year, $21.1-billion plan includes the installation of tolls in 14 locations. The toll rates would be capped at between $0.50 and $1, but there’s no guarantee they would come down in 27 years when the federal low-interest loans are paid. Lamont said he could write it into the contract to give people “legal confidence” […]

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Lamont’s transit package includes major commitments to Metro-North

The new plan proposes 14 strategically placed toll locations on or near state bridges, with dedicated revenue streams to support rehabilitation work on each span. Lamont’s offering to sweeten the pot, by offering 5-percent of revenues flowing to the communities that host the highway tolls. The massive transportation program includes $5 billion in major upgrades […]

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$12M medical-office space development underway in Middletown

The development, which has already received city approval, will increase by 50 percent the medical-office park located on Saybrook Road. That medical complex currently consists of three buildings at 400, 410 and 420 Saybrook Road, collectively encompassing more than 100,000 square feet. Adding about 50,000 square feet of medical space to the medical complex will […]

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This is Lamont’s vision for transportation — and how he’ll sell it

A $21 billion transportation plan Gov. Ned Lamont intends to begin promoting Thursday would touch every aspect of Connecticut’s highway and rail system over the next decade, expanding and improving Metro-North, unclogging highway bottlenecks, replacing aging bridges and connecting Bradley International Airport to a more robust regional rail system. There would be five tolls on […]

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Ørsted offers $100 million to southeastern Connecticut in offshore wind bid

Ørsted-Eversource announced Wednesday that if its Constitution Wind bid to supply up to 2,000 megawatts of offshore wind power is successful, the partners are ready to commit funding for scholarships for community college students, money for research and monitoring at the University of Connecticut Avery Point and Mystic Aquarium and to a small business loan […]

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Klarides tweets Gov. Lamont’s transportation plan includes 14 ‘temporary’ tolling locations

A top Republican lawmaker says Gov. Ned Lamont’s latest transportation funding plan will include 14 “temporary” highway tolling locations. House Minority Leader Themis Klarides, R-Derby, revealed the number of tolling locations in a Twitter post Monday after Lamont administration officials briefed House Republicans on the 10-year, $18 billion transportation funding plan. Klarides tweets Gov. Lamont’s […]

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Amid national growth, CT’s construction workforce down 8%

The region’s construction industry lost 1,600 jobs between Sept. 2018 and Sept. 2019, down 8 percent from a year ago, according to a new report by the Associated General Contractors of America. Construction employment declined in Connecticut during the last year as the workforce grew nationally. In fact, the industry added jobs in 68 percent […]

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Lamont Makes Transportation Pitch to Senate Republicans

The plan Lamont gave Republicans Thursday included a list of projects, the order the projects will be tackled and what each project means for congestion. He also broke down whether a toll was associated with the project and how much revenue for that project would come from in-state and out-of-state drivers and trucks. There are […]

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GOP holds fast on tolls: ‘No’

Despite speculation by various radio program hosts this week, Senate Minority Leader Leonard A. Fasano, R-North Haven, said Wednesday that he has not changed his position on tolls. While he remains committed to finding a way to fund the state’s transportation projects without tolls, he feels that as governor, Lamont deserves the respect of listening […]

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Former Higher One headquarters in New Haven undergoes $25 million renovation

The new owners of what once was the headquarters of financial services firm Higher One are looking to boost the occupancy rate of the 145,000-square foot-building by adding much-needed laboratory space for biotechnology companies. Now, the joint venture partners are spending about $25 million on renovations they hope will allow them to take advantage of […]

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