They’ve got it all backwards.
And so, the drama surrounding how to redevelop the abandoned UConn campus continues.
There was a chance to reduce travel lanes on Trout Brook Drive, improve street lighting, and install proper sidewalks on both side of the road so that existing area residents could have safe and dignified connection to existing stores, parks, and schools. They could have created bump-outs and addressed the lack of safe mid-block crossings on the 0.6 mile stretch of Trout Brook Drive between Asylum Avenue and Albany Avenue; previously, there was one by the former campus, but the Town’s lack of vision involved removing that signalized crossing when the school left — effectively disconnecting the park from many residents.
They could have addressed walkability and then invited developers to work with this in mind. Instead, what they’ve done is ask developers to try dictating how the town should look. The frustrating backlash? They walked into that. They walked into that like one walks into a hole on a poorly lit, sidewalk-deprived section of Trout Brook Drive.
Had they the guts to prioritize safety and strive for actual village charm, they would be receiving less bonkers pitches. These might look like a modest number of townhouses within walking distance of the existing multiple grocery stores — The Crown, Whole Foods, Big Y, and Target — in the neighborhood. There is a need for housing, yet that does not mean automatically accepting whatever plans get pitched.
Sit that capitalism in the corner for a time out. More retail, including grocery stores, is not what any part of West Hartford needs. Walk around the Center/Blue Back, around the mall, New Britain Avenue, Park Road . . . it’s not a ghost down for retail, but there’s nothing to suggest that more is needed or would serve any purpose beyond to claim more was added. There are vacant storefronts as it is.
Those who aren’t following along closely are hearing from West Hartford’s decision-makers that they really and truly care about the safety of its road users, but the town is allowing new drive-thru businesses to be built. As published by CNN: “Magnets of traffic and congestion, drive-thrus discourage walking, public transit use and visits to neighboring businesses. They also lead to [crashes] with pedestrians, cyclists and other cars, and contradict the environmental and livability goals of many communities.” It does not matter what those decision-makers claim when invited to a pedestrian’s vigil that becomes a press conference those decision-makers did not even have to plan themselves. Actions speak loudest, and some of us are listening to the untethered development happening at 433 South Main Street. We’re listening to the town’s choice to drag its feet on improving street lighting in areas where pedestrians are frequently known to be, with a decision-maker recently passing the buck by saying out loud that pedestrians should use phone lights to be more visible on West Hartford’s poorly lit roadways. We’re listening to a so-called West Hartford Vision Zero Plan 2024 that claims the Town of West Hartford is “committed to eliminating roadway deaths and serious injuries by 2033,” while the plan contains no actual directives; there’s a lot of analysis and blah blah blah in the plan, but the “action plan” itself does not even appear until the appendix, and neither that nor the Vision Zero Focus Area Segment List (also in appendix) contains specific concrete steps or language to indicate that these moves are mandatory. West Hartford’s Vision Zero Plan is just vibes.
There is, allegedly, a plan that details what is to happen where. Residents kept telling me about it, but after scouring the West Hartford Vision Zero Plan 2024 multiple times it would not reveal itself to me. That’s because, for reasons unknown to me, that information is not included in the plan itself. It exists separately, as a map, and even from that what’s provided is unclear. This exists as a West Hartford Vision Zero Projects page, which is a map. For a moment, I thought “This is it! This is the document that will show West Hartford’s decision-makers to be serious.”
It wasn’t.
A fresh raised crosswalk was recently added to a section of Fern Street which was ranked lowest priority. It’s not a high-injury area nor is it a Transportation Equity Zone nor have any pedestrians or cyclists been injured there in recent years. Sure, it’s a nice addition to a street that’s hard to cross because of few marked crosswalks and people choosing to park in the paint-only bike lane, obstructing views of oncoming cars being driven way too fast down a hill next to a school, but it makes you wonder why this was prioritized over addressing the design of Trout Brook Drive, where the former UConn campus lounges.
In recent years, a pedestrian and a motorcycle operator were killed in separate crashes near the UConn site on Trout Brook Drive.
There were multiple other crashes with injuries there as well.
But, over on Fern Street, there have been no fatal crashes since 2015.
Since 2015, no pedestrians or cyclists have been injured on Fern Street near the new raised crosswalk.
