Governor Dannel Malloy’s transportation plan for Connecticut, announced last month, has two major spending components – over five years and over thirty years. What it doesn’t specify is a clear funding plan to pay for all the projects in either time period, and instead establishes a commission to recommend a method for paying for the Governor’s identified needs.
The Transportation Committee, for example, held a hearing on Chairman Guerrera’s proposed bill to install electronic tolls at major border points and some kind of funding mechanism is critical if all those projects are to be paid for.
The five year plan puts a lot of money into highways and existing services, and in particular Metro North and the under-construction New Haven-Hartford-Springfield service. The 30-year plan includes about $1 billion to extend rail service from Danbury to New Milford (14 miles), as well as improvements in other parts of the state.
NB: The Housatonic corridor project has been and continues to be well received and there is very little else in the proposed plan for NW Connecticut. Continuing efforts to communicate with legislators and Governor Malloy are extremely important.
The Honorable Dannel Malloy
Email: malloy.office@ct.gov
The State Capitol, 210 Capitol Avenue, Hartford, CT 06106
(860) 566-4840
Twitter: @DanMalloyCT
Make a case to the Governor that between the ski areas that could run shuttle bus to and from the new stations created by this expansion in the winter and the expansion of a summer tourism season in the summer Connecticut will only benefit by the creation of new jobs. The jobs will come in real estate, tourism and in foreign investment. The state will then be able to see an increase in tax revenues form all of this.