Beach Street project gets gala opening

By MICHAEL P. WALSH

Public Relations Information Coordinator

With more than 100 people looking on, Mayor Dorinda Borer cut a “Westie blue” ribbon suspended across Beach Street on Friday evening to mark the grand reopening of the shoreline road after a yearlong state-bonded road-raising project.

A half-hour before the ribbon-cutting, a slate of speakers, including Borer, Gov. Ned Lamont’s chief of staff, Jonathan Dach, and members of the Sandy Point Neighborhood Association, commemorated the occasion at the Sandy Point Beach & Bird Sanctuary near Second Avenue with testimonials praising the many people who helped bring the years-in-the-making project to fruition.

In her opening remarks, Borer told those gathered that the road raising spanned three administrations and thanked former Mayors Nancy R. Rossi and Edward M. O’Brien for helping to shepherd the project. Borer also thanked the city’s state and federal delegations for securing the funding.

“In addition to coastal resiliency, building a beautiful corridor, we also took the opportunity with the funding to build a platform that not only provides vehicle safety but pedestrian safety, cycling safety as well,” said Borer, who was joined by West Haven state representatives, City Council members and other city leaders, along with Board of Education, police and fire officials.

Borer continued: “We’ve added speed humps, signs, widened the bike lane, and put in aesthetics to make the project something that those from around the state would want to visit.

“Today we’re standing in a section that we can all be very, very proud of. And in West Haven, we are a very proud community. I want to take the opportunity to thank all the residents for your patience during this project, and I know that all good things come to those who wait.”

Deputy Chief William S. Johnson IV of the West Haven Fire Department followed by speaking about the hazards first responders faced on Beach Street during Tropical Storm Irene in August 2011 and Superstorm Sandy in October 2012.

Councilwoman Michelle Coletti, D-2, a co-founder of the nonprofit Sandy Point association who served as its inaugural president in 2021-23, talked about her positive working relationship with the city to solve the neighborhood’s coastal challenges and improve its quality of life.

Councilwoman Meli Garthwait, R-at large, who like Coletti represents the Beach Street district, also spoke, along with association co-founder and former Assistant City Planner Dave Killeen and President Kathie Hebert, who chairs the association’s Beautification Committee.

Garthwait thanked project contractor Laydon Industries LLC, Killeen talked about the project’s design elements to protect the waterfront, and Hebert discussed how the project drove the Sandy Point association’s formation.

Christopher Marone, a principal of CDM Holdings LLC, which owns the former Chick’s Drive-in restaurant property and is developing the site at 183 Beach St., talked about The Tides, the company’s new townhome condominiums, and its plans for a new restaurant, complete with a beer garden, a courtyard and firepits.

As Marone spoke, an excited Borer and CDM principal Michael Del Vecchio held up the restaurant’s preliminary renderings for all to see.

Borer then introduced Dach, who called West Haven’s 3 ½ miles of publicly accessible shoreline “Connecticut’s best public beach” and “a hidden gem of the state’s shoreline” to enthusiastic applause from the crowd.

“Keep your shades on because this is only the beginning,” said Dach, referring to the city’s promising future.

With a line of people standing behind the mayor and Rossi and O’Brien flanking her, Borer led the crowd in a spirited countdown — “1, 2, 3!” — before cutting the ribbon with a pair of oversize scissors.

Once the ribbon fell to the pavement, Borer took the crowd for a short community walk across the road to the newly paved Morse Park municipal parking lot, where a DJ played music and dessert trucks served complimentary coffee, “cakecups” and ice cream.

After the ceremony, the picturesque shoreline road officially reopened to vehicular and pedestrian traffic for the first time since May 2023.

The freshly paved and landscaped road includes new concrete sidewalks, wooden roll fencing and wooden guardrails, as well as new concrete stairs, concrete handicapped-accessible ramps and wooden pedestrian bridges so people can access beach areas.

The road also features a new crosswalk of stamped concrete that resembles red brick pavers in three spots: near Morse Avenue, in front of Morse Park and near Second Avenue.

Other improvements include a paved two-way bike lane beautified with newly planted seagrass on the beach side of the road and a graveled parking lot decorated with wooden flower boxes at Sandy Point.

The Beach Street improvements are complemented by new paving, lighting and fencing at the April Street boat launch and parking lot, just up the road near First Avenue.

Like all other beach lots in West Haven, the boat launch is now a Premium Parking “Pay for Parking” site for nonresidents. Parking is free for city residents.

Premium Parking, based in New Orleans, is West Haven’s contractor for digitally driven paid parking.

According to City Engineer Abdul Quadir, the two-phase Beach Street project consisted of raising an approximately 3,900-foot stretch of the road.

Phase 2 consisted of raising a section of Beach Street up to 11 feet above sea level, from the Water Pollution Control Plant at 2 Beach St. to Morse Avenue, to protect the area’s flood-prone neighborhoods.

Safety improvements were implemented because of the road’s change in width to restrict flooding, including the installation of speed humps to slow traffic and the posting of signs to reduce the speed limit from 30 mph to 25 mph, per the Board of Police Commissioners.

Borer said the finished project has also spurred interest in economic development along the vibrant Beach Street corridor.

In May 2020, Borer, then a West Haven Democratic state representative, announced $5.2 million in state funding for Phase 2. At the time, the money joined $3.5 million in federal and local funding for Phase 1, including $2.94 million from the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery program and $560,000 from the city.

Former state Rep. Stephen D. Dargan, D-West Haven, obtained $1.5 million in state funding for Phase 1, which was completed in 2021 and raised Beach Street up to 7 feet from Monahan Place to the wastewater treatment plant. Like Phase 2, the project included new concrete sidewalks, wooden guardrails and a two-way bike lane on the beach side.

Just over a decade ago, the area, including more than two dozen homes, was 5 feet underwater during Superstorm Sandy, city officials said.

On Oct. 29, 2012, the treatment plant was inaccessible to staff members and emergency vehicles for nearly 12 hours due to extensive flooding from Sandy.

Thanks to federal and state funding to help Connecticut municipalities mitigate flooding in the wake of the superstorm, the city has taken steps to make its shoreline more resilient to tidal flooding and coastal storms, including dredging the Old Field Creek salt marsh off Beach Street and installing a new tide gate system on the Cove River.

According to Borer, future Beach Street improvements are also in the works, including a new Cape Cod-designed pumping station near East Avenue.

The $4 million project will include major infrastructure upgrades, as well as an adjacent building with public bathrooms and showers.

A rendering of the project was on display at the ribbon-cutting. Construction is expected to begin in spring 2025.