I checked out what had been written about the town’s Vision Zero plans; nothing about a raised crosswalk on Fern Street had made it into print. A We-Ha.com piece from August described various small tweaks being made — mostly the addition of Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacons added at some crosswalks on Boulevard, Sedgwick (at Lemay and Wardwell), Tunxis, Buena Vista, Quaker Lane South, and Fern Street. The only raised crosswalk mentioned was the first one, at the time yet-to-be-installed, on Boulevard at Wardwell.
An earlier We-Ha.com article from January 2024, mentioned that raised crosswalks for Boulevard and Fern were “being reviewed” — a noncommittal statement from the Town’s community services director. One might think that since this did not pop up again in August, that the review determined no need for the raised crosswalk.
Then, I looked at the WH VZ Projects page, last updated in late September 2024, and it showed this:
What ensued between late September and early November in West Hartford that might have expedited a raised crosswalk in an area that was otherwise low priority?
I wondered if they deleted completed items from the map, but I clicked around in other areas and saw that they had been leaving finished projects on the map with a note.
Interesting, right?
The only thing in the Morley School area was a project at Fern and Auburn: “unsignalized intersection signing upgrades” simply marked “upcoming” — no dates.
Using the same project map, I checked to see what was being done for the section of Trout Brook Drive where in recent years a pedestrian and motorist were killed:
What’s happening there? According to the map, curve warning signs for Lindy Drive are upcoming. There have been no fatal collisions or crashes with injuries on Lindy Drive in the last decade. Signs don’t cost much, and they’re just ignored anyway, but one has to wonder why this street is getting something when Lawler Road, which has seen several crashes with injuries and one fatality, is not.
According to the West Hartford Vision Zero Projects map, nothing at all is in the works for the intersection with Lawler Road, where in 2022 a motorcycle operator lost his life. At Asylum and Trout Brook where a jogger was killed in 2017, the only planned change coming: reflective traffic signal backplates; the retroreflective pavement markings and six-inch wide edge lines were already completed. This is something, like the RRFBs, the helps the motorists who are already driving with some level of mindfulness. Those who are going to race? They’re not going to care. What makes them care is when their vehicles or comfort are threatened, and this is accomplished to some degree by having features like speed humps or rumble strips. Narrowing roadways with actual physical objects, like vertical delineators, slows vehicles down. There is nothing on the project map about implementing serious technology like that.
Across town, we can see that this year no improvements have been made on the segment of Sedgwick Road where a 74-year old pedestrian was killed on Thanksgiving Eve. Most of Sedgwick is considered by the Town of West Hartford to be a High Injury Network and they ranked it as a level three priority road, with level four being top priority. A safety audit is allegedly forthcoming, and I suggest any safety audits conducted happen at night. No improvements were made on Oakwood Avenue where an 87-year old pedestrian was killed earlier this month; that is despite having a “plan” since at least September 2024 for a Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacon at the intersection with St. James Street.
And, there’s nothing at all slated for the area of Trout Brook Drive right around the former UConn site; that section of Trout Brook Drive is considered part of the High Injury Network.
This omission suggests either that in less than one year the Town of West Hartford has already fallen behind on updating the Projects map, or, that the Town has indeed chosen to continue waiting for a developer to essentially dictate what the Trout Brook Drive redesign will be, and we have to ask how many more years this will be pushed out for.
It is clear that West Hartford’s decision-makers — elected or appointed — want to be praised for what they perceive as progress, but all I can do is scratch my head. In June 2022, the Town of West Hartford via its social media outrageously offered “thoughts and prayers” following the preventable death of a pedestrian who was standing on the town green at South Main Street; there was an opportunity to immediately make meaningful, positive changes so that everyone could move around safely in public. Decision-makers have taken few measurable, concrete actions in the 2.5 years since then, and one has to wonder what they are waiting for. Between June 1, 2022 and November 30, 2024, drivers have killed six pedestrians in West Hartford.
Prioritizing people would look like doing quick-build demonstration projects while waiting on the bigger money needed for major changes, and it would look like committing to major changes in places that need these, rather than waiting on something like the development of a site that has been unused for six years and counting. It would look like Vision Zero “plans” becoming plans containing directives, and ensuring that work moves forward to address known problem areas.
