Government

‘It’s Going to Impact the Quality of Our Lives’: Concerns About Locust Avenue Parking Deck Plans Linger

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The Board of Selectmen on Tuesday approved funds for preliminary, pre-construction work on a proposed new Locust Avenue parking deck, conditioned on two things: that a widely anticipated traffic study turns up no safety concerns and that there’s input from police, fire and EMTs on the plan. The architectural and engineering services, from a Rocky Hill-based firm, come to a total of $52,226, under a contract approved during the selectmen’s regular meeting. “We are not going to go ahead with this until we get our traffic study and involve our police and fire department,” First Selectman Rob Mallozzi said during the meeting, held Tuesday at Town Hall. An initial traffic study conducted several years ago flagged no reasons to delay or reject the project, however, people felt that the study wasn’t complete, according to Mike Pastore, director of the Department of Public Works. A second traffic consultant was hired, and the report should be analyzed within the next few days, he said.

Government

Heritage Hill Road Residents Concerned About Traffic Flow in Early Locust Avenue Parking Deck Design

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Heritage Hill Road residents say they’re concerned about an early mock-up of the Locust Avenue Lot parking deck that would have traffic exiting onto their street dangerously close to a busy intersection at the end of a curve. It’s the mostly heavily trafficked area in the vicinity of the Locust Avenue Lot “and the offset from the intersection does not allow a lot of time for people to enter and exit onto Heritage Hill,” Jim Stevens, representing the Oenoke Association on Heritage Hill Road, told members of the Parking Commission at their most recent meeting. “I think it would be problematic having traffic make a left out of the proposed lot,” Stevens said at the Nov. 5 meeting, held at Town Hall. “And if you are going to force everybody to go right, you have everybody who is trying to get back to town or back to over to the Merritt or other towns who are going to be making U-Turns onto Heritage Hill Road.”

Parking Commission Chairman Keith Richey responded that the mockup of a Locust Avenue parking deck that features two levels with no ramp between them and access to the top level from Heritage Hill Road in fact was a high-level rendering offered up by a local person “without checking on elevations or anything.”

“It was a pretty cute plan but it was by no means a fully laid out or potentially final plan,” Richey said.