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Old 01-27-2014, 01:14 PM
 
Location: Connecticut
34,763 posts, read 56,596,486 times
Reputation: 11174

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Quote:
Originally Posted by mrgmrg View Post
I don't think there's anything wrong with criticizing decisions made 50 years ago as long as it's done in the context of when they were made. That's the only way you can learn and avoid repeating the same mistakes again. The urban renewal projects were disastrous, and now that we have some opportunities to remediate them, we should absolutely take a critical view (not negative--critical).
I do not agree. Would Stamford be the city it is today without urban renewal project? No. All those downtown high rises and apartments were part of an urban renewal project. Same for Constituion Plaza in Hartford. CBT, Hartford Steam Boiler and the Phoenoix would all likely have headed to the suburbs if they did not have a place to build a large office building for themselves. Hartford's XL Center was part of an urban renewal project. Even New Haven would not have some of the buildings it has today in its downtown without urban renewal. Was the New Haven Coliseum a failure? It brought hundreds of thousands of people into downtown New Haven that would likely not have ventured into the city had the arena not been built. I would not classify that as disastrous. Jay
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Old 01-27-2014, 04:02 PM
 
468 posts, read 705,636 times
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We'll have to disagree. I look at the big picture, and I see two cities that have been embarrassments for decades. New Haven is only in the last 5 years or so beginning to right the ship--and has struggled mightily against the "improvements" wrought by urban renewal, which have impeded its ability to become a city of the 21st century. Hartford is struggling, at best. Stamford is doing well, but it's not analogous to the rest of the state because the influence of the wealth from NYC and FFC. And Stamford's renewal is not on the same scale as the projects of the 50s and 60s, in terms of literally reshaping entire cities, building highways, etc.
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Old 01-27-2014, 04:05 PM
 
468 posts, read 705,636 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Stylo View Post
What always bugged me about how they built 95 was their total disregard for the coastline, one of CT's most beautiful assets - especially in Bridgeport and New Haven where it's practically on top of the water.
The routing of 95 was and is an absolute travesty, and unfortunately will be for the foreseeable future. That's a great example of a glaringly poor decision that is honestly dumbfounding and continues to plague this state.
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Old 01-27-2014, 06:12 PM
 
3,434 posts, read 3,919,561 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mrgmrg View Post
We'll have to disagree. I look at the big picture, and I see two cities that have been embarrassments for decades. New Haven is only in the last 5 years or so beginning to right the ship--and has struggled mightily against the "improvements" wrought by urban renewal, which have impeded its ability to become a city of the 21st century. Hartford is struggling, at best. Stamford is doing well, but it's not analogous to the rest of the state because the influence of the wealth from NYC and FFC. And Stamford's renewal is not on the same scale as the projects of the 50s and 60s, in terms of literally reshaping entire cities, building highways, etc.
New Haven has been on the upswing for way longer than 5 years, more like 15 + years. The city reached its nadir in the late 80s and early 90s. The catalyst was the murder of Yale student Christian Prince in 1991. It forced Yale to face the reality that New Haven was decaying rapidly and that it was in Yale's interest to bring New Haven back from the precipice (it's hard to get students to enroll if they think they may be killed in cold blood on campus). By the late 90s the city was beginning to undergo a renaissance, due largely to the school's efforts. DeStefano deserves credit too, mostly for stepping back and letting Yale take the lead.

Hartford lacks a private sector parter like Yale to make its redevelopment work well. There is only so much the state or city can do (i.e. money). That's why Hartford has had lots of big plans but little to show for it. Who are the private stakeholders in Hartford? The insurance companies don't care (they'll just move to a campus in Bloomfield or Windsor). Law firms? Accounting firms? I just don't see it.
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Old 01-28-2014, 09:44 AM
 
Location: Connecticut
34,763 posts, read 56,596,486 times
Reputation: 11174
Quote:
Originally Posted by mrgmrg View Post
We'll have to disagree. I look at the big picture, and I see two cities that have been embarrassments for decades. New Haven is only in the last 5 years or so beginning to right the ship--and has struggled mightily against the "improvements" wrought by urban renewal, which have impeded its ability to become a city of the 21st century. Hartford is struggling, at best. Stamford is doing well, but it's not analogous to the rest of the state because the influence of the wealth from NYC and FFC. And Stamford's renewal is not on the same scale as the projects of the 50s and 60s, in terms of literally reshaping entire cities, building highways, etc.
You are looking at it from a different point in time and from a totally different point of view than people from that time. They were building a city of the 20th Century and were trying hard to stem the mighty push to the suburbs that was so strong back then. They had to do things that would appeal to the people at that time which meant they had to accomodate cars with parking and highways. What do you think these cities would be like if they did absolutely nothing? They would be a total wreck with even more poverty and crime.

