Connecticut Legislative Policy Framework

Choose Competitiveness!
PRIORITIES 2008

Introduction

Our Recommendations:
Spending and Performance
Transportation
Health Care
Education
Energy
Housing
Quality of Life

Transportation

The mobility and connectivity of residents and workers is a key to the success of any region. Our proximity to the global financial markets capital is an asset only if people and businesses in New York and Connecticut can access each other in a consistent and efficient manner. Similarly, the office complexes in Greenwich, Stamford and Norwalk only benefit the rest of the region if workers from Bethel, Trumbull, Fairfield and scores of other communities can reach them every day in a reasonable amount of time. Record ridership growth on the Metro North railroad – both out of state and within the state – is testimony to the regional economy’s need for connections to the west and mobility within the state overall. In fact, Stamford has the busiest station on the New Haven Line outside of Grand Central; and for the first time, more riders get off trains at Stamford during the morning peak than board to commute to New York City.

• Provide more frequent service between Manhattan and Greenwich, Stamford, Norwalk and Bridgeport, as well as more service between Stamford and other Connecticut communities.
  

• Support the inauguration of direct service between New Haven/Stamford and Penn Station, leading to direct rail access into Long Island and New Jersey.  
  

• Increase bus service to complement rail service and reduce congestion. Connecticut should fund the Transit for Connecticut plan: $12.7 million per year for operating expenses and $43.1 million per year for related capital costs for the next five years, totaling $63.6 million and $215.4 million respectively. The plan improves connectivity in all of the state’s economic corridors, stimulating growth in a responsible way.

• Establish a joint services and capital project planning team between Connecticut, Westchester County and the Bronx.
  

• Transportation improvements, including operating expenses, will require the
  use of “EZ pass” tolling on major state roadways and, possibly, participation in a tri-state metropolitan regional tolling system.