NORWALK, Conn. – A potential scandal was avoided Monday in Norwalk when no one broadsided Mayor Harry Rilling.
“I came up Elizabeth (Street),” Rilling said. “The way cars were parked, some of my sight lines were blocked. I thought I was going to get broadsided at my first Police Commission meeting, and guess who’s fault it would have been?”
The former Norwalk Police Chief got the laughs he was looking for from the new Traffic Commission, Department of Public Works Director Hal Alvord and Norwalk Police Chief Thomas Kulhawik as they discussed two potential traffic changes that Rilling has had on his mind.
Rilling has proposed reversing the one-way directions of Elizabeth Street and Haviland Street in SoNo, where the police station is, and putting an all-way stop at the intersection of Scribner Avenue, West Cedar Street and the Best Buy driveway. The former would also involve taking out the diverter island in the Best Buy driveway.
Alvord told him that would probably require a traffic light, at a minimum cost of $200,000.
“I’m going to have to think hard on that one now,” Rilling said.
He said making Haviland and Elizabeth both one way should have been considered when the police station was built.
Southbound drivers who would like to turn left onto Haviland Street are often frustrated because cars are blocking the intersection, he said, thereby blocking traffic to North Main Street. Drivers trying to leave the police station parking lot onto South Main Street have to turn left or right and cannot go straight, he said.
“I thought making Elizabeth Street one way towards the water and Haviland Street one way towards South Main might alleviate some of those problems,” he said.
Alvord said reversing the direction would be easy but there are ramifications.
The parking angle on Elizabeth would have to be reversed, and there are issues with the turning radius of tractor trailers coming out of the street now, he said. The entrance for the Haviland Street parking deck is slanted in the direction that cars go in now, he said. Parking spaces could be lost on South Main Street, depending how the turning radius of trucks work out.
He said there might be other solutions to the problem, like a “block the box.”
“The only thing that would do is cause more problems for the police department, I imagine,” Rilling said.
Alvord said he was suggesting, not advocating.
“We get residents who would want us to do it all over the city,” he said. “They say it works great in New York City and yes it does, because there’s a police officer standing there with a ticket book three out of five days a week. So that would create another demand on police department resources.”
Alvord said the idea would be studied, as well as the Scribner Avenue idea.
In other news:
• The Traffic Commission approved on-street metered parking in the area of the Waypointe development under construction and on North Water Street, where Sono Ironworks is being built.
The latter is for seven new spaces.
Commissioner Charlie Yost asked about the curbs at 20 North Water St., saying they are “way out into the roadway.”
Alvord said the curbs and the catch basins are a foot too high due to a miscommunication between the developer and the contractor. The building was raised a foot when the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) changed the flood plain elevation requirements. “The contractor put them in thinking the original plan was what they were going to do,” Alvord said. It will all be adjusted.
The curbs will be pushed back two feet to make room for parking and normal-size travel lanes, he said.
That was unanimously approved, as was the on-street parking for Waypointe, where the plan is to have up to 16 parking spaces on Orchard Street and nine parking spaces on the north side of Merwin Street.
This is in addition to the parking garage being built. Alvord said the idea is to encourage shoppers to go to the retail stores that will be on the bottom level of Waypointe.
The commission also discussed other improvements.
• An all-way stop was put in at Meadow, South Main and Wilson Streets, on Route 136, Alvord said. This was requested from the state nearly two years ago, he said.
“It actually is a lot safer,” Alvord said.
• A stop sign has been requested for Newtown Avenue and Chestnut Hill Road.
• The city is asking the state for street parking modifications for Main Avenue.
This is in the area of a popular Venezuelan restaurant, Alvord said. Rilling asked that the ingress and egress from the Duchess parking lot also be considered, as the restaurant’s owner had spoken to him.
• An all-way stop sign is being considered for West Cedar Street at Colonial Village, where the Norwalk Housing Authority is building a new community center, Alvord said. This would be just north of Price Avenue, dependent upon where the NHA is putting its new driveway, he said.
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