Also you can tell that you did not know Stamford from before the 1970's. Virtually all of what is downtown today was part of an urban renewal effort. All the large office, retail and residential buildings along Tresser Boulevard and Broad Street were urban renewal parcels dating back to the 1960's. Jay
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Old 01-28-2014, 09:52 AM
 
Location: Connecticut
34,763 posts, read 56,596,486 times
Reputation: 11174
Quote:
Originally Posted by mrgmrg View Post
The routing of 95 was and is an absolute travesty, and unfortunately will be for the foreseeable future. That's a great example of a glaringly poor decision that is honestly dumbfounding and continues to plague this state.
So where would you have put I-95? Would you have run it through the countryside areas that were not developed at the time and that are now nice quiet neighborhoods? Would you have run it outside the city centers so there would be no access to them? Would you have run the highway away from the business and factories that was where thousands of commuters worked?

It is easy to try and second guess decisions made but Connecticut put I-95 (back then called the Connecticut Turnpike) in what was the best location they could. In Stamford it went south of the downtown area. In Bridgeport it went through an industrial zone and south of downtown. In New Haven it was placed outside the downtown in unused mashland that was later filled and developed and built a secondary highway into the core of the city (Route 34, aka the Oak Street Connnector). Jay
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Old 01-28-2014, 10:43 AM
 
468 posts, read 705,636 times
Reputation: 229
I'd have built 95 "above" the cities, not "below" or through the middle of them, as it is now, dividing cities in half and cutting off access, both visually and practically, to the water. Very simple, actually. I don't think building a highway on the water was the best location by any means. Aside from the aesthetic and development issues, having a major highway located adjacent to wetlands/water or in the middle of a city makes expansion extraordinarily difficult. Whereas if someone seriously wanted to expand the Merritt, it would in large part be possible, since it's (largely) not located on unbuildable land or in the midst of hundred-million dollar high-rise buildings.

At the risk of repeating myself, it's not second-guessing to examine the decisions of the past to figure out how not to repeat the same mistakes--it is the single best way to learn how to move forward.
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Old 01-28-2014, 11:07 AM
 
Location: Connecticut
34,763 posts, read 56,596,486 times
Reputation: 11174
Quote:
Originally Posted by mrgmrg View Post
I'd have built 95 "above" the cities, not "below" or through the middle of them, as it is now, dividing cities in half and cutting off access, both visually and practically, to the water. Very simple, actually. I don't think building a highway on the water was the best location by any means. Aside from the aesthetic and development issues, having a major highway located adjacent to wetlands/water or in the middle of a city makes expansion extraordinarily difficult. Whereas if someone seriously wanted to expand the Merritt, it would in large part be possible, since it's (largely) not located on unbuildable land or in the midst of hundred-million dollar high-rise buildings.

At the risk of repeating myself, it's not second-guessing to examine the decisions of the past to figure out how not to repeat the same mistakes--it is the single best way to learn how to move forward.
So you would have built it along the Merritt Parkway which goes through some of the pricest and most sensitive land in the area? I cannot imagine how that would have served tyhe core of the population back then. Again it is easy to say I would have done it differently but different routes were considered and dismissed because of impacts that route would have caused. Jay
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Old 01-29-2014, 06:55 PM
 
Location: Miami, FL
79 posts, read 111,357 times
Reputation: 118
It's too bad that they built highways through Hartford instead of around it. I went to university in Vancouver and apparently there were plans to build highways through the city to make downtown more "accessible". Below is a map of what was planned.

http://bc.transport2000.ca/learning/...eeway_plan.gif

Historic Chinatown which was considered seedy would have been destroyed (like Front Street). Also the beautiful waterfront of downtown would have been just highways (like Hartford's riverfront). In the end they didn't build them and the effect is that the closer you get to downtown or transit lines, the more the property value increases. Living in the exurbs or far off suburbs is not a viable option, simply because the commute would be too lengthy.
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Old 01-30-2014, 10:19 AM
 
Location: Connecticut
34,763 posts, read 56,596,486 times
Reputation: 11174
Quote:
Originally Posted by paul1981 View Post
It's too bad that they built highways through Hartford instead of around it. I went to university in Vancouver and apparently there were plans to build highways through the city to make downtown more "accessible". Below is a map of what was planned.

http://bc.transport2000.ca/learning/...eeway_plan.gif

Historic Chinatown which was considered seedy would have been destroyed (like Front Street). Also the beautiful waterfront of downtown would have been just highways (like Hartford's riverfront). In the end they didn't build them and the effect is that the closer you get to downtown or transit lines, the more the property value increases. Living in the exurbs or far off suburbs is not a viable option, simply because the commute would be too lengthy.
The difference would likely have been that Hartofrd's major employers would have relocated out of the city center if there were no highways into downtown. That trend started long before I-84 or I-91 was built. Jay
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