BY ANDREAS YILMA

REPUBLICAN-AMERICAN

NAUGATUCK — The vacant lot next to the Naugatuck Eve3t Center is expected to be dug out to establish a clean foundation to set the stage for its eventual transformation into a new transit mixed-use development.

ANDREAS YILMA CITIZEN’S NEWS
Parcel B, the vacant lot at the corner of Maple Street and Old Firehouse Road.

The Board of Mayor and Burgesses unanimously approved at its Nov. 1 meeting a motion to award a bid to Red Technologies of Portland for $213,825 for the excavation and disposal of polychlorinated biphenyls or PCBs contaminated soil in the vacant lot at Parcel B, or the 7.75 acres at the corner of Maple Street and Old Firehouse Road.

“There is approximately 500 tons of soil that’s got to be excavated and trucked off to an approved location which is very far away,” Public Works Director Jim Stewart said.

Workers will have to excavate and square out 10 feet down into the ground, Stewart said.

Mayor N. Warren “Pete” Hess said the borough has previously received a $1 million grant from the Department of Economic and Community Development, which already has mostly been utilized on Parcels C and B.

“This is going to get us pretty close to the end of that grant and of course we’re going to be seeking more grants in the future but for the most part, this will be covered by the grant,” Hess said.

About $194,000 is remaining left in the DECD grant, Stewart said.

Stewart said the initial low bidder was ACV Enviro but the environmental services organization proposed to take the soil to a location that wasn’t permitted to take the concentration of waste the borough has.

“They were going to take it to a land fill that was approved to take a concentration that we are at; but we’re at the very high level of concentration so EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) is apparently making us take it to the more expensive location”

Hess said in the borough’s dealings with Parcel B, remediation falls on the borough and the soil stability and structural geotechnical issues fall on the developer.

“We’ve already removed things from Parcel B. We’ve done a lot of remediation,” Hess said. “

Hess said the removal of material doesn’t mean the borough won’t find something else later; but all the known PCBs will be removed and any possible remaining PCBs will be a low enough level to allow workers to build over or cap it.

Stewart expects the work would start this winter season.

and the work can be done as long as the ground isn’t frozen over.

The borough board on July 21 chose Pennrose, a real estate development company with its headquarters in Philadelphia, and the Cloud Company, a Hartford-based firm, to develop Parcel B.

The project will connect the existing downtown area to the TOD project on Parcel B. Parcel B adjoins the Waterbury Branch Line adjacent to the location of the new train platform to be relocated by the state Department of Transportation. The state DOT has allotted funding for the relocation of the Naugatuck train station from Water Street near The Station Restaurant to Parcel B. This also comes after improvements and expansion of service to the Waterbury branch line of the Metro-North Railroad have taken place.