Wingate, center, with Robinson-Thorpe, at right.
A city planner came to Beaver Hills and Edgewood neighbors with a pitch — help us imagine how the whole city should look
Susmitha Attota made that pitch Tuesday night at a meeting of the Whalley-Edgewood-Beaver Hills (WEB) management team at the police substation at Norton and Whalley.
Attota is City Hall’s point person for a required once-a-decade drawing of a comprehensive plan for New Haven. The document helps guide applications for grants and other outside funding for city projects. Thanks to an extension, the due date for the plan has been pushed from this July to October.
Click here for a full story on the plan revision.
Thomas MacMillan File Photo
Attota shared some of her research findings with the WEB neighbors. New Haven’s population has grown 5 percent over the last ten years, with the growth concentrated on the eastern side of town, she said. Some projections show the city growing another 10 percent in coming years. Attota also cited a more than 400 percent increase in Connecticut Transit Shuttle ridership.
“It doesn’t make me feel that there is a proactive plan,” WEB member Bob Caplan told her.
Attota responded that the future of the city rests in the hands of the citizenry. “You tell me what your vision is,” said Attota.
On To Snow
Towards the end of the meeting, Beaver Hills Alderwoman Claudette Robinson-Thorpe continued to voice her frustration about unplowed snow still left on some streets and in mounds at intersections nearly two weeks after blizzard Nemo. “We can’t keep saying what we can do better,” she said. “We need to address it.”
Another Beaver Hills alderman at the meeting, Brian Wingate, echoed Robinson-Thorpe’s concerns. Wingate said that New Haven has the potential to cope and clean up after sizable snowfalls at least ten times better than they have in the days following Nemo. “I went down to City Hall and they told me to pray for rain,” said Wingate. As of Tuesday night, his prayers were answered.
Click here and here for stories detailing the city’s approach to handling the storm.
