I've been reading Arch Boston for years. Finally decided to register. Thanks for sharing my Hartford Development FB group.Clearly the above pictures did not "jump start" a thread that just doesn't have much going for it. However, it doesn't have NOTHING going for it, so here's a bit I found.
First, there's a Hartford Development facebook page that you can browse, whether or not you actually have a facebook account.
Hartford Development | Facebook
This is a group dedicated to discussing developments happening and proposed in Hartford. Here we can post our news about developments happening, developments proposed, and developments we want to...www.facebook.com
The main project going on right now is the DoNo development, surrounding Dunkin Donuts Park. (looks like that's a baseball field for a minor league team)
https://www.hartfordbusiness.com/article/hartfords-250m-dono-development-nears-groundbreaking
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Long-awaited launch of development around Hartford’s Dunkin' Donuts Park cheered in Thursday’s groundbreaking
The city of Hartford and its developer Thursday celebrated the start of construction of apartments, restaurant and entertainment space and parking around Dunkin' Donuts Park.www.courant.com
Hartford CT
- Thread starter Arlington
- Start date
Lots of varying opinions on this pro and con
Is it time to close Hartford’s Brainard Airport? Some see major development opportunity in 100-year-old airfield in the city. - Hartford Courant
Is it time to close Hartford’s Brainard Airport? Some see major development opportunity in 100-year-old airfield in the city. - Hartford Courant
F-Line to Dudley
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It employs 360 people, and makes $45M in annual revenues. And it serves a corporate executive jet audience that the city's Insurance industry titans overtly say makes keeping corporate HQ in town more convenient...where the loss of the airport literally down the street from HQ would make them more open to exploring relocation. I very much doubt with how much undeveloped/underdeveloped land is still in the City that they are capable of coming up with anything better/grander than current use. Or that they won't wilt yet again when the Insurance CEO's tell them that Brainard's proximity makes the City 'stickier' for keeping HQ. This is a repeat of every study done 10 years, 20 years, 30 years....60 years ago. Not a single original idea to be had in that City Hall, Bronin merely the latest to fall for the shiny-ball syndrome of doing a study. The fact that the airport's actual owner, the Connecticut Redevelopment Authority, doesn't ever say boo about the...uhhh...."redev" potential is because they know it fills out its balance sheet quite nicely and trusting the locals with execution on something better is a fool's errand. It's always a Mayor's Office shiny-ball syndrome thing pushing to tear it up, not the people with an actual economic understanding of the site usage.
Another study would, without question, simply reaffirm the results of the last one and say: "Maximize its AIRPORT value, damnit, and stop falling prey to lazy distractions!!!" As is, this seems to be driven by NIMBY trojan horse of mostly Wethersfield residents bitching about another round of routine tree-trimming on the landing approach. You really think they're going to allow honest-to-god density to sprout up instead when that's their boredom tactic now on current land usage??? Jeez...this was a tiresome kick-the-can topic back when I was growing up there 25 years ago. Back then it was Mayor Mike and the circular firing squad on that Council amplifying the NIMBY gripes. The names change; the short-attention span theatre never does.
Maybe they would've had a leg to stand on if Brainard was the city airport that went, and much bigger-capacity Rentschler across the river were the keep. But they already squandered that one for "FOOT-BALL!!!! UNGH-UNGH!!!!" and chasing the spectacular corruption of NCAA Div I. But that ship sailed, and the better of the two airstrips is now half-assing it in sprawlsville. I fully expect Bronin to claim he's got a mystery NHL team gunning to relocate and that would be the perfect place to put a public-funded arena for the Nü-Whalers, since they probably can't perceive reality outside of a self-imposed Rentschler + DD Park box.
Only tangentially related, but Hartford-Brainerd would be an excellent location for a Cleveland-like airport IndyCar race. Hartford's the type of city that would benefit from an event like that, and having an urban airport to run the race on makes it an easier sell as they aren't tying up city streets for construction for 2 months.
