The Town of West Hartford held a project update meeting on the West Hartford Center streetscape improvement plan on Wednesday.
The overall goal for town officials is to make things safer and more convenient for West Hartford’s residents, businesses, and visitors.
Wednesday's meeting was to allow the public to review design options for improvements to LaSalle Road and Farmington Avenue. Town officials said the renderings were drawn up based on feedback received from the community at previous meetings.
Community members including business owners, workers, and residents had a lot of questions at Wednesday’s meeting. Some of their concerns were about the price tag of the project and where the money would come from.
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Duane Martin, West Hartford’s Director of Community Development, said the money would come from American Rescue Plan Funds (ARPA) and it was not clear yet how much the project would cost since decisions on what is being done had not been made yet. With each option shown to the public, the price tag went up or down.
“To make a choice without knowing what the impact is doesn’t make any sense at all. The people that have businesses in WH center, the people that own properties in WH center, we need to know what the impact is going to be before we can give you any real feedback,” a business owner said during the meeting.
Options shown to the public in renderings included sidewalks, parallel or diagonal parking options, outside restaurant space, bike lanes, potential street expansion, and space for trees.
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Here are a couple of other things the community learned:
No construction will happen in 2024. There will be multiple pre-construction meetings then a contractor will be chosen and there will be meetings with the construction company.
The construction will happen in phases.
This will lessen the impact of the road work on businesses and residents trying get to work and home. Construction workers will do as much of the work at night as possible.
Parking and safety were also hot topics during the meeting. Many residents talked about the difficulty of safely backing out of parking spots. Workers also brought up the dangers of walking in the town center because of drivers speeding through.
Martin said the next step is to hear more feedback from those who could not attend.
You can find the information and see the plan options online here.
