Route 123 will be closed in both directions next month for about three weeks, officials say.
Though town officials had asked that the work—replacing a “box culvert” or bridge near the New Canaan Field Club—be put off until next summer, the Connecticut Department of Transportation is moving forward with the work early next month, according to Public Works Director Tiger Mann.
“We asked for that to be changed to the summer, and while we had already gotten a delay from them back in November, because they couldn’t detail that they were actually going to finish before winter shutdown, they won’t budge it further,” Mann told members of the Selectmen’s Advisory Committee on Buildings and Infrastructure during their regular meeting, held Monday via videoconference.
Originally scheduled for last summer, the project was delayed due to the COVID-19 public health emergency and then pencilled in again for October. But the town urged the state to put off a project so close to Thanksgiving, as well as the date that asphalt plants shut down for winter, and the state agreed.
The project is expected to cost the state nearly $1 million, DOT officials have said. The box culvert to be replaced spans the Rose Brook just north of the intersection of Smith Ridge Road and Glen Drive, in the area of 183 Smith Ridge.
The work is expected to take place between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday, DOT officials have said. Motorists will be detoured with signs at multiple locations along Route 123, according to plans, including at Canoe Hill Road north of the project, and Parade Hill Road and Brushy Ridge Road to the south.
Town safety officials: Please put up a for residents only road block at both ends of Rosebrook Road during this construction project. Rosebrook Road is far too narrow to handle Route 123 traffic during that planned road closure. Thank you.