Deadlock Q: Save Park? Or Build Housing?

I think it sets a dangerous precedent to lose green spaces for housing, even affordable housing. Trees and other foliage in parks help reduce asthma rates, clean the air and provide oxygen, and reduce stress. If the park is underutilized, then maybe it needs benches and tables and a water fountain with splash pad for the neighborhood to enjoy. If the hospital workers nearby enjoy it, maybe the hospital could help financially to improve the park for everyone. The city should look to acquire abandoned and neglected buildings, sliver lots, empty or old commercial buildings to rehab as public and affordable housing. The city should also pass regulations that require developers to set aside a percentage of units for low income and affordable housing and handicap accessible at median income affordable rents. Scattered site apartment units mixed in with market rate apartments reduces the stigma of living in public housing, and insures that the building and its units will be kept up. NO more ghettoization of public/affordable housing in mega complexes like Church St South!

I doubt those trees are 100 years old. Most likely, they were planted circa 1965 as part of an urban renewal project. Moreover, this would hardly be the first time a park was sacrificed for a different social good. Hillhouse and Cross high school both sit on former parkland, and Bayview Park was largely lost when the Connecticut Turnpike bifurcated it. Urban planners often saw parkland as easier to take than privately owned land, as is the case here. Ultimately, the tide turned, and park preservationists kept a a stopped a highway going behind Cross, and kept route 34 from crossing West River Park, leading to the abandonment of the Route 34 plan.

Half the site plan looks like it'd be made a parking lot. Why not ditch the on-site parking to save half the greenspace and trees?

How often were there proposals to take land out of Central Park in NYC for a variety of purposes. Fortunately NY understood the value of its green spaces and it remains a green sanctuary for city dwellers. The addition of the High Line Park even expanded the vision.
This is a terrible precedent. Once the park and trees are gone, they are NEVER coming back.
There are studies showing the health benefits, mental and physical, on city dwellers who desperately need relief from asphalt and pollution.

I think the design is not in keeping with the Dwight Historic District. The park does help with the health and safety of neighborhood.

Could we consider alternative site for the building. The design is not compatible with the historic housing stock nearby.

I would promote residential parking for street and add more green space and work the design with existing park elements.

Let's look a some other vacant lols in the area

Design is really very ordinary and incongruent the character of the neighborhood. The architect did not consider any of the architectural elements of the existing streetscape.

Do not sell park land. If the park is underutilized, make some changes so that it is used. Get creative.

This is a tough one - there are real shortages in New Haven of both open space and affordable housing.

Patricia, there actually is precedent in New Haven for doing exactly what is proposed here. The recent redevelopment of the Farnham Court (now Mill River Crossing) public housing project involved the acquisition of a small park on Grand Avenue, which had mature trees. There was an earlier precedent on Goffe Street.

A couple of ideas - no silver bullets.Going to Cove'ds comment, the Board of Zoning Appeals has regularly reduced parking requirements, particularly for developments serving lower-income residents. It may be worthwhile to seek a new or expanded variance. Secondly, the developer may be willing to make a one-time contribution to offset the loss of the park. This could take the form of land for a new or expanded park or cash for the Park Department's budget. CT land use law generally does not permit impact fees, but in this case this may be an option. Finally, it may be possible to redesign the project to minimize the loss of trees, which perform all sorts of environmental services.

@Cove'd,

Yeah, that's what I'm thinking too. I don't think there's no need for any extra parking, but what is needed in that neighborhood would be a beautiful park that's nicely done over to better complement the site itself.

Having a parking lot included will do very little of making the proposed park feel like an actual city park in my opinion.

Hi All - Kristin Anderson here - Hamden resident (former New Haven resident) and project manager referenced in this article. I want to clarify a few points that were missed in this article about the land swap that the City is proposing with the Parks Department.
1) The article doesn't mention that the swap that LCI is proposing would result in a net gain of 4,000 square feet of Parks owned land for New Haven and provide park land in another neighborhood of the city that currently does not have as much green space.
2) There is a tree planting plan that was approved by the tree warden for full replacement of the trees that would have to be cut down, as measured by tree coverage.
3) In addition to gaining new park land, the project also funds a number of improvements to existing parks and green space in the neighborhood, funded by the development project and not having to come out of the Parks Commission budget.
4) The concept for the swap came out of a year long planning process with community members, local nonprofits, the City of New Haven, parks department, and the community liaison officer for the neighborhood and is part of larger redevelopment plan that improves the condition of 88 affordable housing units through historic preservation, builds a new pocket park (in addition to funding park upgrades to City a owned park), donates housing to a local nonprofit, and adds new affordable housing in a Passive-House (energy efficient) building.
These points were all discussed at the parks meeting but didn't necessarily make the article, so just wanted to highlight them here. Thanks!

@KristinA

Thank you for your insightful comment. All of what you shared seems to me to be VITAL INFO that the NHI journalist failed to convey to readers (the community). Were this a print publication, one could argue that space restrictions limited the reporting. However, that is not the case here. How in the world was this info absent from this piece of community journalism?

Who needs trees? What NH needs is more buildings; so construction workers can have temporary jobs knocking things down and building things that will be knocked down in a few years again.

