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Selling Out Connecticut: East Hartford Set to Destroy Another 47.3 Wooded Acres

The subject property includes about 28.5 acres in East Hartford at 90 Long Hill Road and 1152 Tolland St. The rest is in Manchester, at 1769 Tolland Turnpike, 104 Glode Lane and 104-A Glode Lane.

By all appearances, neither Connecticut nor its towns are serious about climate action.

It's been a while since we added to our Selling Out Connecticut posts.  Not that there's been a shortage of material to write about.  It's as if there was no climate crisis and preserving woodlands and green space weren't essential parts of climate action solutions. Connecticut's inaction and blithe obliviousness is lunacy. 

East Hartford Planner Eager to Develop Last "Vacant" Parcels

So now there's another large woodland tract that East Hartford is eager to bulldoze.  You can read about it here:  Husband-and-wife team buy 47.3 acres in East Hartford/Manchester, plan ‘hundreds’ of housing.  As quoted in the Hartford Business Journal, East Hartford Town Planner Carlene Shaw said:

“We are really excited to see what they come up with. This is one of the only vacant parcels we have left that is developable.” 

Sheesh. That's pretty tone-deaf considering the extent and pace of the climate crisis.  Need we repeat:  for starters, trees absorb carbon pollution that's contributing to global warming.  Trees provide shade and cool the land.  Green space aids in rain management and runoff.  Forests and fields provide habitat for wildlife and pollinators that are essential to our ecosystems.  We need more trees, not fewer. 

[Hint:  when reading coverage of new development, "vacant" usually means forests or fields or otherwise green space.]

There's a climate crisis and it's getting worse.

We need more nature-based solutions to the climate crisis, not less. But East Hartford and Manchester, along with the developers and broker Amodio and Co. Real Estate, haven't read the memo. Or don't care. As HBJ reports, husband and wife team Viswanatha Nayunipati and Radhika Nagineni plan to build a large-scale multifamily residential development on the wooded property. The satellite view above shows the extent of the woodlands the parties want to destroy.

Connecticut is failing to even get close to its statutory goal of conserving 21% of our land base. Once again, all we have is lip service. Lotta talk, little to no action. It's been three years since DEEP's Comprehensive Open Space Acquisition Plan (the 2016-2020 Green Plan) needed to be renewed. As  they say, failing to plan is planning to fail. And we are.

What about local environmental champions? Does East Hartford and Manchester have any? Do the towns have Green Teams to inform, organize and galvanize citizens who care about the environment?

Do state and local conservation plans have any weight whatsoever? Have they even been updated to reflect the severity and acceleration of the climate crisis? Are local conservation commissioners really environmental champions, or are they serving to make sure development goes forward?

Perhaps our environmental advocacy organizations, such as the CT Coalition for Climate Action and its members, could put preserving and conserving open space is high on their 2024 agenda.

Hold This Thought

Hold this thought:  as CT opens the floodgates to build new housing, guess what's going to happen to our open space?  It's going to be bulldozed so developers and brokers can line their pockets.  Agreed, more housing is needed but how about adaptive re-use?  We need to wake up and get organized to insist that our state and towns preserve open space, as if our lives depend on it.  Because they do. The storms, floods, droughts, and disease caused by climate change destroy homes and take lives. It could be us next. 

You Can Do Something

Send this post to any environmental champions you know from East Hartford or Manchester.  And talk to your friends and neighbors about preserving open space and building more nature-based climate solutions in your own town.  Thank you. 

Update! Contact Town Planning Staff

Be a polite engaged citizen and email East Hartford planning staff.  Tell them that any plan to destroy 47 acres of woodlands is not preserving natural resources in keeping with the Plan of Conservation and Development, is not what the environment needs in an era of accelerating climate change, and that adaptive re-use for building is the only climate-friendly way to go.

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