Route 34 West Plan Gets 6 – 0 Thumbs Up

Last week, Dolores Colon wasn’t ready to vote. She worried about more pollution coming to an asthma-choked neighborhood. Six nights later, she had waded through reports — and voted for a plan to start rebuilding a bulldozed former neighborhood, a plan that she concluded won’t further dirty the air.

Five of her fellow Board of Alders members agreed. They voted 6 – 0 Wednesday night to approve the sale of 5.39 vacant acres along Legion Avenue across from Career High School to make way for a new office building, hotel or medical building, pharmacy, restaurant, and garage.

The swift vote took place at a City Hall meeting of the alders’ Community Development Committee. The matter now goes to the full Board of Alders for approval.

The vote supported a plan to sell the 5.39-acre megablock along Legion Avenue and MLK Boulevard between Dwight and Orchard streets to a Middletown developer called Centerplan for $2.65 million. It is block one of a larger plan to fill in 16.2 vacant acres between Legion and MLK — dubbed ​“Route 34 West ”— that the government leveled two generations ago to make way for a highway that never got built. (Click here for a previous story detailing the plan and the public’s concerns, and here for a story about the developer.)

The alders’ Community Development Committee held a public hearing on the plan last week. But it didn’t vote on the matter at hand, a land disposition agreement that paves the way for the sale. Members wanted more time to sift through the passionate arguments on both sides: From proponents who see needed new life coming to the area, not to mention tax revenue and jobs; and from opponents who see an anti-pedestrian and anti-cyclist suburban-style business park that will add or at least not reduce pollution in the neighborhood.

Committee Chair Frank Douglass called a special meeting Wednesday night to reconsider the proposal, as an important clock ticks: The full Board of Alders needs to pass a new city budget by the end of May. The proposed budget assumes the city will collect the $2.65 million from the megablock sale.

Before the meeting, committee members (including Douglass and Edgewood Alder Evette Hamilton, pictured) huddled with Centerplan CEO Bob Landino and his attorneys, Anthony Avallone and Rolan Young, to go over some last-minute concerns. Dolores Colon said that at the request of two determined ​“little old ladies” in her ward she wanted to add language to the land disposition agreement ensuring that the developer can’t sell any of the taxable property (equaling 91 percent of the block) to a not-for-profit without approval from the Board of Alders. Landino called it ​“redundant” because of other existing language in the agreement, but said he had no problem adding it. Douglass, a Dwight alder, said he wanted to make sure the eventual design incorporates ample sidewalks and other ways for people to bike or walk comfortably. Landino responded that he’d be happy to work with alders on that, but asked that they present a united position.

Then the meeting came to order. And promptly ended.

In contrast to last week’s inconclusive three and a half hour hearing, Wednesday night’s meeting lasted 20 minutes at most. Much of it included lengthy recitation of public notices and amendments. The six committee members present passed Colon’s amendment. Then, after a few laudatory comments from the committee, the alders voted 6 – 0 to approve the land disposition agreement. Now it goes to the full Board of Alders for approval.

Douglass spoke of the overwhelming support for the project expressed at the hearing by people working for or with Continuum of Care, the growing mental-health agency that plans to consolidate its offices in a building on the lot.

Beaver Hills Alder Brian Wingate (pictured with Colon after the vote) complimented the developers for ​“being open” to public criticisms and responding with alterations to the plan.

“We’re looking forward to holding you accountable every step of the way” to keep promises to hire local people, Wingate added. Centerplan has promised to work with the new New Haven Works agency to steer New Haveners to jobs created by the project.

After the hearing, Colon spoke of her evolving decision to vote yes.

She had been concerned about new pollution worsening the neighborhood’s already dirty air. She said she was heartened that the developers were willing to compromise by agreeing not to build the full 800-car garage if they don’t end up building the entire envisioned project. Also, a letter submitted to the committee by city traffic tsar Douglas Hausladen put the number of spaces in the garage at a maximum 745, plus 112 surface-lot spaces; his letter stated that the project will result in only 19 new vehicle trips during peak rush hour. (Click here to read Hausladen’s letter.)

Colon further received a 122-page air quality report from consultants hired by the developer. The report concluded that the project will result in ​“de minimus,” or barely any added, air pollution. (Click here to read a summary of the study. Click here to read Centerplan’s memo about how it plans to design the project to be as sustainable and pedestrian-friendly as possible. )

Colon complained that she hadn’t received the report until Wednesday morning. She didn’t have time to print it out. ​“I had to read it on my computer,” she said. She focused on the pages of text (rather than try to wade through detailed numerical charts and appendices on her screen). She was satisfied in the end that the project won’t make the air dirtier.

Opponents remain convinced that the project brings car-centered, suburban business-park-style design to a neighborhood that needs greener, more residential, walkable and bikeable development. Colon was asked by project opponents’ argument that, given the high asthma rate in the area, the alders should hold out for a project that lowers air pollution — by, for instance, not approving new parking and instead relying on mass transit.

“Let’s get real,” Colon responded. She said she personally does favor dramatically improved mass transit and development geared toward walkers and cyclists. She too wants to see pollution levels lowered, she said. But for now it’s unrealistic to expect employees of offices on the new site to be able to commute by bus or to walk. Some 70 percent of Continuum of Care’s workforce lives outside the city, for instance. And it’s hard to commute by bus from the suburbs, she said.

“Even in New Haven, on Howard Avenue, they cut bus stops. It’s not fair! Every day they’re cutting routes,” Colon remarked. She said the fight for better mass transit must continue, but meanwhile it makes sense to plan for the new Route 34 West development taking people’s real transit options into account.

Hours before the hearing, the advocacy group Elm City Cycling released a letter urging the committee to require the developer to include ​“a continuous, 10-foot-wide bikeway, designed to national standards for two-way bicycle facilities, fully open to the public and connecting Dwight
St to Orchard St by the time the first phase of the development is completed.” The letter noted the plans to create safe, separated bike routes from the east side of New Haven to downtown. Click here to read the Elm City Cycling letter. In this letter submitted to the committee before Wednesday’s meeting, city development chief Matthew Nemerson referenced a 2008 plan, never realized, to build a dedicated bike path out to West River Memorial Park. He wrote that city officials believe the plan ​“has merit and will further analyze the potential for building this route as a separate project. We will report back to you later in the year.”