Another thing that never changes is Hartford's crushingly punitive CRE tax levy relative to peer cities in New England. Boston, of course, has the envious privilege of being able to set its rate pretty damn low, $26 per $1,000 or whatever it is these days, because its assessed values are so relatively astronomically high. But everyone else--Providence, Hartford, Springfield, Portland, Manchester, Worcester--is at least in the same ballpark, in the $30s per $1,000... then there's Hartford: $74.29 per $1,000. Plot that on a Bell Curve distribution with all the other NE cities--oh wait, you can't, because it's basically off around Pluto, when everyone else is operating in the Mars/Mercury/Venus/Earth range.The names change; the short-attention span theatre never does.
No matter where you are on the food chain in the regional economy, if you're making relocation/expansion/development decisions, and you're looking at all those cities, and all variables, and costs count (which they do for everyone), I don't see how that insanely high levy compared to the others doesn't hurt Hartford, over and over again. But the most powerful force in the universe is inertia.
Current Bushnell South Master Plan
2 more vacant buildings to be converted to apartments.
Hartford’s historic former firehouse and city offices near Bushnell Park are being converted into apartments, and work could get started as soon as early next year - Hartford Courant
Hartford’s historic former firehouse and city offices near Bushnell Park are being converted into apartments, and work could get started as soon as early next year - Hartford Courant
Massachoicetts
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Some views of Hartford, today around 430pm
Attachments
Portlander
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I've always had and still do have a lot of respect for Hartford. Never thought I'd see the day where it would fall to the 8th largest city (2020 census) in New England and even more surprising it being only the 4th largest city in Connecticut. But I also never envisioned Huntsville surpassing Birmingham as Alabama's biggest which is why metropolitan (MSA) populations are a more accurate way to determine a city's true stature and relevance.
Unfortunately the downtown is as lame as a typical southern city and not on par with most of the northeast. 2 things really did it in. First was the highways cutting off downtown from neighborhoods. However, probably even worse was the 1980's recession. There were plans for a whopping 4 towers 700'+, with 2 of them even topping the Hancock at 800'+. Much of the existing downtown was razed to make was for these new towers, which were then all cancelled once the recession hit. Thus instead of a gleaming new city full of 80's inspiration, it was left with piles of rubble and has never recovered.
Portlander
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Cutter Financial Center would have been the tallest building in New England by 100 feet!
New England Born & Raised
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Hartford has pretty much been propped up by the large number of white collar jobs in the downtown these last several decades. Much of the upper and middle class stopped living there some 50 years ago escaping to the suburbs around it. That has created today's Hartford which has a very large percent of poor residents. With the work from home models recently adopted due to Covid, especially in the white collar office sector, the city's over dependence on day time workers is very much in jeopardy. It will not be able to rely on the business community for growth and new taxes. It will have to make itself more attractive to live there. If not, it will further stagnate and decline.
Stamford went from 8th in New England to 6th. That probably has more to do with it's proximity to NYC than anything else.
CT as a whole is on the decline. Fairfield County has a chance of defying it but it's fortunes really rely on NYC, even if the whole point of living/working there is to be close to NYC without paying NY taxes.
dhawkins
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That is a fantastic Pedestrian bridge in the foreground. I did a little research and found that it stretches the river and is part of a cool grassroots effort from the 80s to get folks on to the river paths squeezed between the highway and the river.
Riverfront Recapture
Yeah, I was living and working in the hartford area....30+ years of my life in CT and I had to get the heck out in 2017
Hartford is a dump, and I don't find any humor in that. I'm old enough to remember when it was flying high back in the mid 80's. But like CT and RI as a whole, there's no reason for businesses to locate there instead of neighboring MA and NY. Connecticut isn't that much cheaper than it's neighbors and it's constantly in economic distress. Aside from the areas within commuting distance as a poster already mentioned I don't see how this gets turned around anytime soon.
Unpopular opinion I guess but I moved to Hartford in 2017, lived there for a year (near the Mark Twain museum) and loved it. What's dumpy about it? I only moved after I split with my then partner (and moved to Goshen, if you want dump check out rural CT)
In my 10 year experience of living in CT, when people say a place is a dump they tend to mean minorities live there.