Mountaintop Trucking is looking to renew its earth excavation permit – likely for the last time. The Planning and Zoning Commission will be reviewing the application for the renewal at its meeting Wednesday, City Planner Jeremy Leifert said. It is the ninth time the renewal has come before the commission since about 2005. Danny Stoughton, owner of Mountaintop Trucking, which produces aggregate from material excavated on the property, said the quarry is reaching its end. The quarry renewal repeats every two years, Leifert said. Since the surrounding area is commercially zoned, he doesn’t anticipate “the same pushback” that occurred last spring when O&G Industries and Haynes Aggregates Torrington jointly renewed their permits to excavate a quarry in a more residential area of Winsted Road. In those hearings, neighbors complained of noise from blasting and raised environmental concerns.

https://www.rep-am.com/localnews/2024/02/11/torrington-commission-to-review-renewal-application-of-quarry-site/

So when a ceremonial ground-breaking was held on the site Jan. 16 it came as a surprise that 160 of the 420 units planned for the first phase of construction would be lower-priced workforce housing. Not low income, but aimed instead at teachers, police officers, nurses and others, and exceeding an affordable requirement in an earlier agreement with the city. According to state officials, the 160 apartments will be spread out among different sizes, from studios to three-bedroom units, and with rents starting around $2,000 per month. The average projected savings for tenants is $385 per month over market rate. Pasquale Guliano is managing director of multifamily programs with the Connecticut Housing Finance Authority, a quasi-public agency involved in helping Steelpointe. He in an interview said the challenge the Christophs faced was convincing people with money that luxury housing would work in Bridgeport.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/article/steelpointe-development-luxury-apartments-18658848.php

After a Common Council committee set the maximum contractor costs for the upcoming construction of the South Norwalk School and the new Norwalk High School, the city is looking at a maximum combined cost for the projects of as much as $271.4 million. Newfield Construction, the South Norwalk School’s contractor, can charge the city at most a committee-approved a $51.8 million. The new high school’s contractor, Gilbane, can charge no more than $219.6 million for the build. Alan Lo, the city’s building and facilities manager, said the city did well with its guaranteed maximum prices. Both projects are set to break ground in late February, Lo said at the meeting. The South Norwalk School is slated to open for students in the 2025-26 school year, while the Norwalk Public Schools anticipates the new high school will welcome its first class in the 2027-28 school year.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/education/article/norwalk-new-schools-building-costs-high-sono-18656321.php

n recent weeks, the Westbrook Outlets, an open-air shopping center off Exit 65 of Interstate 95, some 20 miles west of Waterford’s Crystal Mall, has emerged as the potential site of a $425 million development that would involve leveling what’s there now and replacing it with a mix of residential and commercial space. The plan ― still so preliminary it doesn’t have a name ― would comprise 595 apartments, 100 townhouse condominiums, retail and entertainment components, and possibly, a hotel and an amphitheater. Hartford-based Lexington Partners is teaming with the outlets’ owner, T Westbrook Center, a foreign limited liability company, to develop the project. Lexington Partners worked on The Borden project with Westbrook’s town planner, Peter Gillespie, who was then the Wethersfield planner and economic development manager. The relationship smoothed Lexington’s “entree” to Westbrook officialdom, Reilly said.

https://www.theday.com/local-news/20240210/redevelopment-plan-for-westbrook-outlets-calls-for-mix-of-housing-commercial-space/

A proposal to build 107 townhouses on Pickett District Road has a few nearby residents concerned about the project’s potential impact on traffic and on their properties. Flagstaff Investments of New Milford submitted a special permit and site plan application to construct the 12-building townhouse residential complex to the Zoning Commission in November. The commission held a public hearing for the site plan application at its Jan. 23 meeting, and the hearing will continue at its Feb. 13 meeting. The construction would cost $10 million, according to the site plan application. Szymanski said he would like to start construction this year and anticipates it would be a multiyear project, though he did not say when the first townhouses would be completed.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/newmilford/article/new-milford-pickett-district-road-townhouses-plan-18638034.php

