Connecticut is now talking ‘smart growth’ and transit-oriented development

A $500 million town center may be built in North Haven, next to a proposed train station. Connecticut, previously a laggard in smart-growth policymaking, has begun launching initiatives over the past year aimed at extending commuter rail service into currently automobile-dependent parts of the state and clustering a substantial volume of new development around future train stations. The state legislature has approved a plan by Governor Jodi Rell to establish a new commuter rail line running through the center of the state, from New Haven to Hartford to Springfield, Massachusetts. The $300 million rail line, approved last year, could begin operating around 2011-2012, with eight commuter trains a day going in each direction between New Haven and Springfield. An environmental assessment must first be carried out. Additional track would need to be installed on parts of the 62-mile route, which is owned by Amtrak and currently traveled by eight long-distance Amtrak trains per day. “Imagine what the future of Connecticut will look like with new neighborhoods and people walking and biking to our train or bus stations,” said Rell, a Republican from Fairfield County, a corner of the state that for decades has relied on rail for much of its daily travel to and from New York City. This March, Rell appointed Albert Martin, formerly director of the Detroit (Michigan) Department of Transportation, to the new position of deputy commissioner of transportation, with responsibility for overseeing mass transit and encouraging related development. The previous October, Rell issued an executive order to establish an Office of Responsible Growth, intended to “coordinate state initiatives to control rampant, ill-conceived development.” “The development of housing and businesses near train stations” is one of the goals Rell hopes to achieve with the expansion of rail transit. TOD project in North Haven In the New Haven-Springfield corridor, the most ambitious transit-oriented development (TOD) proposed so far is in North Haven, where a developer is asking permission to build more than 2 million sq. ft. of stores, offices, and housing on 163 acres. The $500 million mixed-use project, proposed by Rabina Properties of Scarsdale, New York, would be served by a proposed commuter rail station and would occupy the site of a 1.3 million sq. ft. Pratt & Whitney Aircraft factory that closed in 2002. After decontamination and new construction, the property could be a lively, walkable, mixed-use center, something long missing from dispersed, suburban North Haven. The Rabina project, called North Haven Town Center, would feature a town green area containing an ice rink and a farmers’ market and would have a mix of retail, offices, entertainment, and housing, Lynne Lawrence, senior vice president of the company, told New Urban News. About 40 percent of the site, including wetlands along the Quinnipiac River, would be preserved as green space, with hiking trails added. Lawrence contends that commuter rail and development close to train stations could ease traffic on Interstate 91, which largely parallels the rail route. Michel Dionne, a partner at Cooper, Robertson & Partners in New York, is drawing up a master plan to be submitted to the town. “North Haven never really had a town center,” Dionne noted. The municipality recently demonstrated support for the concept by establishing a “special design district” designation, which allows specified areas to have an intermingling of uses. “It’s something we really need to promote,” First Selectman Kevin Kopetz said of TOD. A disadvantage of the site is that, because of the river, the highway, and the train tracks, it’s somewhat isolated from surrounding areas, said Heidi Green, president of 1000 Friends of Connecticut. Nonetheless, if developed as Rabina is promising, “it would be walkable and dense” and “a good use of the site,” Green said. Retail is expected to be the largest single component, but Dionne pointed out that there would be “mid-density” housing, including townhouses, four-story stacked flats, six- to seven-story residential buildings, and apartments above retail. Site plans for the first two phases, including a medical office building, retail, and some housing, are to be submitted this year. Build-out of the project may take three to seven years. state plans for commuter rail The state has already been making plans to build commuter rail stations in two communities that currently lack stations — West Haven and Orange. Both are on the well-traveled main line of the Metro North system between New Haven and New York. Rell also has attracted favorable notice from smart-growth advocates by appointing Gina McCarthy commissioner of environmental protection. McCarthy had been deputy secretary of operations in the Massachusetts Office of Commonwealth Development, the agency that Governor Mitt Romney established to oversee formulation and implementation of major state initiatives on infrastructure and to promote smart growth in the Bay State. Promotion of alternatives to sprawl has been aided by the formation of 1000 Friends of Connecticut in December 2003 and by about four years of extensive coverage of sprawl issues by the Hartford Courant, which circulates through much of the state. The Connecticut chapter of the American Institute of Architects will make its contribution this fall, devoting its Oct. 5 annual conference at the Pequot Library in Southport to discussion of transit-oriented development.