Government

Wet Weather Delays Work on Alley Between Playhouse and LPQ

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Town officials say they’re trying to wrap up work on the alley between The Playhouse and Le Pain Quotidien so that it’s open to shoppers during the holiday season. Closed for the past month, the alley—or ‘allée,’ as it’s called by the Department of Public Works—is getting a new ramp and staircase connecting the Playhouse Lot to Elm Street. In addition to making the alley traversable to those with mobility challenges, the ramp is expected to help move delivery trucks off of Elm Street itself—part of a multi-phased plan to help traffic flow in the heart of downtown New Canaan. Yet the project is still “at least two pours away,” Public Works Director Tiger Mann said, referring to concrete. “They’re getting close to the secondary pour for the staircase itself,” Mann told members of the Board of Selectmen during their regular meeting, held Tuesday at Town Hall and via videoconference.

Government

Town To Make Weed-and-Elm a Three-Way Stop

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After years of wrangling about it, town officials decided this week to make the intersection at Elm and Weed Streets a three-way stop. Currently, there’s only a stop sign for motorists on Elm Street, approaching Weed. Police say they’ve received an increasing number in complaints in recent years about motorists ignoring pedestrians trying to get across Weed, including many who are coming to or from Irwin Park. “Obviously there’s a high volume of pedestrian traffic there, to get to Irwin and back from Irwin,” Police Chief John DiFederico said Tuesday night during a regular meeting of the Police Commission, New Canaan’s designated local traffic authority. “Although it’s a real flat road there, if you’re coming south on Weed Street there’s a bit of a crown in the road, and it’s difficult to see the intersection as you approach on Weed Street from the north,” DiFederico said during the meeting, held at police headquarters and via videoconference.

Government

DPW: ‘Western Lot’ Next to Waveny House Two Weeks from Reopening

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The repaved and reconfigured “western lot” near Waveny House is two weeks from reopening, officials say. Approved this summer after the Board of Selectmen called for more information, the approximately $480,000 project will see the number of spaces double in the heavily used lot. “It’s coming out very nice,” Public Works Director Tiger Mann told NewCanaanite.com in an interview. 

The contractor has remade the western side of the lot with “pervious pavers” instead of asphalt, which will help with drainage, Mann said. “He’s got all the granite in,” he said. “He’s working on the grading on one side, and he’s already started to grade the other side, the sidewalk.

News

Playhouse Lot: Work Underway for New Dumpster Enclosure; New Ramp in LPQ Allée To Start

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The new dumpster enclosure that’s going into the parking lot behind The Playhouse is progressing on time, officials said Tuesday, and it’s taking steps this week toward completion. The contractor working in the Playhouse Lot is planning to pour walls for the dumpster on Friday, and soon will start building a ramp from that lot down to the alley or ‘allée’ between the movie theater and Le Pain Quotidien, according to Public Works Director Tiger Mann. “I was pushing for Thursday,” Mann told members of the Board of Selectmen at their regular meeting, held at Town Hall and via videoconference. Mann continued: “And he [the contractor] has got a little bit of forming work left to do, and then the contractor will be looking to start the excavation Thursday-Friday on the ramp going down on the allée. So at that point in time, we’ll have to take that [the current staircase] out of service since it’ll be under construction.

Government

‘That Is a Milestone’: At Last, Pine Street To Be Repaved

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Municipal officials are poised to approve a contract Tuesday to repave the very last road in New Canaan to get a new surface under the town’s comprehensive 21-year-old program. 

The Board of Selectmen will vote on an approximately $525,000 contract, including a contingency, with a Norwalk-based company to do the work on Pine Street—about $25,000 less than an original estimate, according to Public Works Director Tiger Mann. “That will start some time around Oct. 1 and go through the rest of the season,” Mann told members of the Town Council Infrastructure & Utilities Committee during its Sept. 12 meeting, held at Town Hall and via videoconference. “And that is a milestone for us, me, our DPW in general, because that is the last road in town that needs to be paved since we started our pavement management program in 2004,” he continued. 

Public Works officials had said when the program got underway that it would take 20 years to do all the roads “and it’s pretty much exactly 20 years,” Mann said. 

“We were done a year ago but Pine Street was the only outlier,” he said.