Bedbugs led New Haven officials to close seating at Union Station

NEW HAVEN — City officials said the seating area at Union Station has reopened after bedbugs forced their closure, prompting them to increase the frequency of thorough cleaning for the station in the next three months.

The New Haven Parking Authority was alerted to a “potential” bedbug problem at the station over the weekend, said Doug Hausladen, the parking authority’s executive director.

“In response, we contacted the health department immediately to seek guidance,” he said Tuesday. “We did not allow seating in the station out of extreme caution and professionally treated and cleaned the areas affected, resulting in the seating area being reopened on Tuesday morning in time for the morning rush hour.”

The station serves as a major crossroad, with service to New York City along the Metro-North rail system and up to Springfield on the Amtrak Hartford line, as well as other destinations in New England.

“Union Station is the tenth busiest Amtrak station in the country, with millions of travelers passing to and through the train station annually,” Mayor Justin Elicker said in a statement. “That’s a lot of people, and with that amount of volume, incidents of this nature are bound to happen on occasion – and, when they do, the New Haven Parking Authority takes them very seriously and addresses them immediately.”

The Parking Authority director said in a followup phone interview the bedbugs probably came from “one of the millions of passengers” that brought the bugs with them. He said the security guard alerted the station management team, who began the exterminating and cleaning process immediately after.

Hausladen said the team only found bedbugs in one particular spot but needed to close the whole seating area down “out of extreme caution.”

“We were working in partnership with directives from the health department, and overall the health department thought that with the surfaces being hard surfaces, there’s a low risk for transmission, and there’s a low risk for continued issues,” he said.

In response to the situation, Hausladen said the team will try to inspect the problem over the coming months to see if the bedbugs come back. A thorough cleaning of the station will be done every four weeks for the next three months instead of every six weeks.

“From there, we’ve also asked our pest contractor to monitor as well on a more frequent basis,” Hausladen said.

The tiny bugs often live in mattresses, couch cushions or tucked away places, typically emerging to feed on the blood of people or other mammals at night, according to the Environmental Protection

Agency. An infestation is often identified when people find tiny dot stains in bedding or other fabric from the bugs’ waste.

The insect’s bites are not known to transmit disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but they can lead to upset sleep and itchy or painful skin.

“Thankfully, all seating areas and floors on the premises are hard surfaces like wood, tile, and stone, and so issues of this nature are much easier to address and abate in a place like Union Station, Elicker said.

“The Parking Authority conducted multiple treatments and will continue to monitor the premises accordingly,” he added.

Chatwan Mongkol/Hearst Connecticut Media The seating area at Union Station in New Haven has been reopened after discovery of bedbugs prompted its closure.