With imagination a green building with a green roof could replace the park. If the developer has the means to build affordable housing, it should have no trouble finding a place to build in New Haven. How about using part of the Stop and Shop parking lot? I have never seen it anywhere near full and there can be parking under the housing units to preserve parking spaces. The Stop & Shop location is a walk to the Green and access to the City's bus system, including a free bus to Union Station.

Although it is very unlikely the trees are 100 years old, giving park land away is a very bad precedent and should not be done.

What does the Kensington community want? What other parcels have been considered? Green, out door space is already developed and should not be a place to build. Others have mentioned the essential services offered by trees and parks, especially important in a city. Find a better spot for the housing and make including affordable units a requirement in all new developments. Build them in Woodbridge? Orange?

CityYankee, just because this and other developments are using contemporary designs and building technologies does not mean they are likely.to torn down in a few decades, much less a few years. The design is bland and inconsistent with nearby buildings, as Patricia and Olivia note. But those are separate issues from the building's durability.

Dear Kevin--- stone buildings--- Farnham Courts, Quinnipiac Terrace, The Jungle, The ones on Orchard St..... shall I go on? STONE buildings did not last 75 years. This is more mmake work and make jobs for one group of workers and the developers feed at the public trough for these contracts.

I know most don't remember and/or care that these projects keep a few busy for years and years.
They are allowed to fall into disrepair so they be torn down and rebuilt for more money.

Roman aqueducts and viaducts have been around for 2000 years and are often still used. HOW COME?

Dear Cordalie,

I am commenting as a 41 year home owner in Dwight who as lived here before the COMMUNITY BUILDERS INC. aka Kensington Sq. etc. came into the city after making its name as the non profit developers of Faneuil Hall in Boston starting about 40 years ago. They are now a 15 billion dollar behemoth operating in over 15 states in the U.S. (check out their 990s). When they first came in about 30 years ago, they prided themselves on doing quality work providing low income housing and facilitating and supporting positive relationships in the Dwight Community. Within ten years the management tanked. They allowed their facilities to deteriorate, failed to adhere to their own tenant screening policies, failed to repair their buildings - they now own two large complexes and 41 buildings total just in the historic Dwight district. The Dwight Central Management Team began calling them out in earnest starting about 20 years ago when their failure to replace burnt out lighting around their properties, terrible trash build up on their sidewalks and curbs and back yards, dangerous behavior happening in around their facilities and failure to operate the after school and other enrichment programming they had promised to the neighborhood repeatedly. Every so many years when their buildings go completely to hell, like a farmer freshening the milk supply they bare a calf which results in more millions of dollars going into their coffers. Then they disappear again. Their local staff ranges from fast talking, fake caring, very professional sounding, fake concerned corporate staff in New Haven when they are attempting to milk more federal/state money, along with a hardcore bully resident manager here the rest of the time who plays favorites, intimidates and neglects her residents and fails to attend neighborhood meetings. NO to CBI new ugly cheap building in the green space. Accountability, performance, and benefit to the community first with existing 41 locations. We cant breathe.

I vote NO to this development at this time.

You can question the specifics of this all you want, but nothing is going to make the decision to eliminate a public green space in favor of a building for maybe 20-30 people a right one at the very outset of the challenge COVID has laid down as to 'what does livable mean for a community?'

Although at one time I may have cast a 'yes vote' on the housing authority commission to something relating to this development, at this time, I simply do not support this. Since COVID, I believe it is important to protect what amenities this neighborhood has, so that we can be provided time to evaluate, for example, what green space will be needed for a hospital campus and fellowship place who disallow smoking, sending people out into the neighborhood to smoke. Increasing the sizes of their institutions, and likely encouraging wellness at the same time, which might mean a need for green space on a lunch break. What about the SHARP rise in dog ownership. Its great. BUT...you need greenspace for dogs!

It's just not right to move forward on doing some park swap that might accomplish the same thing swapping Delauro Park across from Ferraro's did when they swapped that to Ramsdell drive. That make sense to you? Me neither. But it's what was needed to get a development done.

TCB I think owns a building that was torn down over 10 years on dense chapel street one or two buildings up from the corner of day and chapel on the right. Put something there. Fill in a gapped tooth. Or do something else that looks less like 'we want to build something on some free land so we can hit some numbers' and more like...community building.

CityYankee, a building's longevity is primarily a function of economics, rather than construction technology or design. Over a span of decades, the federal government substantially cut operating support for public housing, causing projects such as the ones you mention to deteriorate. Developments using the same building design, built by for-profit and non-profit developers, have done much better.

How do you explain the Roman acqueducts and viaducts and roads, then, Kevin?

CityYankee, you didn't see the word "primarily" in my comment, eh? Construction materials are relevant, but rarely decisive, in determining building lifespan. My wood frame house was built in 1844. It has survived because it made economic sense for its previous owners to maintain it. In contrast, most of the pre Civil War buildings in New Haven, whether built of wood, brick, or stone, were replaced with newer buildings. In most cases, this was an economic decision. Stone is a lovely building material - I once lived in an 18th century stone building. But unless it is maintained, it falls apart, like vast majority of the Roman road and aqueduct networks.

With all the unsightly vacant lots and decrepit abandoned houses (most with fire damage), why take away a city park green space to build affordable housing? The city probably controls acres of these vacant properties, which could accommodate new affordable housing, while improving many neighborhoods. Leave Kensington Park alone!