New Haven Independent

It’s making way for a surface parking lot — for a while.

The parking authority has hired Manafort Bros. to dig up part of the grassy median strip off Legion Avenue (the land that was cleared 40 years ago to make way for a highway that was never built) between Sherman Avenue and Tyler Street in order to build a 350-space parking lot. It will serve the construction workers building Yale-New Haven’s new cancer center.

Parking authority chief William Kilpatrick said the authority wanted to build the lot there to avoid worsening the parking crunch in the neighborhood immediately around the hospital or in the hospital’s garages. Kilpatrick said the workers will probably ride shuttles to the construction site, or else walk.

Manafort’s site manager, Rick Boundy (pictured), said he’s about to have the area fenced in and expects the lot to be ready within two weeks.

Long-term the city hopes the land will become part of a larger new development of stores, apartments, offices, biotech facilities… and, of course, parking garages. Click here to read a previous story about that. Lower-density housing will be closer to the West River end of the strip, according to mayoral spokesman Derek Slap. The higher-density housing and institutional uses would probably be closer to downtown, he said. Look for that construction to begin in two to three years.