Cassetti: Wakelee Avenue Rebuild Will Be Done This Year

The long-awaited reconstruction of Ansonia’s Wakelee Avenue will be done this year, Mayor David Cassetti said Tuesday after signing a $4.4 million contract for the project.

Brookfield-based J. Iapaluccio Inc. was the lowest of nine bidders for the work. 

The Board of Aldermen voted unanimously to award the contract to the company Dec. 12. 

On Tuesday Cassetti and Kris Nigro, Iapaluccio’s vice president of construction, signed the construction contract during a meeting in City Hall.

The mayor said he hopes for construction to begin within a month. The contract calls for the work to be completed by Nov. 30.

Work will be done weekdays between 7 a.m. and 4 p.m.

Officials said the city has received state grants totaling $5.2 million to pay for the project, which will include new street lights, sidewalks, granite curbing, underground drainage, signs, and benches.

The mayor first announced a state grant to pay for the work in April 2015.

At the time, officials said the construction could begin within three months.

That didn’t happen because the scope of the project — along with an initial budget of $3.5 million — was expanded, according to Sheila O’Malley, the city’s economic development director.

Originally, the new curbing and street lights weren’t included.

So the city had to have its initial designs redone, O’Malley said, in addition to asking for the state to increase the amount of its initial grant.

“Our engineers had to go back and redo the design and go right back through the process, which caused delay, and we also had to secure additional funding,” O’Malley said.

In addition, Eversource decided to install a gas main under the street, which added another year to the timeline, according to project manager Bill Anderson, of VHB, the engineering firm working for the city. 

As time dragged on, residents who live near the pock-marked, uneven road grew more and more frustrated with the lack of progress — especially after Eversource installed the gas main and left the road in what the city deemed unacceptable condition.

The company eventually agreed to pay for a stopgap ​“temporary resurfacing.” 

Now, the mayor said he hopes the work will be done before the end of the year, with construction to begin ​“within a month’s time, weather permitting, of course.”

“The last week has shown some mild temperatures are coming out, so we can start getting the drainage going,” Cassetti said.

Anderson said the work will be planned to allow at least one lane of traffic on the road. 

Some detours will be necessary, he said, but officials will reach out to residents or business owners affected to notify them in advance.

The city’s corporation counsel, John Marini, said the city would work to ​“minimize disruptions” by communicating with those in the area.

He said anyone with concerns while the construction is going on should contact him.

The mayor said some disruption is inevitable given the scope of the work and the age of the road, under which trolley tracks from the early 20th century are still buried.

A 1901 monument commemorating a Revolutionary War British raid will also be preserved, officials said.

“This project is much much larger than the Eversource job. You’re talking a mile of road from one end to the other,” Cassetti said. ​“It’s going to be time-consuming. There is going to be some inconveniences, I’m not saying there isn’t.”

Wakelee Avenue is a busy road that stretches from Derby to Seymour near Tri-Town Plaza. It runs next to Route 8.

Despite the delays, the mayor said the project is moving quickly compared to others in the past, like work done on Prindle Avenue and Hill Street, which he said was first approved in 1994 but did not begin until 2007.

“This was granted in 2015 and we already have a contractor on tap to start the project,” Casssetti said.