Fed-Up Senator Murphy Says It’s Time To Wake Up About City Transportation Issues

Murphy, Ganim transportation
U.S. Senator Chris Murphy unveils transportation proposals.

Fed up about the “dire state” of Connecticut’s roads and bridges, U.S. Senator Chris Murphy joined Mayor Joe Ganim on Thursday to issue his report that identifies transportation trouble areas for city commuters and proposes a set of recommendations for improvements along I-95, Metro-North and Port Jefferson ferry.

“I’ve heard the commuter nightmare stories of Bridgeport’s residents,” says Murphy. “Some leave their homes two hours early to avoid delays but still get stuck in bottlenecks in the city or on I-95. Others would like to walk or bike to school or to work, but can’t do so safely. And everyone knows that the next superstorm will be disastrous to Bridgeport’s low-lying roads,” said Murphy. “Commuters don’t need to accept the status quo of gridlock and delays. We need to make Bridgeport’s roads and rails more user-friendly, and the steps outlined in this report will help get us there.”

To download a PDF of Murphy’s report, click here.

Based on feedback received by commuters in Bridgeport, Murphy’s latest “Fed Up” report recommends ten specific action items:

1. Complete Barnum Station
2. Improve Metro-North’s Waterbury Branch Line
3. Relieve highway congestion by widening I-95
4. Prepare Bridgeport’s transportation infrastructure for next superstorm
5. Widen Seaview Avenue
6. Convert certain one-way streets, like State Street, to two-way streets to help local businesses
7. Widen and deepen select railway underpasses
8. Improve Lafayette Boulevard’s connection to Exit 2 off Route 8
9. Add bike lanes to underutilized Railroad Avenue
10. Complete relocation and expansion of the Bridgeport Port Jefferson Ferry Terminal

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24 comments

  1. Lol, not this again. This same “report” comes out every year, just different politicians attach their name to it. Just for once, I’d like them to tell us the truth, “These ideas are a pipedream, we have no way to pay for any of this, and the roads will only get worse.” Now that’s reality.

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  2. This is based on comments by commuters in Bridgeport?
    I don’t think so.
    This sounds pretty much like the list the city and the BRBC has been throwing around for the past 20 years.
    Expansion of the Port Jefferson Ferry Terminal?
    Bike lanes on Railroad Ave?
    Exit 2 off Route 8?
    Widen Seaview Ave?
    Waterbury branch?
    From whom and where was Chris Murphy soliciting these recommendations?

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  3. ONE big thing is missing. The State of Connecticut has been subsidizing corporations/business for DECADES to move and/or stay in Stamford. So we have the huge influx of Labor into Stamford. The traffic nightmare is now about 30 years old. Connecticut needs to stop all subsidies for Stamford corps/businesses and possibly encourage moving into Bridgeport creating a reverse flow of traffic. Of course, that would be a hard sell but some businesses might be enticed. Or even to move to other parts of the state. None of Senator Murphy’s plan will alleviate the Fairfield County parking lot aka I-95, Merritt Parkway. There is even a lot of traffic on local streets in Fairfield County. Also, Norwalk is developing as a destination spot for businesses and a new mall including a high-end Nordstroms is planned for Norwalk.

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  4. The traffic on I-95 around Norwalk is already a disaster every day of the week. The new high-end mall is only going to make it worse. Something has to be done about I-95 ASAP.

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  5. The Governor initiated a LONG RANGE PLAN/DISCUSSION about widening I-95 that would possibly/probably include tolls. The monies raised would be put into some type of “seal-proof untouchable” legal lockbox future governors/legislatures would not be able to raid and the monies would remain strictly for the roadwork. Any discussion of this got swept away by the present $900 million shortfall the State found itself in.

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  6. Senator Murphy, this is your priority to work on for Bridgeport residents? Seriously? Commuting on I-95 is an issue, including for some Bridgeport residents.
    Whatever happened to the conclusion that creating jobs in Bridgeport would help avoid commuting trips on I-95?
    Is Senator Murphy (and Blumenthal) doing anything to address Sikorsky closing their Bridgeport facility? Priorities.

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  7. All BS by another down-county tool. We keep voting for these a-holes because they’re magnanimous enough to visit Bridgeport for photo ops to announce the throwing of another meatless bone to their junkyard dog (e.g., Barnum Station). How stupid are we to keep our tails wagging for this BS?!

    (Frank; I see you’re starting to see the light. Encouraging.)

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    1. Hi Jeff. I am still a very strong supporter of the Barnum Train Station. I take the trains every day. We MUST change our perception of the New Haven Line/Metro North. You MUST perceive this as a Fairfield/New Haven Counties subway line. I see people getting off and on at ALL stops. The trains are a game changer for all communities and access to train stations is a compelling reason for new construction, real estate sales and the rental market.

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  8. I will NOT being voting for Senator Murphy and Senator Blumenthal and I have no problem voting for Republicans to replace these two bums, they can’t get out of office fast enough.

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  9. Frank, re-read your own statement from above.

    “… The State of Connecticut has been subsidizing corporations/business for DECADES to move and/or stay in Stamford. So we have the huge influx of Labor into Stamford. The traffic nightmare is now about 30 years old. Connecticut needs to stop all subsidies for Stamford corps/businesses and possibly encourage moving into Bridgeport creating a reverse flow of traffic. Of course, that would be a hard sell but some businesses might be enticed. Or even to move to other parts of the state. None of Senator Murphy’s plan will alleviate the Fairfield County parking lot aka I-95, Merritt Parkway …”

    Your words, Frank. How do you suppose an East Side, Bridgeport train station is going to help Bridgeport or the rest of the state? Analyze the situation. Why would any commuters want to make Bridgeport, that station, a destination? What Bridgeporters would want to use that station to reach another destination? THE BARNUM STATION IS BEING BUILT TO ALLOW FOR AN INCREASE IN THE NUMBER OF STAMFORD-BOUND COMMUTERS! ANY CAR TRAFFIC THAT IS REMOVED FROM I-95 BY THE TRAIN STATION WILL BE QUICKLY REPLACED BY MORE STAMFORD-BOUND WORKER-COMMUTERS FILLING POSITIONS CREATED BY THE NEW DEVELOPMENT ALLOWED BY THE NEW TRAIN STATION/ACCESS TO LOW-WAGE BRIDGEPORT WORKERS.

