Plan should never see light at end of tunnel
The extremely poorly conceived conceptual proposal for the garage at the Stamford Transportation Center recently unveiled by Department of Transportation Commissioner James Redeker is not the solution Stamford needs. This costly and irresponsible plan is clearly a subterfuge and abjectly fails to address the desperate need for train station parking. This proposal should be completely re-thought to serve the best interests of the commuting public and the taxpayers of Connecticut.
What was presented was a $100,000,000, 960space auto commuter parking garage that, anywhere else in the northeast, would cost no more than $20,000,000. Yes, the site is challenged and difficult to develop, but it only accommodates half the present parking needed and does not account for anticipated future demand. The proposal includes a 350-feet enclosed pedestrian walkway from the garage to the train platform.
For those commuters familiar with Manhattan, that is the equivalent of approximately 1 ¾ avenue blocks, a nice addition to the morning commute. The commissioner stated the plan was worked out with cooperation and in participation with the mayor’s office.
Simultaneously, the Legislature also working with the mayor’s office, approved authorization for the city to establish a new Tax Increment Financing District, (“TIF”), to include the area around the station. Local authorization to create the district is pending before the Board of Representatives. Due the recalcitrance of the mayor’s staff to furnish requested supportive information to determine the consequences, ramifications, benefits, costs and potential loss of revenue to the city in a timely manner, a hearing on this matter has been rescheduled numerous times.
The commissioner and the mayor’s staff seem to have forgotten that the role of government in its administration is to serve the public, not some alternative agenda. They are silent as to their intentions pertaining to the replacement of the existing parking garage at the station. It is apparent that locating the garage at the station for the convenience of the commuting and traveling public is secondary to other interests. Redeker has stated as much. The commissioner and the mayor have also seem to have forgotten the very adverse and visceral reactions of commuters to the inconvenience that would have increased commuting times caused by Malloy’s previous Transportation-Oriented Development plan to move the parking away from the station.
The STC should be a strong focal point for Stamford. After Grand Central, the STC is the busiest station on MetroNorth’s New Haven Line. For many, it is the gateway to our city. As such, it should be given the importance it deserves and not developed in a hodgepodge and piecemeal manner to promote a social agenda or Transit Oriented Development schemes that ignore the responsibility of our government to serve and provide for the convenience of our commuting and traveling public.
I cannot state strongly enough that Stamford needs parking at the STC. We have a tremendous opportunity to rethink the STC as a truly comprehensive, efficient, forward-looking and physically attractive transportation center that reflects Stamford’s motto, “The City that Works.” This is an unnecessarily expensive and irresponsible proposal. There is no reason the garage should not be rebuilt where it now stands.