Hartford debates fate of I-84

Officials and citizens in Hartford are considering what to do about the Interstate 84 Viaduct, an elevated stretch of highway that carves through the northern part of the city’s center and separates the North End and Asylum Hill neighborhoods from the capitol area and the downtown. “It’s a structure that’s really outlived its life span,” David Spillane, an urban planner at Goody Clancy in Boston, told the Hartford Courant in March.

The viaduct, essentially a continuous series of more than 40 short bridges in each direction, is more than 40 years old, and most recently has been kept intact by $22 million for repairs that will provide “about a 10-year fix,” according to state Department of Transportation consultants. The main choices are to rebuild the viaduct with a few improvements (a prospect that urbanists oppose), convert it into a surface-level boulevard, put it in a tunnel, or use some combination of those strategies. Once the current study is completed, DOT promises to use the conclusions to guide its thinking.