Life after landfill

[MadVlad]

Date: Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Time: 5:30pm - 8:00pm

Location: Hartford Public Library - Main Branch

550 Main Street

Councilman Luis Cotto asked that I pass this along(from his Facebook site):

"On December 31, 2008, the Hartford Landfill stopped accepting all trash. Work is presently underway to close the landfill and to ready it for a new use.

The Mayor has appointed a Landfill Advisory Committee which is charged with making recommendations on the future use of the landfill. The Committee wants to hear your ideas for the future of this important piece of land at the entrance to Hartford. Please attend and share your thoughts with the Committee."

I can't make it, and I know we had a thread here regarding that parcel, but I can't seem to find it. If I recall, that thread had some awesome ideas regarding that land. So, for those that can't go, let's post some ideas for the landfill here and maybe if someone goes they can write down all the ideas and pass them along.

[drc72]

A park or maybe a small sports facility, track, baseball field.....

[The Voice of Reason]

I made this post in this thread

http://www.urbanplanet.org/forums/PROGRESS...l=hartford+dump

So, here is a question. in your opinion is the kind of seperated quasi gated quasi suburban development represented in Park Place viable in Hartford?

I know park place was supposed to be 3x as big, and I could see more development happening there still some day, but looking at a map made me think.

Asking this because I-91 seperates the city from its waterfront, but in one small place this is almost a good thing.

Up on jennings road where the police HQ currently sits, there is a relatively small chunk of land up there right on the river. this chunk of land is not really desirable at face value, but if you concider that the dump is now closed and could easily be concidered a hilly park. or easily turned into a hilly park. the river is the river, so thats a plus, and its seperate from the north end because of the highway. You got a few low density warehouse/industrial properties over there, the soon to be old police HQ buildings, and one fairly modern warehouse. as best I can tell the most valuable thing there, ot maybe the only valuable thing there is the warehouse.

could a park place type development work on this waterfront land?

it is Dump/park to the north, River to the East, and Park/boathouse to the South. I-91 to the West

Mind you the other use I see for this land after the police leave would be for I-91 to bend and cross the river connecting to E-Hartfords Highway interchange and allow for I-91 to be removed from downtown Hartford.

[Bill Mocarsky]

We should be thinking beyond the landfill site.

I feel we should be looking at how this area would dovetail with Riverside Park, downtown and even Windsor.

Would there be any excuse for not striving to transform this area into an attractive riverfront neighborhood? We can't blame I-91 for cutting it off from the river. How about "North River Drive"?

[The Voice of Reason]

I agree Bill. I will be at the meeting as best I can tell at this point, so if there are any other ideas, please post them right away.

I am not sure how much I will check back here before the end of work.

EDIT-(trying to brainstorm on my lunch)

Lots of cities have low/midrise developments along the river either just north or Just South of downtown.

Minneapolis has a huge area of fairly new townhomes along the water.

Baltimore has a bunch in Fells point and Canton (there are also highrises going in now too)

clearly this is a way that people like to take up residence.

If all of the land East of 91 were to be used at a higher level, what would we have?

Obviously you cant live on top of a dump, but a park with an observation tower or some other kind of "tourist attraction" up top for views.

a large amount of previously industrial land would need to be cleaned and cleared and a master planned community would be developed.

I am seeing pretty much just the one big warehouse/distribution center as the only high use property. This building would eventually need to be revoved to make this area a success, but as the nothern area were developed, it could function as normal. North of the landfill is an area of land well suited as a marina with room for some residential units on the safe side of the dike. There is a "pond" that could be incorporated into the master plan after cleanup as well.

There is a simularly situates master planned community in Portland, OR. I think its salled the south waterfront.

they went with highrise leed certified buildings. there are something like 6 built almost all at once. Many of the projects stalled due to the econemy, but it is a very interesting development. I there is a ton of info about it at skyscraperpage.com

Do I think there is the demand for highrise development here? not so much, but I do think there could be some serious development here that would be absolutely unique to the area. Think about it, where along the ct river is there modern waterfront housing? where is there immediate boat access? and where is there city access, and where is it next to a park, and a major highway onramp.

This is Hartfords "steel point"

[The Voice of Reason]

It seems most people are interested in making this some kind of park.

thats fine with me, but its a bit of a hot button issue here. one camp says build me a park, the other half says we need to build something that can financially support itself and maybe even help the city as well. these people also seem to want a park or some public space.

So these were some of the ideas

forest

lookout park

greenhouses (commercial)

tree farm/nursery (commercial, but also green sapce

massive solar power plant

"Hartford" sign planted into base of mountain as a welcome to the city

sports fields on the smaller ash pile(6 acres)

public gardens

a tent city for homeless people with communal farms to help feed them (I kid you not)

The ash pile will not settle, but the main hill will settle over the next 10 or so years as it composts. during this time they will be retrieving methane commercially. The city has a contract for this and is making a share of the money off it. aparentley it can support something like 1700 homes.

I do not know if anyone else was there, but there was good attendance including a bunch of college? students.

[MichaelQReilly]

It seems most people are interested in making this some kind of park.

thats fine with me, but its a bit of a hot button issue here. one camp says build me a park, the other half says we need to build something that can financially support itself and maybe even help the city as well. these people also seem to want a park or some public space.

So these were some of the ideas

forest

lookout park

greenhouses (commercial)

tree farm/nursery (commercial, but also green sapce

massive solar power plant

"Hartford" sign planted into base of mountain as a welcome to the city

sports fields on the smaller ash pile(6 acres)

public gardens

a tent city for homeless people with communal farms to help feed them (I kid you not)

The ash pile will not settle, but the main hill will settle over the next 10 or so years as it composts. during this time they will be retrieving methane commercially. The city has a contract for this and is making a share of the money off it. aparentley it can support something like 1700 homes.

I do not know if anyone else was there, but there was good attendance including a bunch of college? students.