Electric Boat hired 3,700 shipbuilders last year. It wants to hire more than 5,000 this year and just as many every year for decades into the future. The country is spending more than $13 billion a year on the two new, lethal and virtually undetectable classes of nuclear-powered submarines Electric Boat is building for the Navy, Virginia class attack submarines and the Columbia class ballistic missile submarines. As construction gears up, there is concern over whether Electric Boat – and the thousands of other manufacturers in the supply chain known as the submarine industrial base – can hire and begin production quickly enough to meet the aggressive construction and delivery schedule on which the Navy says U.S. security depends. Graney said the shipyard will spend more than $1 billion over the next five years to support the vendors, machine shops, laboratories and others that make up the submarine industrial base supply network in Connecticut. The Navy is spending close to $1 billion more on industrial base here and elsewhere.

CT’s Electric Boat looking to hire 5,000 more employees amidst “once in generation expansion”

Home-improvement giant Lowe’s and online home-goods retailer Wayfair will occupy two massive logistics buildings under construction in East Hartford, various sources have confirmed to the Hartford Business Journal. Massachusetts-based National Development bought 300 acres at the former Rentschler Field airport site from Raytheon Technologies in a $78.47-million deal sealed in January. Wayfair confirmed it’s planning to occupy a 1.2-million-square-foot facility in East Hartford in late 2024. Lowe’s issued a statement confirming it will occupy a 1.3-million-square-foot bulk distribution center by fall 2024. A formal announcement is expected during a March 6 groundbreaking ceremony at Rentschler Field.

https://www.hartfordbusiness.com/article/massive-rentschler-field-logistics-center-development-inks-two-major-tenants

Plans for the 454-unit Niantic Village senior housing complex come at a time when town utilities engineer Ben North said there’s little, if any, capacity remaining in the system designed to send 1.5 million gallons per day of sewage to New London’s Piacenti Water Treatment Facility. Officials said the choice is either halt all large development or figure out how to add capacity to the system. Pelletier-Niantic LLC earlier this year filed a request to secure enough access to the sewer system to accommodate 160 condominiums, 144 apartments, and a 150-bed assisted living section, as well as urgent care and radiology facilities open to the public. New London attorney Bill Sweeney represented the New York-based senior housing developer at the hearing. He framed the capacity issue as one much larger than the development itself. He estimated construction would start two years from now, with peak demand realized in three or four years.

https://www.theday.com/local-news/20230303/will-sewer-capacity-limit-shut-down-development-in-east-lyme/

The developer who wants to build a regional tournament center for youth athletic teams in Enfield after unsuccessfully pursuing a similar plan in Windsor Locks has clashed with fellow investors in at least two similar projects in the past. The developer, Andrew Borgia, who has spent the last few years pursuing the All Sports Village proposals in Connecticut, also has filed for personal bankruptcy twice. A 2017 lawsuit against Borgia remains pending in a New York state court. It stems from his efforts to build a sports complex in the southern Long Island community of Islip, New York. Early in the consideration of the Windsor Locks proposal, then-First Selectman Chris Kervick briefly suspended negotiations over the project after news of the lawsuit broke. But, despite the lawsuit, Windsor Locks voters ultimately approved creation of a Tax Increment Financing District for the area of the project by a 969-719 vote in a 2019 referendum.

https://www.journalinquirer.com/towns/enfield/developer-of-enfield-all-sports-village-proposal-has-complex-history/article_0f571444-b9d9-11ed-927b-0f02ce1774d4.html

Plans to restore the playing fields at Western Middle School — six years after they were closed because of high levels of contaminants in the soil — now include scraping off the toxic dirt and replacing it with synthetic turf. Greenwich Public Schools recently submitted an application to the town planning department for approvals on the roughly $19 million remediation plan, which has been eagerly awaited by the school community in the west end of town. The plan, drafted with the Langan Engineering consulting group, will scrape off a two-foot layer of soil at the fields, add a layer of man-made material and cover the restored area with a synthetic turf. Depending on a number of factors, the goal is to have the planned clean-up could starting in June and running 144 days, according to the engineering firm.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/article/greenwich-western-middle-school-fields-toxic-dirt-17816145.php