A solar farm developer petitioned the state late last month to build a facility in Manchester’s “rural residential” zone. California-based TRITEC Americas hopes to install a solar array on 7.8 acres of vacant land at 250 Carter St., bordering the cul-de-sac on Amanda Drive and a handful of single-family homes on Blue Ridge Drive and Carter Street. TRITEC bills its proposed Manchester facility to the Connecticut Siting Council in the same way in a narrative dated Jan. 24, arguing in its petition that the solar panels would supply just under one megawatt of “clean, carbon-free” electricity with no adverse environmental effects. The Planning and Zoning Commission will hold a public hearing on Feb. 21 to collect public comment on the proposed solar facility.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/journalinquirer/article/ct-manchester-solar-tritec-siting-council-18651275.php

Attorney General William Tong on Tuesday announced his office had closed a whistleblower investigation into the Connecticut Port Authority and determined there was nothing illegal about the $523,000 “success fee” paid to a contractor, Seabury Capital, whose co-founder was a former port authority board member. “Our investigation did not substantiate the whistleblower’s allegations of impropriety regarding ‘success fees,’ but it did substantiate allegations of unethical behavior, as well as develop evidence of multiple alleged violations of both the Code of Ethics for Public Officials and the Code of Ethics for Lobbyists,” Tong said in a statement. Tong, in a statement, said the success fees paid to Seabury, which were criticized as a potentially illegal “finder’s fee” by the State Contracting Standards Board, were in fact payments contained in an agreement between the port authority and Seabury. The $523,000 success fee was part of a $700,000 payment to Seabury in 2020 for the work the company performed.

https://www.theday.com/state/20240208/attorney-general-connecticut-port-authority-success-fee-to-contractor-is-legal/

Kevin Dillon, executive director of the Connecticut Airport Authority (CAA), said 2023 was a year of continued recovery for air travel in general, and at the state’s largest hub, Bradley International Airport. “We ​captured ​back ​a ​lot ​of ​our ​pre-pandemic ​traffic,” he said. ​“But ​if ​you ​look ​at ​where ​we’re ​at ​right ​now, ​on ​any ​given ​day ​we’re ​still ​about ​5% ​to ​7% ​​below ​where ​we ​were ​pre-pandemic, and ​a ​good ​portion ​of ​that ​is ​related ​to ​this ​business ​travel component.” Overall passenger traffic at Bradley Airport, from January 2023 through November 2023, was up 8.1% from 2022, but 7% behind pre-pandemic 2019, according to CAA data.Private jet use had seen a steady rise in the decade before the pandemic. In the last three years, that increase has been more dramatic. By some accounts, overall private jet use in the U.S. has increased by 20% over 2019 levels. Gollan said more company executives began to realize the convenience of private aviation during the pandemic.

$30M Bradley Airport hangar project aims to capitalize on increased corporate jet use, despite business travel’s slow recovery

The reconstruction of the bustling West Hartford Center is looming. Sidewalks are narrow and hazardous, trees need to be replaced, and the existing pedestrian infrastructure is outdated and at times unsafe. The West Hartford Center Infrastructure Master Plan was first revealed a year ago, with plans to elevate the popular dining and shopping destination to a higher level by replacing and enhancing sidewalks, crosswalks, and other infrastructure. On Wednesday morning, the town showed off potential design options, ranging from keeping the status quo but still replacing sidewalks and trees while enhancing pedestrians safety, to fuller transformations that include a shift in parking from angled to parallel that would leave more space for wider sidewalks, permanent expanded outdoor dining, and even buffered sidewalk-level bike lanes.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/westhartford/article/west-hartford-ct-lasalle-farmington-town-center-18651447.php

Under the city’s Below Market Rate program, developers must offer at least 10 percent of units in a project at reduced rents. In lieu of that, they may seek approval to contribute the value of those units to the affordable housing fund instead. Carmel Partners was asking the board to approve the cash offset which would have added nearly $13 million to the fund. But this time board members instead wanted a portion of the required 49 reduced-rent units to be included in the Clinton Avenue project, because board members felt it was the ideal location for below market rate apartments and would allow low- and moderate-income residents to live within walking distance of transportation, jobs, shopping and Mill River Park. It was weird, Bosak said Tuesday. Developers usually work with the Zoning Board in such instances, he said. In this instance, he said, the board was seeking a compromise with the developer. “I was absolutely surprised by the withdrawal,” Bosak said. “I wanted to get some units on site because the city has such a need for affordable housing. I recognize the nonprofits do this type of development very well, but I didn’t want to wait for that.”

Developer Abruptly Withdraws, as Zoning Seeks Mix of Affordable Units in Downtown Stamford