https://www.newstimes.com/local/article/Downtown-Danbury-to-get-facelift-13024573.php
Downtown Danbury to get facelift
Updated 3:55 pm, Monday, June 25, 2018
DANBURY — A plan to rebuild downtown Danbury’s aging sidewalks will start this year with a $2 million boost from the state.
The project will include new crosswalks, street lamps, murals, trees and reconstructed sidewalks throughout the downtown core from the HARTransit transfer hub to the Metro-North train station and down Main Street.
It is the first phase of the large-scale makeover outlined in the city’s new transit-oriented development plan, released this spring, that envisions a new $30 million Danbury Transit Center that could improve all types of transportation downtown and help stimulate redevelopment.
The state’s $2 million contribution is one of just five grants it is distributing this summer for transit plans designed to improve pedestrian safety and help spur economic activity in the surrounding area, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy announced last week. The other $6.5 million in grants will go toward projects in Hartford, West Hartford, Torrington and Stamford.
The state funding doubles the $2 million the city already set aside to begin the improvements in its next capital projects budget, Planning Director Sharon Calitro said.
“We’re really excited, it was great news for us,” she said. “Our goal is to go bid early next year and it’s all part of the urban revitalization, focusing on transit-oriented development, to help reinvigorate downtown.”
The project will include more than two miles of new sidewalks in total, including on Main Street from White to about Boughton Street, on Liberty Street from Main to Patriot Drive, and for the paths from Kennedy Park to the Danbury Green to Patriot Drive at the entrance to the train station, according to the preliminary plans.
Some parts of that sidewalk network are in relatively good shape, but others were last rebuilt in the early 1990s, Calitro said.
The plan also will include dozens of new trees, bike lanes and artwork — like crosswalks painted with murals — that would make downtown more comfortable to walk around in, she said.
“It’s all the things that go along with that to create a walkable, refreshed look and infrastructure in downtown to make it more enticing and to incentivize development,” she said.
The city’s funding for the project will be available when the new fiscal year starts July 1, so officials plan to hire surveyors and civil engineers to prepare the formal plans for the project this summer and fall. If put out to bid in early 2019, construction could start in less than a year.
CityCenter Danbury previewed what some of the changes could look like earlier this month when they hosted Connecticut Main Street Center’s annual awards ceremony in town and held an event in the alley next to the Post Office on Main Street. The former eyesore shortcut has been transformed by city crews and artists with new lamps, a thorough cleaning and custom murals to the delight of downtown leaders.
The sidewalks are only the first step in a long-term plan to reconfigure downtown transportation of all kinds — by foot, bicycle or car. The chief recommendation of the plan is to combine the HART PulsePoint transfer area near Kennedy Park with the existing train station to create a single hub called the Danbury Transit Center.
Negotiations are still underway among the city, Metro-North, HART and Eversource, which owns part of the property needed to enlarge the station, Calitro said.
Mayor Mark Boughton has said he’s “pumped” for the overall project, which he views as an “aspiraprunttional” plan for the city to pursue as it can within its means. He lauded the state for helping jumpstart the plan with the sidewalk funding.
“That’ll keep (construction superintendent) Tom Hughes and (Public Works Director) Antonio Iadarola going for a long time over the next 18 months,” Boughton joked.
zach.murdock@hearstmediact.com