The developer of a luxury apartment complex on the site of the former Children’s Museum in West Hartford has paid $10.6 million for the property, with construction expected to begin this spring. The price paid by New York-based Continental Properties for the nearly four-acre property at 950 Trout Brook Drive near Farmington Avenue is about $2.7 million an acre — a price, brokers involved in the sale say, sets a new benchmark for development sites in central Connecticut. In Connecticut, Continental has developed upscale rental complexes in Rocky Hill, Glastonbury, South Windsor, Milford, Shelton and Trumbull. Meanwhile, plans call for the iconic, 60-foot, 20-ton Conny the Whale sculpture to be moved just across the street to the Trout Brook greenway. Conny was constructed in the mid-1970s as a symbol of the “Save the Whales” movement but had evolved into a playscape and mascot for the museum.

Former Children’s Museum property in West Hartford sold for more than $10M. Broker says price sets ‘new benchmark.’

About a year ago the Groton Town Council, facing strong public opposition, ended discussions about building a massive data center there. Now the same developer, NE Edge, LLC, is pursuing a data center project in Waterford. While recognizing the necessity of these data centers and defending the legislature’s decision to offer incentives so that Connecticut could compete with other states in attracting them, our editorial also called for more sensible decision making in choosing where to build them. The Waterford proposal calls for construction of a large data center at an existing industrial site, the Millstone Power Station. Providing cloud and other data storage, such centers are critical to life and economic growth in the digital age, allowing the accessing, sharing and storage of enormous amounts of information. This project would be a major job creator, generating upwards of 2,000 construction jobs and as many as 500 full-time positions when in operation.

https://www.theday.com/editorials/20230302/waterford-data-center-plan-is-a-winner/

The state offered the town the right of first refusal for the property at 538 Center St. next to Vinny’s Deli which the state purchased as part of the bridge project that dragged on for years before it was finally completed in 2021. Construction began on the bridge in 2016 but was almost immediately delayed when a contractor expressed concerns about the stability of the structure after a portion of it was demolished. Ultimately plans were redesigned and work began again in 2019 with an anticipated 2022 completion date. The project was completed early, but the additional work increased the cost of the project from $3.9 million to $5.7 million. Now that the bridge is complete, the state wants to sell the property it used as a staging area for workers.

https://www.myrecordjournal.com/News/Wallingford/Wallingford-News/Wallingford-declined-offer-to-buy-land-next-to-Center-Street-bridge

Choate Rosemary Hall overcame one hurdle this week in its quest to build a 14,000-square-foot admissions building and 70-space parking garage on 6.5 acres at the corner of North Elm and Christian streets. At the commission’s February meeting, it also heard from residents concerned about runoff from the construction. “The project is more than just a stormwater discharge,” he said. “There was clearing of acreage of trees, and where there’s natural runoff, that’s now affecting it, and relative to the detention pond, nothing has changed since they built the houses but the water is much greater now.” Ultimately the commission approved the application with only Kern voting no, citing too many unanswered questions that came up during the discussions. Choate now has to gain Planning and Zoning approval before beginning the project. The application is expected to be on the agenda for its monthly meeting March 13 at 7 p.m. in the council chambers at Town Hall.

https://www.myrecordjournal.com/News/Wallingford/Wallingford-News/Inland-Wetlands-Commission-approves-Choate-plans-for-admissions-building

A draft environmental assessment for Tweed New Haven Regional Airport’s proposed expansion project says extending Tweed’s runway and building a new terminal on the East Haven side actually would improve the airport’s impact on the environment. Among the EA’s findings, highlighted by airport officials, is that the project would reduce overall noise by shifting aircraft ground noise farther from nearby homes. The expansion plan also calls for building a new, 80,000-square-foot terminal on the East Haven side of the airport. A new airport entrance would be off Proto Drive in East Haven, with access off Coe Avenue. The proposed new terminal “would be constructed on piers, raising the finished floor elevation above mean sea level,” the EA says. “The space below the finished floor elevation would be left open to allow floodwater to pass.”

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/article/study-tweed-expansion-bring-environmental-17816253.php