    Frank, the train station is just an expansion/continuation of the down-county stranglehold on economic development prerogatives in the state. These policies won’t end until the down-county lock on the Connecticut political machine is brought to an end. As long as Connecticut allows the Gold Coast and affluent suburbs to direct state politics, the part of Connecticut that isn’t the Gold Coast or Hartford suburbs will remain out in the cold. (Electing Hillary or Donald and the Congressional incumbents back to office only guarantees more of the same for the 95% of Connecticut that is not the Gold Coast or Hartford suburbs. Ditto for re-electing Dan Malloy. His transportation initiative is all about Stamford-Greenwich.)

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    1. Jeff, I hear “some” of what you are saying but you really need to widen your scope of perspective and go beyond the one-dimensional Marxian theory of the upper/richer classes taking advantage of the working/lower classes. The one-dimensional socioeconomic analysis provided by Karl Marx in the late 19th century has proved inadequate to give us an effective tool to explain the dynamics of all the different levels of socioeconomic strata.

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  10. *** I have faith in the work Blumenthal has done, is doing and has yet to do. He’s not afraid of going after the big boys in America and his political portfolio work in local, state and federal issues is impressive. However Murphy has a long way to go and seems like at times to mimic the boy who likes to cry wolf, no? *** WHOOP ***

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  11. Well, we are fed up with Congress.

    How about doing something like creating jobs? Keeping companies in the USA instead of offshoring. Equalizing the tax rate so folks pay what their pay scale allows and we save our doomed middle class? How about championing for your state so businesses stay here instead of moving to Massachusetts? You will make $175K for life so now you get to pick pet projects? We are failing in this country. Grrr.

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  12. *** Blumenthal can be on TV all he wants, as long as he continues to deliver and look out for the CT taxpayers! Before throwing more meaningless shade about Richie B; Google his political workbook since day one in CT many moons ago until now and then throw your shade, no? ***

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  13. The proposed Barnum station is unnecessary, unaffordable and unwise. There is simply no transportation need for it. As for the claimed economic development benefit, the record is clear. Despite promises to the contrary, NONE of the new New Haven line stations have generated significant economic development activity.

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    1. Phil Smith, this is one of the few times I have to disagree with you. First of all, which of the “new” New Haven Lines are you using to compile any economic results? I have looked at every stop. In the LAST CENTURY, there have been ONLY TWO NEW STATIONS. West Haven and Fairfield Metro. I have no particular information about the West Haven Station. My sense is West Haven has its own economic issues, almost similar to Bridgeport but on a much smaller scale. In terms of Fairfield Metro, the train station itself was part of a huge development plan by The Black Group Group (the name may not be perfectly right, using my memory). The plans included large additions of commercial and residential building. The 2008 Great Recession happened and there was absolutely no use for the huge commercial and residential plans. The train station part was kept alive and opened in December 2011. I live in Black Rock. I take the train from Fairfield metro every day. I see the amount of people driving and walking from Black Rock (BPT). If you look at ALL real estate ads (purchase and rental), proximity to the rail station is listed as a positive element. I don’t know if you are familiar with the area but we are seeing new construction (multi-retail-residential) just across the town line on the old Fairfield Edge site. There had been some discussion of closing and tearing down the Bridgeport Showcase Cinemas and building townhouses. Last year, prior to the re-evaluation debacle and now with the uncertainty of mil rate/property taxes, that project has been put on ice. If you look at the ENTIRE history of the New Haven/Metro North Line, you can see EVERY community benefited with the presence of a train station. Multiple means of transportation available to a community have been historically proven to be economically beneficial. I Like History. I can go on and on about the economic benefits of an ability for a population to have multiple means of transportation at their disposal.

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    1. Jeff, if you took a look at the map you would see why Stamford has only one train station. Actually, there had been some discussion of a new Stamford train station on the west side of Stamford, but apparently there is discussion of completely remodeling and enlarging the present station. We should also remember Stamford has the New Canaan line, which actually makes stops in Stamford. Bridgeport does have the Waterbury connection but makes no stops in Bridgeport. Other towns along the coast have multiple stations; Norwalk 2, Westport 2, Fairfield 3.

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  14. We do not need a train station on the East Side and we do not need to widen Seaview Ave to be four lanes.

    I do agree Metro North should be used as a subway line for Fairfield and New Haven County, and all train stations should be surrounded by office complexes that maximize commuter potential.

    Examples: there is a vacant lot on the corner of Ffld Ave and Water St, if added to the underutilized Post Office property you could have a 12-story office building right next to the station.

    Second, a lot of traffic is coming from Trumbull and Monroe, for which there is no rail service or like NY high-volume buses to transport commuters. The Waterbury line alleviates some traffic from the Valley but nothing along Rte 25. And access to the Remington property could come from Stratford where Rt 8 and Rt 25 are already close, instead of a new Road parallel to RT 25/8.

    The northbound exit ramp to RT 25 is an engineering mistake, it’s a poorly designed hairpin turn the average driver cannot navigate, so they build a 3/4 mile long staging exit ramp, and when you’re through it they merge three lanes of heavy traffic into two lanes and a merging exit ramp. Duh.

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